© 2014, Andy Hartzler
Condensation gathered outside the glass of ice cold water. It was the last thing she was going to taste. Andromeda liked it as cold as possible; the feeling of the icy liquid dripping down her throat was sharp, made her feel, woke her to the world around, bringing with it the harsh reality of her life.
Outside, the wind howled against the closed window, threatening to reveal her little secret, she imagined. Whispering of her pain and suffering and her solution to it all.
She would never get another chance like this. Only the wind outside to witness her actions, her parents away for the week with two days remaining of their holiday.
Pills littered her bedsheets, tiny capsules of blue and pink. They were to induce sleep, and with enough, Andromeda would never have to wake up, never face her nightmares--her hell--again. It would end and it would end peacefully. Peace was what she'd always craved, what she'd never witnessed.
And now she would achieve it eternally.
The medication had no distinct taste as it touched her tongue, but it was bitter. A few pills at a time, she swallowed and chased them down with the water. Until three plastic bottles were empty and she could feel her eyelids weighed down like lead. Her head hit missed the pillow, landing on the comforter, not that she could notice. Thin raven locks fell over her face and slid to reveal patches of missing hair.
Here she fell. Here she would lie.
Here she would stay for the next two days unless the unlikely was achieved and someone noticed her unexplained absense from school.
* * *
Her eyes opened to sunlight seeping through the window, curtains wide open. The wind from the previous night had faded with the moonlight. For a moment, it felt like any other moment: Events of the last day forgotten completely, though only for a brief few seconds.
Andromeda always shut the curtains at night. Otherwise the sun would wake her earlier than she wanted to be up. She slid her legs over the bed and stood up dizzily. Head pounding, her feet shuffled to the vanity dresser across the room.
The reflection staring at her from the mirror was all too familiar as the evening before flooded her memories. She was still wearing the black strapless dress, the white leggings, her eyeliner thick, dark, partially smudged. Clips were once skillfully placed to cover bald spots where she either nervously tore out her hair or it fell out from stress. Now they hung by a few loose strands, probably pulled out as she moved around in her sleep.
She wanted to be found in that outfit. It shouldn't have been important, but she wanted her cold body to be presentable upon its discovery.
Cursing loudly, Andromeda slammed her fist on the dresser.
It wasn't her first suicide attempt.
It should have been her last.
Minutes later, she found herself in the en suite bathroom, filling the porcelain tub with cold water. Although it wasn't the way she wanted to die, it was still more appealing than another failure to hang herself.
Her mind was made up: Andromeda was going to drown herself.
The choice left was whether she would still put effort into looking her best.
Too tired of living to care how she appeared after her death, she turned off the water and slipped into the tub. Completely submerged in water which made goosebumps rise on her quivering body, she inhaled deeply.
Liquid filled her lungs with each increasingly shallow breath, creating a burning sensation despite the icy temperature. The pain only made her more desperate for an end to it all.
She resisted the urge to sit up and gasp for air. It wasn't too hard to do: Although her body craved life, all her mind wanted was for the darkness to come and never leave.
Andromeda wanted to scream out in pain as it grew in chest. She had thought that by now she would at least be beginning to slip away. But there was only pain, and it didn't fade, it grew. Excruciating, maybe worse than the emotional pain she felt in every waking hour.
Maybe it would disappear with a few more breaths--but it didn't go away. It didn't decrease in the slightest.
It wasn't going to go away.
She grasped for a shower curtain, and pulled herself up, dragging the curtain down. The pole holding up the curtain fell to the floor with a clang, but she paid no notice.
She should have been dead by now: Three bottles originally full of sleeping medication were now lying empty on her bed, and according to the alarm clock on the bathroom counter, Andromeda had spent near eight minutes breathing in pure water.
Grabbing a towel, she stripped off her soaking clothes to change into pyjamas and fuzzy slippers.
She was a failure, couldn't do anything right. Not school. Not relationships. Not friendships. She couldn't even keep her parents from despising her--they hadn't called once since leaving for Mexico five days ago. And now she couldn't even get dying right.
Perhaps mutilating herself, slitting her own throat, slicing through an important artery. But the fear of her own blood and the dizzying effect of bloodloss kept her from running downstairs for a butcher knife.
And there was another fear, too. The fear that even it wouldn't end her life, and she'd be left bleeding but undying on the kitchen tile until someone found her, too tired and sore to move.
It didn't make sense. Sooner or later, she'd lose too much blood and her heart wouldn't function, she'd never breathe again. But here she was on her bed, breathing when she probably shouldn't be.
At the very least, she shouldn't be conscious.
Andromeda looked down at her fingers, still wrinkled after soaking in the bathwater so long. Then she looked up, and in her mirror, a girl stared back with drenched, dark hair, circles under her tired brown eyes. Something about this girl was strange.
Why wouldn't she die?
