CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
LETTERS

Aaron,

I want to start this off with an apology.

I haven't been honest with you for a long time and I know that isn't fair to you, I've known for a while that it wouldn't be fair to you.

I'm sorry.

You're probably going to be confused about why I even wrote you this but I want to tell you how I really feel and get stuff off my chest. I would do it face to face, but I honestly don't think I'd be brave enough.

I want you to know that this has nothing to do with you at all, and I need you to remember that. If I could, I'd stay with you forever, honestly I would. But I can't.

I know it sounds weird and this is all very out of the blue for you but I needed to write this for you so you really know what happened to me and why I had to do it.

I don't regret what I'm about to do, but the fact that we will have no more time together definitely made me debate myself against doing this, but I know I have to.

I know you're probably a little surprised at this and you probably thought I was much better, and I am, but this isn't a sudden thing.

I promise I was getting better and to be honest I didn't even want to do this. But I recently realised I only had two options, wait to be killed in a horrible way at any point or do it myself. I'd rather do it myself.

I know reading that you're probably freaking out, you've probably already got your shoes on to run around to my house to change my mind, but you can't. I promise I'm not dumping you. Don't think this is a break up letter because it's not.

But I suppose I am breaking your heart. Or maybe I'm not? I find it hard to tell these days what people are thinking of me - I always have. Which is fair, it's my own fault I guess. I always overthink everything, and I know really you don't hate me, I don't know why I always convince myself otherwise. I think it's maybe because I'm scared of you hating me for some stupid reason, I'm not really sure.

If you haven't already worked out what this letter is about, which I'm guessing you haven't if you're still reading, I'm really sorry. I'm not really sure how to explain how I feel.

I'm just so tired all the time and I've been holding on by a thread for a while, I guess what's been going on this summer was just the breaking point.

I can not do this anymore. I need an out and this is the best I can come up with. I've been putting it off for too long now, I've been wanting to go for years now, I guess I've just never been fully ready. That's probably why whenever I'd tried to in the past I'd never actually got far enough to fully go through with it, at the most I think I passed out for a couple minutes or got dizzy, I can't really remember. But I'm ready to go now, and I know I have to.

I'd appreciate if you didn't tell the others I wrote to you. I haven't written to anyone else and I don't want them to think it's because I think any less of them or anything, I don't want to cause a rift between you and the others or something.

I couldn't bring myself to write to Max, not with everything going on with her brother, I don't want to cause her anymore stress. I don't want her to know that however I go, I did it myself. I think that would be too much for her, knowing that I had been struggling and she hadn't done anything, even though there really wasn't anything she could do to help.

But I felt I owed you an explanation, I couldn't just leave you behind without one. I know the news will hurt you, and I'm not going to tell you how long or how little you are allowed to be hurt over it. But I want you to lead a good life.

I just want the best for you. And if I'm not able to give you that, I don't want to hold you back from being the best version of yourself.

I know we're still young and I suppose others would consider what I'm about to say to be 'too soon', especially because we only technically going out a few weeks ago, but considering the circumstances, I feel like I have the right to let you know. Even long before we started going out I felt a strong sort of feeling when it came to you, I still don't know exactly what it was. But I know that whatever it was,  it was letting me know why exactly I seemed to care about you so much. Only I didn't realise it right away. I didn't realise it for a while.

I do love you. More than anyone else. I love everything about you.

The way you mess around with the watch on your wrist whenever you're nervous, or how you ramble whenever you're uncomfortable. The way you're always so set on putting everyone else's needs before yourself or how much you care for others. I love the things you say you hate about yourself, like the germ thing or how you only let people you're comfortable with get anywhere near you, how you think it's weird and annoying that you can't do stuff the others do, like touching someone's hand or something.

I don't think you're weird and I don't think you're annoying either. I think those things are definitely what make you different from the others, but in a good way.

You're a nice boy, and I like that about you. There aren't alot of kids our age like you, but I don't think it makes you weird, despite what you might think. I think it makes you stand out, not blend in. I know you probably don't think standing out is a compliment but it is.

I definitely don't stand out, I'm ordinary - if that. I'm pretty sure no one besides the party knows my name, even if we've been going to school together for years. There's nothing more mediocre and boring than being ordinary - I would know. And you are the furthest thing from it. There is absolutely nothing about you that could even come close to mediocre or ordinary.

