Seventeen year old Safaya Bennett must navigate young adulthood under the stresses of her sins, her crumbling relationship with her twin sister, Rue, and a crippling mental disorder that makes her very dependent on her relationship with Nate Jacobs...
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I felt like shit for leaving my sister on her own, but I didn't realize what I was feeling until it was too late.
I stood on the train platform with my lip quivering. I watched as Jules inched further and further away from me; to run from this shithole of a town. As much as I wanted to leave, I just couldn't go through with it. I thought about my family, my mom, how hopeful she sounded at my sobriety ceremony this morning. She saw that I was trying, that I was doing better and she was proud of me. I finally made my mother proud and it was all based upon honesty. Then I thought about Gia and how torn up she was having to find me after my overdose. How I traumatized a 14-year-old, changing her life and how she would look at relationships forever because I wanted to be selfish. I didn't want to put her through that again. I just couldn't.
And finally, I thought about Safaya.
We came into the world together. For some reason, I was given a life-long friend and we had turned our backs on each other, but, now we had a second chance. What message would that send to Saf if I left? No call, no text, not even a letter or fucking pigeon telling her where I was. Safaya was sensitive and I know how losing me would affect her. Especially now that she was losing everything she had ever known. I was all that my sister had left and I couldn't abandon her. I loved Jules, but, I loved Safaya more. I always would.
Our sobriety was hanging in the balance and while I was winning, Saf was losing.
"I need to go home." Was all that Saf managed to say. TJ was following behind her and trying his best to keep her calm but it wasn't working. Nothing he would do would be helpful. He walked back into the dance with her and saw she was heading for a table. "I need to go home." She repeated again.
When she reached the table, Maddy's face was written with worry. "Where did you go? You were gone for like ten minutes." She then noticed that my sister was in shock. Her eyes landed on her forearm and even under the pink and purple lights, could see that there was a bruise forming. Her eyes softened. "He hurt you again." She realized.
"I need to go..." Safaya ignored her and grabbed her clutch purse from the table. "I-I need to go home."
Maddy tried to steady her. "What happened to her?" She turned to TJ. Holding onto her forearms lightly, Maddy tried to help, but her efforts only did more damage.
"She and Nate had an argument and--"
Safaya's eyes grew wide. "Don't! Don't touch me!" She flicked Maddy's hands away from her and the girl realized her mistake. "I'm going home."
"Let me drive you at least. It's dark, Saf." The boy urged. Trying to make sure she was safe but that was the last thing on her mind.
My sister shook her head violently, mascara running down her face. "No. I'll walk. I'm walking."
She pushed past the brunette and TJ, practically running for the nearest exit she could find. The boy wanted to chase after her but Maddy stopped him. She knew Safaya needed to be alone and she hoped that giving her space was the right move.
Safaya walked down the empty, dimly lit road, her heels in her hand. Her bare feet pattered against the wet concrete ground and even then, she couldn't feel a thing. My sister was numb. Numb to emotions, numb to pain, numb to thoughts. For a split second she believed that night would be her last. That Nate would grab her by her hair and bang her head into the railing near by. Leave her bleeding on the cement until someone found her. She fully believed that Nate would have killed her.
She hugged herself tightly. Tears wouldn't stop flowing, even when she thought she was done they just kept going. My sister was sick to her stomach but didn't even have the urge to throw up. Her bruises reminded her of the night she had each time she passed a street light. Her breaths were short and choppy but she knew she was close to home. And if God was on her side she would get some relief.
*play All For Us by Labrinth*
Safaya sat in her room, on the foot of her bed, with her Nike shoe box perched on her lap. She stripped her clothes off from the evening, all being too much of a reminder. She had on an oversized sweatshirt and no pants, covering up the huge bruises that were beginning to form. She knew the only remedy would be whatever she could find in our mothers medicine cabinet that I hadn't touched.
She stared at her wall like a mad woman. The tears had stopped and now she was just left with the pain. On her wall hung a photo of her and our father, little Saf holding the blue Teddy Bear she never let out of her sight. They were sitting in our backyard in the grass, just a regular day, and my sister would give anything to go back. To have our dad back in her life.
Her eyes flickered down to the box on her thighs. With another glance at the photo, she took her miniature glass straw and snorted the two lines she had constructed. When she was finished the box fell from her lap and the straw bounced off of the bed, crashing onto the floor and breaking into tiny pieces.
And there was only a singular sound that filled the house.
Safaya's laugh.
She laughed until she felt like she couldn't breathe. And then she would breathe. And then she would laugh again.
It was official; Nate Jacobs broke my sister.
I'm not sure what exactly happened while my sister was high out of her mind. She told me that she eventually left her room but she couldn't walk straight. She stumbled into furniture, and blinds, until she crashed onto the kitchen floor. She said that's when she heard a voice in her head, singing, and that the voice was mine. It was soft and smooth and she said it was the only thing that didn't completely stop her from going off the deep end.
There were hallucinations of our father, mother, and Gia. Safaya said that Nate visited her too, the younger version of himself that calmed her that day in class in eight grade. After that, she was dragged into some strange occurrence in our neighborhood. There were demons with faces full of glitter. They all tugged on her and flipped her all around and she continued to laugh. In her eyes it was fun.
One thing that stuck out to me as she recounted these events, was a phrase that she said I sang often. In her words she said I was "taking it all for us", and quite frankly I didn't understand what it meant. We were both addicts, had been for quite some time now, and no matter how hard we tried there would always be something to trigger a relapse.
But with that, there would be always be something telling us to stop killing ourselves.
Finding Saf unconscious with her face into the carpet was a major wake up call for me, and as my heart raced while dragging her to the bathtub, I hated myself for ever putting Gia through this.
