(Sierra's POV)
Another day of hoping, waiting, and suffering. I hope and wait for a family to adopt me, but meanwhile, I'm suffering. The suffering is not only here in this home, where everyone is cruel to me, but on the inside, too. Every day feels like a constant battle with myself. Every day I question whether or not I should just give up and end all the pain. Some would argue and say that I'd be acting selfishly and cowardly, but they don't know me. They don't know what I've been through.
I can't sleep. I trudge out of my bed, feeling as if there is a cloud of depression lingering over me. I quietly walk to the bathroom, careful not to disturb the other girls who are sleeping. I know it's either very late at night or very early in the morning, for the sky outside the window is pitch black without a star in sight.
The bathroom is small, but it has a shower, a toilet, and a sink, and it locks. That's all I need. I enter the room and lock the door behind me then walk to the other end of the small bathroom and drop down on all fours next to the bathtub. Groping the cold tile floor and the edge of the tub, I finally find what I'm looking for. Wedged underneath a broken piece of the tub is my razor blade. I return to my feet and stand in front of the full-length mirror that hangs on the back of the door, placing the shimmering blade on the small edge of the sink while I strip down into my undergarments. I then pick the blade back up and toss it back and forth between my hands.
You're fat.
Nobody would ever want you.
Just do us all a favor and go kill yourself.
The words rattle throughout my brain like a song on repeat. No matter how hard I try to push them out, they won't go away. Ignoring them just makes it worse. I remember one day, not too long ago, when I tried to ignore a bully.
"What kind of last name is Web?" a girl asked me.
I ignored her.
"I'm talking to you!" she snarled.
I kept walking past her, trying to return to my room after lunch.
"You know that you're just a waste of space, and a quite large amount of space at that," she snickered.
I held back the tears that pricked my eyes and threatened to fall.
"Listen to me when I'm talking to you, fatass," she commanded, grasping my shoulder and roughly turning me around to face her.
I could feel the tears start to leak from my eyes. She laughed at me, which only caused me to cry harder. She shoved me to the ground and kicked me before finally leaving me alone.
I look at my reflection in the mirror. Silent tears are cascading down my cheeks. My blonde hair is messy from tossing and turning in what little sleep I managed to get. My cheeks are red and blotchy from crying. My skin is pale, bones and ribs jutting out. Old scars scatter my wrists, while more recent ones litter my stomach, hips, and outer thighs.
I return my attention to my blade. I cut several times along my thigh, then eventually give into the temptation and cut once across my right wrist, being careful not to go too deep. I don't cut much on my wrists anymore because other girls were starting to get suspicious as to why I wear so many bracelets or never wear a tee-shirt. It feels reinvigorating to cut on my wrists again. I then clean up the blood and return my blade to its hiding spot.
I put my pajamas back on, but I sense the slight nagging feeling that I'm not done here. I know exactly what I need to do, but I don't want to do it. I haven't eaten anything for the past three days, and I know that if I purge, nothing but stomach acid will come up, and that shit burns terribly.
Do it.
I glance at the toilet, knowing that I have to.
You need to do this if you want to be thin.
I start walking closer to the toilet.
Nobody will ever adopt you if you look like you do now.
I lean over the toilet and shove my middle and index fingers down my throat until I gag. The acid burns my throat as it rises. Once the specks of red begin to appear, I flush the toilet, rinse my mouth out, and brush my teeth before exiting the bathroom. I return to my bed, thankful that nobody has awoken yet. I lay there in a half-awake, half-asleep state until I finally manage to fall asleep completely.
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