It is thirteen minutes past three. I am six years old. My name is Jocelyn Beauheart. I refuse to believe that you exist. I don’t understand why you are talking to me. You’re dead. I know you are.
Why did you follow me from Mummy’s hospital? I can’t make you better. I’m still young. You’re not real. You’re not my friend. Leave me alone. I close my eyes really tightly and count to six over and over. When I open my eyes I am alone and sweaty. I pick up Flip and cuddle her to my chest.
He’s not real.
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
It is eight thirty-two. I am ten years old. Sam is still at my house. He’s sleeping over, seeing as it is a Friday. Dad put two mattresses in our living room, one has been in our loft for as long as I can remember and the other one is mine. We pushed the mattresses together and draped blankets over us. We are, well you are, watching a film Mum picked up for us, and I’m a little busy thinking. Your hand is on my hand. Your thumb is making circles on mine. I don’t understand why it doesn’t feel normal. You feel softer today. Sam. Why am do I want to keep holding your hand forever?
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
I am fourteen years old. I don’t know what time it is. My watch is on my side table, at my house. I’m here. In your basement. Ed. Are you about to **** me? You and I are both underage. I don’t want to be a mother either. I don’t say these things.
You take off my shirt, clumsily, with unpractised hands. I watch you unbuckle your belt. A spark inside of me flares. You have no manners, you don’t deserve my virginity. I keep telling myself this as I watch you get out your video camera, the one you so proudly showed me earlier. The one your mother bought you to film Costa Rico. I nod as you ask me if this is okay.
Relief floods through me as you push my head downwards. My mouth is filled with the taste of warm skin and a faint hint of urine. I don’t think as I give you what you want. I don’t even count. I see Sam. I remember him as he used to be. When we were such great friends. I’m not crying. I promise. I just wish that my first kiss belonged to his lips, not this boy I am now bent over.
I keep my virginity, for now, but I’m pretty much done where self respect is concerned.
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
It is eleven twenty-two. I am sixteen years old. My hand isn’t broken. Dr Garcia leans over me, his thick heavy hands struggling to stitch me back together. I wince slightly at the slight tug of the needle as it pierces my skin.
“So.” He begins, the Spanish name fits wonderfully with his barely comprehensible accent. “How long have you been self mutilating?”
I stay silent. I figure if I say nothing I can’t give anything away. Instead I consider the word he used- mutilating? To me that means cutting of an arm of leg, I’m nowhere near that.
“Stacy?”
I stay silent, I bite my bottom lip, it uncurls, wet, back into place. I glance at my hand. He’s finished stitching and has splinted my hand flat. For the next two week I am to have my hand constantly flat. Great.
“Stacy, you need to get some help, when people self mutilate to this level then medication can help. They say there is no greater pleasure in life than the conquest of a viscous habit.”
I hold myself still. I am not like my mother. I do not need medication to make me a normal human being. I feel myself beginning to lose control. I tighten all of my leg muscles, poised for the run I am about to out myself though. He ties of the bandaging and places one oversize hand on the table. “I want to refer you to the mental health team here Stacy, I think they could do some real good.”
I bolt. My good hand finds purchase on the cool table and I push hard, my feet find the floor and I almost fall as I sprint off as fast as I can. I turn the corner, the white linoleum squeaks under my feet and I go over on my ankle slightly. I feel the warm pulling pain up my ankle through into my lower calf. I ignore it and run out through the waiting room. I can hear Dr Garcia asking one of the nurses to follow me. I’m barefoot, running in a hospital gown down the main street. My ankle is burning; my feet are being slowly ripped to pieces by the rough surface of the pavement. I pray I don’t manage to stand on a piece of glass.
I am not safe until I am in the park, crouching behind a bush, vomiting. I have never felt so scared in the whole of my life. I am safe now. I don’t have a watch, I don’t have numbers. But I am safe. I am alone. I am 1. I am perfect. I smile, my lips slide back over my teeth, the remains of vomit on my lips, my chin and on my breath, I breathe in deeply. I feel the pain of my feet and my ankle. I look up, wiping my mouth on the hospital gowns sleeve. I look up and freeze. Sam.
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
It is one forty four am. I am six years old. I saw monsters in my head. I saw things in my dream. I saw people dying. I saw horrible sick things. I saw Mummy, I saw her all covered in little black bugs, in her eyes, her throat, her hair. She had them crawling all over her. She was really ill but I was too scared to touch her. I don’t want to sleep again. But I’m scared of real life too. I’m scared of the man who keeps talking to me, I’m scared that Daddy and Mummy don’t love each other now. I’m scared that my real Mummy will never come back, that she’ll be a ghost I can touch for the whole of my life. I choke back tears, I don’t want to cry anymore. I turn away from my door and I count the books on my shelf, I count how many dolls I have, I even count the squares on my carpet. I fetch a colouring book and write down, as neatly as I can, as many of the numbers as I can think of. It’s not until Mummy comes in to wake me up that I realise I didn’t go back to sleep at all.
Last edited by Olive branch : 12-09-2009 at 12:41 PM.
Reason: Put chapter fourteen. Whoops...
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
It’s late. I am ten years old. I don’t dare see how late it is. My light up clock is across the room and I would have to wake Sam to get to it. I close my eyes tightly. I can hear him breathing heavily. I imagine his thick brown hair, a little too long for his father’s liking, creeping over his forehead. I think about his blue eyes. And I open my eyes. I glance across at him and something in my chest jumps slightly. I’ve never felt that before. It’s really dark. I wish I could see him, I want to feel my heart jump for him again.
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
It is four-nineteen. I am fourteen years old. Ed and I are the most talked about thing in school at the minute. I hear snippets of discussions about how many times I’ve had sex with him, rumours that spread so fast. People always stop talking about me as soon as they recognise my existence; I can’t tell them to please continue. I can’t let them know that I’m with him because I like to hear about the rumours. I’ve been called a slag by a girl in the year above, she had some sort of a crush on Ed (God knows why) and she tells me that I have stolen him from her. I mean I’m sorry but clearly he wanted to be stolen.
I hope that Sam knows about all of this. I hope he hears the rumours of all the things I’ve done. I don’t want him to think less of me, but I don’t want him to not think of me at all, so I suppose if he thinks I am an awful person at least he is thinking of me. I imagine him half listening to conversations about me, I imagine him hearing my name, remembering. I imagine him being ever so slightly jealous.
I decide to indulge myself for a moment. I let myself think of him. I can see his smile, his clear beautiful eyes and I can sense his confidence. I remember holding his hand, though his hands are hardly the same now. They are darker, larger and they look rough now. He’s not a little kid anymore. I remember his smell, the tangy sweetness, the apple shampoo he washes his hair with, I realise these smells, the ones that made Sam smell like Sam, are probably covered by some generic boy’s aftershave. I don’t really care, in fact I feel I know him better, I know his real smell. I know how he looks when he is scared, when he doesn’t understand something and I know what his real smiles look like.
I know he doesn’t think of me like this, I know every time he kisses a girl he doesn’t pretend her lips are mine. He doesn’t dream of holding me.
I feel obsessed and I push these thoughts to the back of my mind, it’s bad for me to remember him. He’s not that person anymore.
System A
Sophie Mandi Max Gwen Mercy Erin AVA Tracey Bridget My Isaac
