AN:

I remember the first time I took the Ativan.

I described it as a calmness. I had no emotion, after those sweet little pills dissolved in my mouth. I wasn't scared. I wasn't worried. I wasn't sad. I wasn't happy.

I was just... calm.

I felt the same now, though I was as sober as I've ever been.

I was calm. I knew the hurricane was blowing all around me, tearing down houses and throwing branches around the air. But here, tucked right in the centre, it was calm.

It was because I could see the end now. I knew what was going to happen. There were no more surprises waiting for me. There were no final plays, no Hail Mary's. This was written in the sand, and I could read the writing clearer than I've ever been able to read anything else before.

There would be no tearful goodbyes. There would be no letters. There would be no final musings about the tragic mess of my mind that had led me to this.

It was only me. Only me and these pills.

I turned the bottle around in my hands, reading the label. I couldn't have asked for anything better to deliver me to the end. Austin had come through, even if he didn't know it.

The house was quiet. It was still, like my mind. My dad had come home, briefly. He had only asked if I had been to school today, which was easily answered with a thoughtless lie. He waltzed through the door only an hour later, telling me he had a date.

He had a date. Isn't that nice?

He would be better off, just like Zane. I was like dead weight, dragging them down.

Well... I guess I wasn't really dead weight. I was alive, but I wouldn't be. Soon enough.

I finished placing the last of my dirty clothes in the hamper inside my closet. I had spent the last hour or so cleaning my room. I wanted it to be tidy for the people that would no doubt be rushing into my room. When the time came.

Who knew when that would be. It could take them days to realize.

I glanced around my room. My eyes skimmed over the cheerleading trophies that I had gotten in middle school. The Polaroids that were taped on my wall, Olivia and Trinity's faces pressed against my own, our mouths smiling to the camera. Those two will be happy, at least. The pink of my walls, the posters taped to them.

It wasn't me. If my room had truly represented me, as of late, the walls would be black. And that's all there would be.

Maybe, a splatter of yellow on one of them. Messy, unplanned.

That was Zane, right? He was yellow. My yellow.

But, mostly black.

I sighed as I listened to the tick tock of the analog clock on my nightstand. I guess now was as good of a time as any. I walked over to my bed, which was perfectly made, and lowered my body onto it. I unscrewed the lid of the pill bottle, lifting open the lid. I held it in the air, tipping it over and watching as the dozens of pills fell onto my duvet.

Like snow, the way the white pills fell.

I had never seen snow. I guess I never would.

I played with them, my fingers pushing them around the soft fabric. There was enough that it would be peaceful. I made sure of that. I was owed a little peace, after all. Wasn't I?

I took out my final cigarette, the lone one dancing around the foil confinements of the package. I had saved it, just for now. I had never smoked in my room before. I closed my eyes as I lit it, pulling the nicotine and rat poison into my lungs. It turns out, I could have smoked all I wanted to. I should have. I would have. If I'd known.

The silence was nice. My phone had died hours ago. I wondered if anyone had called me. I guess if they had, they've got a head start on realizing I wouldn't be answering, ever again.

I opened my eyes again, just to watch the smoke as I exhaled. It was fitting, wasn't it? The last thing I would pay attention to. The smoke that filtered into the light, the way it was there, you could see it. You could see the way it moved, the way it danced, the way it lived. And then it was gone.

I smoked the cigarette until it was close enough to my mouth that it burned my lips. Like I knew that this cigarette was my final timer. Once it had finally changed its form completely, from solid to smoke, well... then I would too.

With no emotions running through me, I tossed the burnt out filter onto the floor beside me. I gathered the pills in to my hands. This was it.

"You would do this? You would do this to me?"

I looked up, my head swivelling to the direction of the voice. A breath left my lungs as I saw him. He couldn't let me have this, could he? I saw the pain. I saw the hurt in his eyes as they darted between my face and the pills. I had no idea how long he had stood there. I had no idea how much he's seen. It was a moment frozen in time again, him standing there in a painful disbelief, and me staring back, the pills cupped in my hands, almost to my mouth.

We were both frozen. Ten, twenty, maybe even thirty seconds. We were both waiting to see who moved first. Eventually, I realized it was going to be me. It was always going to be me. I titled my hands upwards, opening my mouth as though I was holding my tongue out to catch a snowflake.

He moved only a millisecond later, running across my room. He leapt across the bed, crashing his body into mine. He grabbed my hands, which had clutched in fists to protect the pills. Our hands began a desperate game of keep away, and I had the ball. I couldn't let him get it. But finally, he pulled my hands open, pulling the fingers backwards like you would peel a banana. I could try and keep them in my hands as hard as I could, but it was useless compared to the strength he had. He easily ripped them open, grabbing the pills in his own hands.

He moved off of the bed, running towards my bathroom. I knew what he was doing, and I couldn't let him do it. I jumped to my feet, running after him. He pushed open the door at the same time I threw myself on his back. I looped my arm around his neck, pulling backwards with all my might. It didn't make a difference. He grunted as he pulled his momentum forward, towards the toilet.

"No. NO!" I cried as he dropped the pills into the toilet. "No. Please. Please. Don't." I was pleading with him and he didn't care. I reached for his hands, pulling them away from the lever that would send my pills somewhere I could never retrieve them.

I fell to the floor as I heard the toilet flush. I pulled on the roots of my hair in frustration, feeling the tug of my the skin on my scalp in protest. The tears that I prayed would never surface on my eyes again, fell from my eyes, sprinkling my cheeks as if they were a lawn that needed watering.

My calm was gone. My peace was gone. It was all replaced by something else.

White hot fear, because as I tore my eyes away from the floor, I could see the look in Jax's eyes. He had me all alone, at long last. He was angry. And there was nothing that could take my pain away now.