My Own Worst Enemy Chapter 5

It's been a long time since I've posted anything from this project, so I thought now was as good as a time as ever. Sorry it's so long!

Chapter Five

In school everyone was talking about the upcoming dance. All the girls around the school were squealing in delight when they found that their crush liked them too. Jess and Mel were a part of this group. They got asked by Max and Seth and they were pressuring me to go with Phillip. I explained to Jess and Mel, along with Max and Seth, again that Phil was just my friend, and I was sure he felt the same way. Max and Seth were pressuring Phil too, and one morning in homeroom he came up to me.

I was sitting at my desk in a daze, watching the colors again, when a figure eclipsed the colors, making them turn black. I vigorously shook my head, trying the erase the black like an Etch-A-Sketch. As my head shook Phillip came into view.

"Hey, Dani," he said, with a puzzled look, analyzing my reaction.

"Hey, Phil." He was standing over my desk and I got a good look at him. He still had his first grade baby fat, but had a cute, little boyish, quality about him, perfectly matching his high pitched voice.

"What were you staring at?"

"Oh, nothing really; just zoning out." I was surprised at how calmly I was discussing this. Usually, when I thought about it I would break out into a cold sweat, and see the colors again."What's up?"

"Well, you know the dance on Friday?" While he asked me the question, his eyes dropped to his wrist, where he was cuffing up his sleeve. "I was wondering if you would go with me," he said, his voice rising to an even higher pitch.

My eyes grew wide. First I was speechless. How could he think of me that way after I have told his friends on so many occasions that I didn't? Then I was furious. How could Jess, Mel, Max and Seth do this? They just ruined my friendship with Phil in one terribly awkward moment.

"Phil, you know me, I'm not the dance type of girl," I replied, biting my lip.

"I know," he sighed.

"You're one of my best friends, I don't want to ruin that," I explained.

"Yeah, me neither, it was stupid." I knew he was lying.

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah, I'm fine." Again, the words weren’t true. He turned around and went back to his seat. I sighed. I had just lost a good friend because I wouldn't go out with him. It was a simple request, really, why couldn't I just say yes? One night of my life wasted that's all.

No. I was always trying to make pother people happy at my expense. Getting perfect grades for my family, being happy at school for my friends, and now going to the dance with Phil? No. I was done. School wasn't going to be my main priority any more, I wasn't going to put on my happy face when I was in the presence of my friends, and I definitely wasn't going to go to that dance with Phil. I was done being an actress, done hiding behind the facade of my life, done being the Dani everyone knew.

The bell rang, and I pulled back the veil that I was hiding behind, as Ethan put it, and was who I wanted to be. Then I came back to reality and walked to Biology.

All during the day, everyone was talking about how I had rejected Phil's invitation. I ignored this for a majority of the day, falling into frightening day dreams, but during the last period it was impossible. It was my Gym class. Phil was in this class, along with Ethan. I stayed in the corner and didn't socialize with anyone; I just listened to snippets of the conversations about me. The muffled whispers and laughs were intensified because Phil and I were in the same room.

I tried to ignore the constant jabbering and concentrate on the baseball game, but it was impossible. I instead focused on the baseball being thrown.

When it was my turn to bat, I couldn't block the ridiculing. It seemed like everyone was talking about how horrible a person I was for turning Phil down. I got angry. Why should I be defined from one incident? The ball came rushing at me and I channeled my anger through the bat, and slammed the ball.

It would've been a great hit if Ethan's head didn't get away. The ball flew for about five seconds before ramming into Ethan's forehead. He stumbled backwards then fell. Everyone rushed over to him, but I barged through the crowd. The teacher ordered me to take him to the nurse, my punishment for hitting him.

"Ethan, I'm so sorry. Are you okay?" I asked when we left the gym.

"I'm fine. I don't need to see the nurse," he said, anger in his voice. "Follow me." I followed, carrying both his stuff and mine, into the woods behind our school. He led me to his motorcycle. Without a word, he took his books from my hands and put them in the space under the seat. "Hop on." I sat on the back and wrapped my arms around his waist. He drove to the woods behind my house and guided me to a clearing.

"How could you do that to him?" he asked.

