Scars || m.c AU

Chapter 4

I sat on the cold tile of my bathroom floor with my head in the toilet puking my guts out. I've been doing this frequently, ever since the doctors changed my medication. I hadn't been getting much sleep lately, so he put me on new medication that was "supposed to make me sleep and feel better", but all it has been doing so far was the exact opposite. He changed it two weeks ago, and it seems like all I've been doing in that period of time is puking.

My body shakes as I wipe my face off, and as I do, I touch the scar. It feels as horrible as it looks; the jagged skin brighter in some areas than others, and rough in some places. It definitely has caused people to stare. I've been back to school for three weeks and in those three weeks, I've been stared at more than I ever was in my life. Before the accident barley anyone knew my name. They knew of me, and they knew of my brother, but they didn't know us. The only reason people who weren't my friends knew my name was because of my brother.

To everyone in this town, I was just "the girl whose brother died too early in his life". Now, though, everyone knows my name. I've heard some of the teachers, people in the supermarket, even people on the street when I walked home say "That poor family".

When my brother died this past year, everyone offered a look of sympathy, some even pity. If I had died in that crash, I don't know what would've happened with my parents. They would be broken beyond repair, and I don't think anything could ever change that. Losing one kid was hard enough on them; I cannot imagine what it would feel like to lose both children.

I sighed and walked back into my room. I love my brother, I just don't like to think or talk about him. It gets lonely here without him. Even though he's spent most of his life in a hospital, when he would be able to come home we would have as much fun as we could.

I didn't want to think about him right now though. I just wanted to go to sleep. I knew that wasn't going to happen though, since so many things were on my mind.

My thoughts drifted to Michael. After my first day back, I didn't have the courage to approach him, and he didn't make the effort to talk to me. He wasn't ignoring me though, I knew that. He waved to me on multiple occasions when I saw him in the halls, or in the parking lot; and he smiled at me nearly every day when I glanced at him in class. But other than that we didn't have any interactions.

I don't have a problem with not talking to him honestly; I didn't know him well enough to feel comfortable with him walking me everywhere. I haven't heard anything bad about him, just little things that a lot of teens do; drink at parties, smoke on occasion. That kind of stuff. I'm not uncomfortable around him for that reason; I just don't know him. I'm sure that if I were to get to know him I would definitely consider him as a friend. A really hot friend, my subconscious adds. I blush at my own thoughts, even though I know it's true. Michael is a very good looking boy, and it mystifies me that he hasn't had any serious girlfriends before.

At lunch the day Michael walked me to class, I told my best friend Laney about what happened. She knew of Michael Clifford of course; she knows everybody. She didn't know what to say to that, so she told me that he was probably just doing that because he thought I needed a friend. When I asked her to tell me more about him, she just told me that she's seen him around at parties before. A lot of kids here threw parties in the upper end of the city, where there were bigger, and scarcer houses.

I wasn't really one to go to parties, staying in with my brother most of the time. But Laney did drag me to a few, and I actually enjoyed them. I had been partying a lot, almost every night, after my brother died, but I haven't gone to a party since the day before the crash. Looking back at my two week party streak, I regret a lot of things. I thought that if I drank enough alcohol I'd forget about him. I didn't want to forget about him, but if it was going to stop the pain from losing him so soon, then so be it. I wasn't that kind of person though, so I'm trying to stop with the drinking.