~ ℒℴ𝓋ℯ 𝒾𝓈 ℬ𝓁𝒾𝓃𝒹 | ℂ𝕠𝕣𝕕𝕖𝕝𝕚𝕒 𝔾𝕠𝕠𝕕𝕖 ~

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ᴛʜʀᴇᴇ | ᴄᴏɴꜰʀᴏɴᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ

Though I typically don't do these, I'm going to give you a huge trigger warning for this chapter, I discuss past self harm, as well as the implications of attempted suicide. Not in too much detail, of course. With my history, I don't feel comfortable speaking of it too freely, but if that upsets or triggers you, I'll put a -- before and after the parts where it comes up.

If you are self harming, I'm not going to tell you it'll all be alright, because I'm not in your situation and I don't know what you're going through. But I can promise you that this will pass. Eventually. If you need someone to talk to, vent, anything, I am always always always here. I know how hard it is to go through this alone, but I know it's also just as hard to talk to someone you know about stopping. I'm basically a stranger, I have nothing better to do, and if you need someone who can keep your secrets and won't judge you for them, I'm right here.

Keep fighting. I promise you'll make it through this. It's going to be hard, I know. But I also know that this will get better. I love you, and so do a lot of other people, even if you don't think so. Never forget that, my loves.

--

Confusion was the first thing you felt when you sat up. You had made it back to your bed at some point, apparently. You only remembered bits and pieces from the night before. Dinner, that girl, running back to your room in a panic, and then....black. It was like someone had gone into your brain and scrubbed your memories clean, erasing all evidence that the thing even happened. The only thing that remained was splashes of gold and brown. But you didn't know what they meant. So you rubbed your eyes, only to pull them back and groan. You'd never taken your makeup off, and now it was on your fingers.

So you slouched out of bed, stumbling a bit at the sudden shock of cold that hit your bare feet, moving to your vanity again. You grabbed your makeup remover and cotton pads, performing a task that you'd done hundreds of times before and took only a few minutes, until you were completely free of any extraneous ᵇᵘˡˡˢʰⁱᵗ. You then carefully applied some new eyeliner, making sure to take your time to get both sides as even as possible, using big sweeping lines that narrowed down to winged points at the outside corners of your eyes. Once you were satisfied with how it turned out, you corrected any little mistakes before putting on your mascara and lipgloss. Finally done, you stepped back, popping your lips once with a wicked smile. Just to change it up a bit, you picked up your liquid eyeliner again and carefully drew a tiny heart on your right cheekbone.

And then you went on your way, drifting to your closet to find a dress to wear as you weren't feeling pants once again. Since most of your wardrobe was already black, you didn't need to worry about completely changing it to fit in with the crowd, which was nice. After a bit of searching and inner conflict, you settled on one. It reminded you of that strange girl at the table the previous night, which made you almost put it back, but you shook it off, putting it on anyway, a pair of black pumps to match. Because you were feeling yourself today, whatever happened tomorrow making you feel strangely reinvigorated.