"Not you too," I groaned. "I think he asked me just because Mel, Jess, Seth, and Max made him. He had never shown any interest before, and I think its all fake right now because he's desperate to get a date. I don't even think he really likes me."

"Oh, please," he said. I sat on a rock with an over exaggerated sigh and eye roll, while he began pacing. "You're all he talks about in the locker room before gym, and he's been trying to work up the courage to ask you out for weeks now." I grimaced in confusion and frustration.

"Phil likes me?" I skeptically asked, speaking my thought process aloud. "Why didn't he say anything earlier, not that my answer would've been different. But, it would've been nice to know. I wouldn't have been such good friends with him. Did I lead him on? This is all my fault. I should just go to that dance." I stared off into space as colors filled my eyes. I was back in my own world. Ethan wasn't there anymore.

"No! Danielle, you already made the decision to stop giving in to make other people happy," I said, continuing my rant. "Will it make you happy to go out with Phillip? No, it won't. So you're not going to that dance, you're not going out with him, and you're not going to change this decision." The colors intensified, while I spoke to myself in the second person, as if I was a different person speaking to me.

I came back to my senses and I started speaking like a normal person. The colors soon faded.

"Are you all right?" Ethan asked, obviously questioning my sanity.

"Yes."

"Now, why didn't you go out with him?"

"I was hoping you would ask me," I mumbled in embarrassment. He continued pacing and didn't answer for a couple of minutes.

"Dani, do you know how hard it is for me not to like you? Whenever I see you I have to resist the urge to kiss you. You're the most amazing person I've ever met." He stopped pacing and stood in front of me.

"Then why don't you?" I asked.

"I'm not good for you," he replied, his voice was barely audible.

"Why don't you let me decide what's good for me?" I asked, raising from the rock and walking toward him.

"Dani, I'm not good news, I've almost been arrested six times..." his voice trailed as I came closer.

“Do you have a point, or are you just trying to make excuses for me not to like you?” I asked.

“I like you too, but I’m not sure this is going to work out,” he said. I stopped. I wasn’t sure what to say to him. “Danielle, I’m not sure we’re right for each other.”

“Why not?” I asked in a small voice.

“Well, I’m not completely sure of what happened to you before,” he said, referring to the argument I had with myself aloud. I silently thought of a way to explain what was going on in my head and responded in a weak voice.

“I think I’m going crazy,” I whispered. “I’ve been seeing things lately, like patterns of colors that just randomly appear. It mostly comes when I’m in a really emotional state, like when I was yelling at myself, or when you kissed me. And I’ve been having these impulses. Really weird ones, like sometimes I could be in my room alone and I’ll just want to cry, or laugh. I don’t know what’s wrong, so I can’t really explain what just happened.”

He stared at me, various emotions flashing across his face. First he was confused. His eyes slightly closed and his brow furrowed, then his expression changed. Then he looked scared, like he was afraid I was going to have a psychotic breakdown and attack him. His cerulean eyes widened as far as they could go and his lips parted. His expressions changed so suddenly, I was frightened, then his eyes relaxed, and his lips turned into a soft smile.

“Dani, you’re not crazy,” he sweetly said, walking closer and embracing me. “You’re just going through a tough time,” he said into my hair.

“I don’t know, Ethan. I’m really scaring myself.”

“You’re fine, trust me, Dani.”

“Okay,” I said, not believing him at all. I knew something was wrong with me.

He drove me home and I invited him in. Beth was out picking Sammy up from school, and my dad was still at work, so we were alone. We sat in the kitchen, him at the table and me on the counter. I got him some ice for his head and thought over the day. The daydreams I had filled my mind.

The first was during biology class, we were dissecting frogs. I dreamt that I grabbed one of the scalpels we were using and snuck it into the bathroom, where I cut my throat. The second was during my math class, featuring the same scalpel. I pictured myself dragging the blade across my arm, just slightly tearing the skin, and watching the blood flow out. It was black first, and then turned bright scarlet. In my dream I laughed. The cut didn’t hurt, it tickled, and it made me feel better.

Then, when I was in my literature class I dreamt I killed myself again. This time, I had hung a rope off the ceiling fan in the room and slipped my neck through it, and kicked the chair out from under me. The last was during lunch, while Jess was berating me for turning down Phillip. That time I swallowed a whole bottle of white capsule pills, and went into severe convulsions, then died.

