Lost in Hollywood

Stop Running

Sky sat on her bed, leaning her back against the headboard, her math book lying in her lap, but she had given up on it already. Studying was impossible, like so many things lately.

Maybe she had just missed too much school this year, because of injuries and rehab and heartbreak, or maybe it was still her brain injury, but whatever the reason, Sky had fallen horribly behind in most subjects. Math was the worst. Trying to do that on her own did no good, and it was also the one subject Dad couldn't really help her with. (I'm a historian, he had said, not a mathematician.) Sky was sure she would fail math, and science too most likely - which was a disgrace. Kat would have rolled her eyes at her - they had wanted to be scientists, astronauts, marine biologists, but that was all gone now, all her dreams shattered and turned to dust. Learning wasn't easy for her anymore, it was a struggle and she had no strength for that fight.

Maybe I should just give up. I could drop out of school and become a homeless junkie who lives in a trash can.

Everyone would be happier if she just disappeared. If she just fucking died already.

That thought was like a maggot eating at her heart. She couldn't shake it, it ate its way deeper carving her chest hollow. Maybe the reason for her failing in every subject wasn't the brain injury or the absences - maybe it happened because she didn't deserve any better. Maybe she was a loser and a whore and she deserved all the shit that came to her.

She slammed the math book and threw it onto the floor. Stupid math, stupid school, she hated it, hated everything about it with deep, dark desperation. She never wanted to go back there, and not just because she was failing every subject. Going to school after what had happened yesterday—

Impossible.

She couldn't forget the sound that left Cody's lips when she told him they needed to break up, the look on his face when he realized she had cheated on him. Sky felt sick to her stomach. She hadn't been able to eat anything, and still, the nausea kept turning her empty stomach, bringing bitter bile into her mouth.

Holding her breath, she leaned her back against the wooden headboard and drew her knees against her chest hugging them tight, making herself as small as possible. Her head was heavy as she rested it against her knees, the unshed tears kept burning behind her tired eyes. She was worthless. She didn't deserve to exist, to take space, to breathe. What she had done was unforgivable.

It had been one thing to cheat on Matt. He had deserved that, for every sick and twisted thing he had done, but—

To cheat on Cody, who had done nothing wrong, who had been the perfect boyfriend, who had always been there for her, had believed in her, had supported her, and loved her as if she was something amazing?

It was wrong. Evil. An unspeakable horror. 

Sky drew in a shaky breath and another, but the tight band around her lungs wouldn't ease. Thinking about what she had done to Cody, felt like someone was carving out her heart. Everyone had been right about her, all along. Matt, all his friends, the bullies in school, Tory, Kyler—

She was a slut. A crazy, stupid slut, and she deserved all the bad things that happened to her.

The tears were flowing again, even without her realizing it, soaking the denim of her jeans as she pressed her face against her knees. Crying seemed to be the only thing she was capable of lately - feeling sorry for herself and crying her eyes out. Which, of course, was pathetic, and only made her feel worse, but it wasn't like she had a lot of options. She couldn't turn back the time. She couldn't undo what she had done. There was no way to fix what she had broken. She had tried to call Cody a hundred times, to apologize, to tell him it wasn't his fault but hers, to let him know that he didn't deserve what she had put him through—