Consumed

Chapter Five

Strangely my emotions had started taking over. It seemed that during the time I wanted to become famous, I was so happy and excited, full of life! But recently I'd been feeling upset a lot. I began spending a lot of time in my room. My mother was convinced I was going through a teenage phase and Lilly was sure I was being like this because of Michael. She agreed with James and thought I was being over dramatic and desperate for attention. I was hurt by what she had said so I decided to stop talking to her. I'd stopped all my Music classes and gave up my dream of becoming a pop star altogether. Apparently I had started failing in school too. It had only been a couple of weeks that I'd stopped concentrating but everyone was on my case and I couldn't stand the pressure.

'Can you do surds?' Michael asked.

'Like, surds in Maths?' He nodded and I laughed. 'That's all useless. What do we need it for?'

'Our exam? Come on, I'll teach you.' I nodded a no. 'Why? You've worked so hard up until now.'

'Oh not you too!' Michael opened his mouth to speak but I interrupted him. 'Look, if I wanted to do the work and learn bloody surds, I would. But the point is, I'm not going to be a Mathematician therefore everyone can stop worrying.' A deathly silence hung in the air for a while.

'When I asked you to go back to how you were, I didn't mean this, Mary. This isn't how you were. This isn't my friend.' He sighed and looked at me as if he was trying to work out what to do with him. Then he packed his books and left the room. I didn't think of it much at the time but that night his words were circling my head and I felt something click inside. Another emotion came over me. A far greater emotion than I'd ever felt before.

I started feeling dull and useless. Everyone hated me, I knew it. I wanted to make up for being the horrible person I was but I knew it was hopeless. I was just a burden on everyone, why would Michael like a girl like me? I began losing interest in things I enjoyed such as reading, writing, drawing, even watching TV. I hated TV, full of lies and unrealistic lifestyles that made real people feel unsatisfied with themselves. I was already unsatisfied  never mind people in a box making it worse. I no longer wanted to eat but I didn't want to disappoint my mother either. I got into a habit of chewing for a long time then after a few bites I secretly fed the rest to Romy, my cat. I also found it hard to sleep at night, I felt and overwhelming loneliness at the thought of losing Michael although I hadn't lost him. The same thoughts circled my mind day in day out; I will lose Michael at the rate I'm going. After I lose him I'm going to lose all my friends and family. They'll no longer find me bearable and they'll toss me into the street with a bin bag full of my clothes. No one will blame them because one look at me and they'll say, you did the right thing.

I no longer talked as much and many times I got told off. Everyone had been telling me I'm not the same any more. It started politely with voices full of concern but it transformed to irritation when I failed to form a response. Lately, James had given up speaking to me and Jack just awkwardly smiled when he saw me. Lilly and I stopped talking too; she concluded I was a self-centred person. Michael sometimes talked to me; he hadn't given up on teaching me surds. Wayne was probably the only one who hadn't noticed anything, probably because of his age. I was too tired to try and talk to people even though I knew it was wrong of me. I told myself I felt like this because of Michael, but deep down there was something else making me feel this way. The feeling of unworthiness that I had brought upon myself. It hurt too much to think of that so I told myself it was all Michael's fault. Bloody perfect, amazing, flawless Michael.