Buck Up, Buttercup<3

▪︎ January 8th, 2022 ▪︎

Apparently I'm supposed to go on like normal. To be honest, I'm not entirely sure what normal is anymore, but it seems like that's what everyone expects nowadays.

For me to just keep on doing the things I always do.

Like everything's normal.

You might be wondering why I'm even bringing this up, so here's why.

This morning I sat down at the dinner table and tried not to notice the black hole in the middle of Chase's seat, pulling me closer and closer to my inevitable oblivion.

Now this happens every day of course, but this time my mother actually spoke to me, instead of staring into her bowl of soup, like it's the saddest thing she's ever seen.

"...Gabby?" She started. "Lizzie's mother was asking about you today.. She said Lizzie had texted you and you weren't responding."

I wouldn't know. I haven't checked my phone at all since Chase's disappearance. It was a lot easier to just shut out all of the pitiful messages being sent to me by almost all of my former classmates.

As soon as Chase went missing, my phone just started flooding with messages asking if I was okay, asking what happened, offers to talk if I needed to, condolences, apologies, etc, etc.

You would think that all of the attention would feel nice for once, considering I was never that popular with the sophomores. Chase was the popular one. Always had been. I was always left in his shadow.

Which is ironic, considering now all I want is to be able to do that. Hide in the shadows. Never be noticed again.

But it's too late. I'm in the spotlight now.

"That's possible. What did she want?" I asked. My mother paused for a second before continuing. It's not like I blamed her. It's hard for me to breathe nowadays, much less speak.

She met my gaze again. "She wanted to know if you wanted to come over to her house? You know.. to talk? About things?"

I hate this. I hate how my twin brother going missing is "things" now. Why can't anyone ever say what they mean? Why does everyone have to tiptoe around these things? Like saying them out loud will make me start bawling eveywhere?

"Why would I need to talk to her?" I asked. My mother sighed. "It's nice to have someone to talk to sometimes.." She looks back down into the dark depths of her sad soup. I know she hasn't been able to talk to anyone except me and Chase after our father died. We kind of live away from everyone else so it's not like we have any neighbors, and she never made any friends, because we used to be all she needed conversation wise. But I didn't care to feel sorry for her right then.

"Okay." I simply said and went back up to my room. This is where I am right now. In my closet, writing in this stupid journal for absolutely no reason. I'm writing like someone else is going to read this. I guess the possiblity of someone else reading this at some point makes me feel a little less alone.

A little less trapped inside my own head.

It's bloody dangerous in there.

I can't talk to Lizzie though, because as long as she's been my friend, there's no way I'd be able to say any of these things to her as easily as I'm writing them.

Just the thought already makes me nauseous.