Boys don't have eating disorders. Those are only for vain, teenage girls. Not for Alex. Alex Rivera doesn't know why he started counting calories or why he's addicted to stepping on the scale. He just knows it's what he needs to do. His parents don't understand, and neither does his twin brother - the hotshot player of the school. His little sister doesn't get it. His fucking pet lizard doesn't get it. None of them understand how, a family so happy and so healthy, could've festered this disorder. A disorder that's taken everything from Alex. As the heartbreaking secrets unfold and Alex's disorder is brought under the microscope, the Riveras must find a way to get by, even through the impossibility of Alex's eating disorder, a molestation charge, and the realization that pain isn't always clear-cut and obvious. Told through multiple point of views, The Way We Get By shines a light on the often ignored side of mental health and eating disorders, and it shows that with a little love, humor, and sacrifice, absolutely anything is possible. - - Highest Ranks: |#1| - ednos |#1| - disorder |#1| - mentalillness |#2| - eating |#3| - recovery

Violet Ferrari is at breaking point. Moving out of home was supposed to fix her problems, not exacerbate them. All the shit she tried to escape, came right along with her - the grief, the guy, the pain. It won't go away. She's spiralling. One misstep, and it's over for her. Rio Valenti has fought his whole life to make it to this point. The start of his professional basketball career is just around the corner. He can't lose focus now, not with his criminal ties hanging over his head. He's on the edge. One misstep, and it's over for him. The rainy college town should have been their safe haven - the wetlands surrounding it a moat separating them from their pasts. The two meet in their freshmen year, with little in common but their social circles. Violet spends her days numb - hiding from the pain in any way she can. Rio runs from his. He's out from dawn to dusk, if not on the court, then scrounging up money for food or finding somewhere to sleep other than his car. What divides them most... is hope. Rio has it. Violet doesn't.

Metanoia (n.) the journey of changing one's mind, heart, self or way of life. Part one Darcy Russo a nine year old girl living in a run down orphanage on the outskirts of Athens, Greece has had to fend for herself for the majority of her life. Being abandoned as a child and having to endure cruelty and abuse from those who were supposed to look after her has caused her to become untrusting and wary of others. Instead she seeks solace in nature, spending any and all free time exploring the wilderness and the ocean with her dog Bear. Although Darcy has accepted that she can only depend on herself, what happens when she finds out that she wasn't abandoned she was taken and her eight older brothers will stop at nothing to get her back. Part two After being kidnapped by the Russian mafia and tortured for years for information she doesn't have, Darcy Russo becomes cold and calculated. When the leader of the Russian mafia Ivan Volkov offers her a deal, train and work for him as an assassin or die, she can't exactly refuse. Being nicknamed 'Sin' by the underworld, she changes her identity and becomes a ruthless, efficient killer. But what happens when she is sent on a mission to destroy the family she once loved. Will she let the resentment she has for them for being the reason she was tortured take over or will she spare their lives? And what happens when she catches the attention of her brother's best friend.

after a prank gone terribly wrong, hayden jones is sent across country to caldwell academy, a school for the bitchy, the dangerous and the rebellious. and if that wasn't bad enough, it becomes much worse when hayden is accidentally put in the male dormitory, landing her in a room with the school's notorious heartbreaker, chase everett. [not edited...like at all]

Emmalin Folliero is a 14-year-old who has been though more than most girls her age. Her mother is a drug addict and her step-father is extremely abusive. She has a four-year-old sister, Sofia, who means the world to her, and would do anything to protect her. She studies extra hard, and is fluent in 11 languages. Hopefully, this will help her give Sofia a better life for when she's old enough. When her mother and step-father die, she finds out that she has five older brothers, who are taking them in. Will Emmalin be able to trust her brothers to protect her, and care for Sofia.

Idalia has been abused ever since she was 3 years old. When she thought things couldn't get any worse and nothing was going to change, she ran. She ran until she she was safer than ever before. Little did she know, fate had awaited this moment for 10 years... The Morreli Mafia men. Heartless. Cold. Dark. The only light in their life was their little girl. They searched but only now have they found her. Can she open up to her past and let her long lost family in? Or will fear consume her? [[No pictures are mine! Also please do not copy or hate on this story, I am trying. Thanks!]]

Miguel Hernandez has known a few things well: the cushion of an older brother rising to stardom, basketball and sex. His reputation's whispered from the luxury corners of the Upper East Side, spanning over New York City. Debauchery's come to be his middle name. Girls are rarely pictured leaving his side. A comfortable, familiar routine that he doesn't stray from, nor does anyone expect him to. Until her. Eyes that harbour secrets, a tongue sharp enough to cut, passions she's given up and a darkness bearing on her shoulders, Malibu Adams knows nothing but survival. Unapologetic about the trail of messes she leaves behind or the anger festering within her that will only set her on one ruinous path, love had never been on her radar. Nobody knows her enough to understand her nor the pain seeping from wounds she disregards. Until he becomes desperate to. She breaks everything she touches, they say - he isn't afraid to bleed.

{𝘉𝘖𝘖𝘒 𝘖𝘕𝘌 𝘖𝘍 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘓𝘖𝘝𝘌𝘓𝘌𝘚𝘚 𝘛𝘙𝘐𝘓𝘖𝘎𝘠} Ria Romano knew hurt like the back of her hand. She was dealt her fair share of bad cards, more than anyone so young should have to face. A cynical girl riddled with the remnants of her past, a shattered sort of soul. She concealed like it was second nature; her instinct being to suppress. She'd offer you a cigarette with a shrug while you were crying because she never was too great with affection. She didn't smile so often but when she did and it was directed at you, you'd never feel such satisfaction. I was told Aria preferred to be alone, isolated; clouding her mind with inhales of her cigarette and drowning it in alcohol. Until she was dealt her good card, out of the pack of bad. They had a love beautiful enough to last a lifetime, the type directors desire to capture and authors aspire to write. Two souls, shattered by the cruelty of the world time and time again with flames that rekindled each others. They were each other's oxygen. They breathed life back into each other, those two insomniacs. <3

{𝘉𝘖𝘖𝘒 𝘛𝘏𝘙𝘌𝘌 𝘖𝘍 𝘛𝘏𝘌 𝘓𝘖𝘝𝘌𝘓𝘌𝘚𝘚 𝘛𝘙𝘐𝘓𝘖𝘎𝘠 } Hudson Tempest's an enigma nobody's capable of solving. Darkness has been moulded into his skin, running through him as easily as his blood. More than he's ever allowed anyone to see. Swept up into a world of sin and deviance, Hudson Tempest was broken as a boy and shattered several times over the course of his life. Made to be cruel and forced into a pool of self-destruction, a life that will only ruin him if it continues. Death has been the only thing in sight to him, for a long time. But how hard it is to save someone, who wants to let themselves drown. Val Emerson's the embodiment of light. A heart that outpours warmth like she was made to love, from the very moment she was born. The sunny side up sort of girl with an affinity for the sea, and smiles. When the cruelest of them all and the happiest of them all collide. When her hatred turns into a desperate desire to save the most broken of them all, far past salvation. When his hatred morphs into something he promised not to feel. Opposites. Dark, to light. Whole, and broken. Rivals, in all they do. Until somewhere along the way, they find themselves falling into each other's arms. Somehow, into each other's clashing hearts. <3