Lift // Hamliza

• chapter 28 •

• Eliza •

Alex and I walked into the schools office together, going to the section where the counselors office sat. He seemed a little nervous, so I squeezed his hand tightly to try and reassure him.

"Eliza, I've never gone to anyone for help before. What if someone finds out and then the whole school knows I'm not really as strong as I pretend I am?" He whispered in a rush, fear filling his eyes.

"It'll be fine, Alex. Mr Diggs will know exactly how to help and it's all confidential, so nobody will know." I said, kissing his hand. He smiled at me and breathed in shakily as we walked in the counselors office, where Mr. Diggs sat at his computer, his curly hair viewable over the top of the computer and his eyes squinted in concentration. We walked in and he looked up with a smile.

"Hey guys! What's up, do you need anything?" He asked, standing up to greet us and close the door

"Um, well, we need your help with something. It's kind of really big and not exactly a good thing, but it's about Alex, not really me." I said after greeting him and introducing myself and Alexander. Mr. Diggs motioned for us to sit in the two other chairs in his office as he rolled his own over.

"What kind of problem is this? A family problem, friend problem, mental health issue?" Diggs said with a slight frown.

"Mental health issue I guess." Alex said nervously.

"Ah. Can you explain what it is exactly? It doesn't matter how long it takes, give me the backstory and all, ok?" Alex nodded at this, and began his tale of moving from the Caribbean and losing his family, and talking for the first time to me or anyone about his fathers abusiveness.

"So when I came here, I was in a really bad place and began to um, I started to..." he began to breathe heavily, eyes filling with tears as his hands shook, not wanting to say what he did out loud. He looked to me with something in his eyes that made me immediately understand that he wanted me to say it.

"He would cut." I said, simply and quietly. Mr Diggs looked taken aback by this, clearly knowing Alex's rep around the school was as the funny, cool, happy and strong guy.

"It's Alright, Alex. You got through it, yes?" Alex nodded, but stopped Mr Diggs before he could congratulate him on overcoming it.

"I stopped for a while, turning to dance and writing to keep myself occupied. But, yesterday I had a panic attack and I relapsed." He choked up and bit and pulled his sleeves up to show.

Mr Diggs looked even more worried once he saw the cuts themselves.

"Alright, Alexander. This is what I want you to do. I have a few pamphlets on things like this that I'm going to give you. Every time this happens or almost happens, I want you to come into my office the next school day and talk to me about it. And if you ever have suicidal thoughts, I want you to call Eliza here or me." He said this as he collected his pamphlets and a post it note, which he wrote a phone number on.

"Thank you Mr. Diggs." Eliza said, nodding at him.

"It's the least I could do to help out. I've been there too." We both looked at him now, shocked as he pushed his own sleeves up to reveal long faded scars. He smiled sadly at us.

"Also, I'm gonna write you two a pass to leave for the rest of the day. There's only two periods left so you won't miss much." We thanked him and smiled gratefully back, still kind of shocked at his admittance of past self harm.

"Let's go Alex." I said to my boyfriend, picking up the papers Mr Diggs gave us and walking out to the parking lot with them.

"So, did it feel good to get that off your chest?" I asked hopefully.

"I guess. I still can't believe he's gone through what we have though." Alexander said, putting his keys in the ignition and buckling up as I did the same.

"Me either. I'm just happy we're going to help you. And maybe I'll take a look at those pamphlets too, even though I've overcome my problems." I said. Alex nodded and smiled at me, kissing my cheek before he drove off towards the mansion.

Hey, maybe everything was gonna be alright after all.