“Have you ever thought of killing yourself?” I asked. My question caught him off his guard. His head jerked up and his eyes were two blue slits.

“No, Dani, have you?”

“Yes,” I whispered, going into a detailed explanation of my daydreams.

“Please don’t think like that anymore,” he said, jumping on the counter next to me.

“I can’t control it.” I crumpled into his chest.

“Try,” he pleaded; “Dani, I love you,” he said kissing my forehead. Then he jumped off the counter and left the condo.

The colors washed over me, purples, greens, oranges, blues, all forming mysterious pathways in my mind. I got off the counter and followed the green path. I walked unaware of my real surroundings, only aware of the bubbles of colors popping in my head.

The path led to my bedroom, next to my art supplies. It was like I was being possessed, I had no idea what I was doing. I went through my art box, and withdrew a sharp razor blade. And suddenly I was in my small bathroom.

I sat on the pale green tiles, tracing the texture with my fingers. I leaned my back against the bath and pressed my feet against the base of the sink. I let my head roll back and I stared at the light, until the white light bulb turned green around the edges. Then I slid my eyelids close and watched the watermark change colors from yellow to green to purple to a bright orange, ending in a deep red. I took a deep breath and opened my eyes again.

I twirled the razor in my hand, in its leather case. The leather was rough; it used to be my grandfather’s. When he was young he was a sailor, he would teach me how to tie knots and how to manage the sails, he gave me the razor when I was eight. We would use it to cut up old sheets to use as our own makeshift sails when we had nothing better to do, and he said it had helped him when he was in the navy.

I unsheathed the small blade and held it to the light, watching the brilliant patterns it threw onto the wall. I rolled up my sleeve, brushing my skin with long fingers. The blade suddenly had a mind of its own. It dragged itself down the skin of my arm, across the crease at my elbow. I giggled. The blood poured out of the small slit, trying to force pain out of me. I didn’t felt this pain, just pure relief.

All my anger, confusion and sadness were lifted away through the piercing blade. I was truly happy. I stood up and looked in the mirror above the sink. There was an insane looking girl in the mirror, with wide blood shot eyes and a huge grin, spreading from ear to ear.

I filled the basin with cold water and dunked my arm in. I watched as the blood floated from the cut, dancing through the water. The water turned scarlet, I couldn’t see my arm anymore. There was too much blood in the small sink.

The pain still hadn’t hit me, but I cried anyway. I cried noiseless sobs, crystals falling from my eyes. A ball formed in my throat, making breathing difficult. I looked back in the mirror. A small amount of sanity had filled the girl’s cheeks, her blood shot eyes were now swollen, with shining pools at the edges, and her smile had faded.

Red and orange pigments swam to my eyes, blocking my view of the sad girl. The colors formed familiar swirls and argyle patterns, and then new colors added their company too. Grey, black, white, green, and blue came in, and for the first time, the colors formed a recognizable picture.

The red and orange fused with the green, producing long stems. Some Flowers. Then the blue filled my vision, with little puffs of white. A sky and clouds. More green poured in, rushing like an ocean but coming to an abrupt halt when it met the blue. Some Grass. Then the grey came, in formations that looked like bricks, making a rectangle at first. Then some of the grey was shaven off, to make the top rounded. A headstone. Lastly the black snaked its way through the grey, producing letters, in an elegant script. Danielle Marie White.

It was a picture I had drawn once, when I was seven. I drew my own grave site. My mom had yelled at me. She said it scared her to see me draw like this. She made me promise never to draw like this again, or she would have to take me to a special doctor. My mind filled in the word I hadn’t known when I was seven. She would take me to a psychiatrist.

So I agreed and never drew a grave again. I only drew pretty flowers, rainbows, puppies and birds.

Why had this picture been formed in my mind? I didn’t kill myself, only gave myself a little cut. I tried to shove it out of my mind, blaming it on too many restless nights. The image disappeared, leaving the faint remnants of the grave.

It was then that I knew Ethan wasn’t right. I was crazy.

Sorry again for the length! Reviews would be greatly appreciated.

~Dommy