3 (jaylor) perpetual darkness and stolen sequin smiles

chapter twelve.

The desire to hurt herself was always there now. It never left. Always in the back of her mind, always sending a flurry of thoughts into her head, and she was beginning to stop resisting them now. What the fuck was the point? What was the point to any of this? Life, living... love. What was the point, when it all hurt so bad? When she could feel the eternal pain deep within her chest. When she could feel herself beginning to fade until the point where she'd lost herself entirely. Lost every piece of the woman she'd once been. Lost. Trapped in a relationship with a man that she was supposed to love. A man that was supposed to love her. But Taylor couldn't help but feel like love wasn't supposed to hurt this bad. It wasn't supposed to hurt her like this, to the point of wanting to end it all.

No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't avoid feeling that darkness. It was as if it was taking over her life slowly, piece by broken piece. She couldn't go on living like this. She couldn't go on feeling like she was drowning, with no one there to save her. She'd thought that Adam would be the one to pull her out of those dark waters that she'd been in before, and for a while he did. For a while, he managed to keep her close enough to the surface that she could occasionally breathe, occasionally feel the water from where the sun had warmed it a little. But now, he was the thing that was drowning her. She didn't know what to do, how to leave. She couldn't leave. He'd told her the things he'd do to her if she'd left. The things he'd do to her family. She had to stay, she had no choice. 

And she knew, even then, that when she did manage to leave... when the stars aligned in a way that meant her freedom... that people wouldn't understand why. She knew that question would haunt her for the rest of her life. She knew that they would never know why she couldn't. And she couldn't even begin to explain it. How was she supposed to explain something that she didn't quite understand herself? She didn't know why this was happening to her. She didn't understand what was wrong with her, what was so wrong with her that meant he had to hurt her like this. She couldn't explain it, because she couldn't fucking understand it. He'd gotten into her mind, every waking moment of every day, he was in her head. It was almost as if her thoughts weren't even her own anymore - her life certainly wasn't. She'd had to turn down Ed when he'd asked her to travel to London with him for a week because Adam said no. That Ed didn't really want to be with her, that he just felt bad for her. That he really didn't want her there. Adam really needed her to stay with him. Taylor had turned down Blake when she'd asked her to meet her for lunch. She'd turned down Selena when she'd invited her to dinner, and she'd turned down another party that Karlie had invited her to. The only thing that she hadn't said no to, was the fact that her mom was coming to visit. Taylor was beyond nervous for that. So nervous to see her, to have to pretend that everything was okay when in reality, she was inches away from falling apart. She knew that if anyone was going to see that, it would be her Mom. If anyone was going to be able to see past the facade that she'd seemingly successfully put up, it would be her. Taylor's Mom seemed to know if there was something wrong before Taylor did. And sometimes, that was a good thing. But when Taylor was trying her best to keep something from her, like she was now - it was awful. It meant that Taylor had to try ten times as hard to pretend that everything was okay. Adam seemed to be aware of that too. 

Taylor ran a tired hand across those little scratches on her arm. The little breaks in the skin that provided her with a slight time of relief. Those little scratches that helped her to fade away for a few moments. Of course, it wasn't the arm that she did things with - she wasn't that stupid. She didn't want her friends, family or fans to find out about this. She didn't want anyone to know that she was going through such a rough time in her life that she'd had to resort to this method to escape from it all. It really did help her to make the pain she was going through seem manageable. It made her feel as if she could continue living like this. Because, for just a moment, Adam's bruises didn't hurt as badly as the blade on her skin. Just for a moment, she could feel herself give into another sort of pain, and she needed that. That break... that pain. To make her feel something again. She'd been feeling number and number as each day passed, as each time Adam hit her faded into her memory. She wouldn't admit this, but she knew that hurting herself like this was becoming more of a habit. A habit that she knew would be hard to escape from.