Saving Amaya

Chapter 15

Liam and Blake are still in school, so I walk home. It's not a long walk, 20-30 minutes, but it does little to ease my mind.

I got kicked off every team. I lost my best friend. I attacked someone today. I beat someone almost unconscious. For a minute, I fully lost control of myself.

For the record, my doctor was right. My forearm aches where I almost severed my tendon because I overexerted it.

When I finally make it home, the stillness of my empty house almost unsettles me. Silence is a commodity that I missed. I haven't been alone since my attempt and to be honest, I missed it. I missed the calming nature of silence. Of being alone with myself.

I go to my room and throw my book bag in my bed. My reflection catches my attention.

My hair sticks up in every direction. My cheeks are flushed pink. My eyes are wildly dilated. This isn't me.

This isn't me.

The blue jeans and the bare face and the faded hair. It's not me. I'm fucking sick of not being me and everyone still hates me. Because it's not the way I look on the outside, there is something deep down within me that is awful. That makes people hate me.

And you know what fuck them.

I'm so sick of constantly worrying what everyone thinks of me just to find out they all hate me. So fuck it. They want to hate me? I'll give them something to hate.

"Maya?" Liam's voice comes from the foyer as I towel dry my hair.

"Up here." I shout back down from my bedroom.

These last couple of hours, I have been busy. For the first time in weeks, I smile at my reflection.

"Hey are you okay?" He asks rounding the corner of my bedroom door before he sees me. As Liam is finally able to take in the sight of me, he pauses slightly. "Wow."

I'm not reading into what that reaction means at all. Because I don't care anymore.

All my piercings dawn my face and ears once more as well as freshly dyed, bright green hair. My eyes are smudged with black eyeliner and an all black ensemble covers my body. A few new jewels dangle from freshly pierced holes in my ears that ache slightly.

"How was school?" A wide smile crosses my face. I can't help it, I feel good.

Liam looks me up and down with an unreadable expression. I can't tell if he likes the new (kind of old) look. Maybe he preferred when I dressed like everyone else. If so, he can suck my dick.

"School was fine." Liam walks more into the room. "I see you're changing things up again." The way he says it isn't really positive or negative, just neutral.

"Yep." I pop the 'p' and continue to flutter around my room. While my hair was dyeing, I rearranged my room and started redecorating.

I was even thinking of going to the hardware store to paint my walls. Grey is so boring. I want to paint fun designs on them like Rapunzel. I'm just like her because for the next week I'm going to be locked away in my tower again.

"You're talk of the town again." Liam sits on my bed as I continue buzzing through my chaotic room.

His statement makes me roll my eyes. "What else is new?"

There's a small pause where Liam thinks about what he wants to say next. I know he is trying to perfectly craft the sentence to not come off a certain type of way, but the situation at hand is fragile.

"Did you want to talk about it?" He says 'it' as if he didn't want to say 'did you want to talk about you savagely beating Ava to a pulp?'

"Nope." I responded without hesitation.