Of course I'm not expecting you to feel the same way, it's okay that you don't. I kind of sprung it on you and I know that's not fair.

I might be stepping over the line a bit here and don't hate me for saying this but I know how invisible you feel. I know it bothers you that your parents are never around and that you hate how they don't make time for you or how you think your parents favour Steve whenever they are home. I know you feel invisible in your own house. I get it. It's shit being left out or feeling like you're worth nothing.

But I want you to know that you're not invisible to me. And you're not worth nothing, because you are worth everything to me.

Actually, I spend most of my time thinking about you as embarrassing as it sounds. I can't help it. You have no idea how much you mean to me, I could tell you a million times how much I love you and it still wouldn't be enough.

I hope you find comfort in knowing that you really made a difference in my life. How you made me laugh, how you were always so set on cheering me up, our ice cream dates, the homemade cards you made me, watching movies. Anything. All the big stuff and the small.

But I can't help but feel that we could have done nothing, absolutely nothing but stare at a blank wall for hours and I could still leave with a smile on my face, unable to stop thinking about it. Because I would have done it with you.

So for the last time, I love you very much.

Love always,
Kimmy :)

P.S. good luck with the hockey try outs, I know you'll make the team no questions asked.

Aaron read the folded piece of paper three times before the shock wore off and he came to his senses. The panic instantly flooding him and taking full effect.

He'd found the note in the pocket of his bag he'd filled with his hockey gear to go back to the store with Kimmy. That was a day ago and he hadn't seen her since.

She must have slipped the letter in some point that day without him noticing.

The boy didn't even have time to second question what it was she was so scared of, who she thought was going to kill her and why she felt that she had to kill herself even though she didn't want to. His brain was too scrambled at that very moment and he couldn't really get a full thought to process.

He blinked rapidly, furrowing his brows before he finally forced his feet to move and he left his room, instantly making his way to his older brothers and pushing the door open hastily.

"Don't you know how to knock?" Steve scoffed in an irked tone, not even looking up from where he was messing around with an old looking Walkman as he sat on his bed.

"I need you to take me over to Kimmy's." Aaron instantly stressed in as calm of a voice as he could muster, his face blank. Not because he wasn't freaking out - he was, but it was almost like he was feeling so much emotions at once that his face didn't even know what it wanted to express.

"Fat chance." Steve laughed loudly, a sense of faux sincerity lingering in his voice as a slight scowl crossed his features. "We're not talking. You don't get to just ignore me and then come running when you need something-"

"Steve, just take me I'm serious." Aaron snapped in a much rougher tone than he was sure Steve could ever recall hearing from him, the younger boy not in the mood to bicker with his brother at all. "I need you to drive me, something's wrong and if you don't take me because you're pissed off that I did to you what you did to me and I don't get there in time I'll never ever forgive you."

Steve glanced up at that, all sense of mocking wiped from his face as he looked to his brother with a slightly alarmed look that he tried and failed to hide.

"What's wrong with Kimmy?" The older boy asked with a concerned tone.

"I will tell you in the car." Aaron retorted in an agitated tone, not understanding why Steve still hadn't moved from his spot. "Get up and drive me over there, please-"

Steve's eyebrows knitted together curiously, his expression unmoving for a moment before he spoke up again in a perplexed voice. As if he was having fun guessing what was wrong with her. "Is she-"

"Oh, my god! Just get up and drive me to Kimmy's it's not that difficult of a task to fucking understand." Aaron was now yelling at his brother. Even with all their arguments he'd never felt this angry in his life and this was probably the tamest he'd ever seen his older brother. "I just told you something was wrong with her and you won't take me to see her? Seriously? Get up and drive me over there. You're the biggest piece of shit, Steve. You know something's wrong and you know I'm worried-"

"Calm down, Aaron! Jesus!" Steve retaliated harshly, reluctantly standing and grabbing his car keys.

Upon hearing those words the blond turned and abruptly exited the room. It was like everything was a blur for him, his hands shaking slightly and despite his heart rate picking up, he couldn't really focus on it.

He couldn't help but feel bad that he hadn't noticed the extent of her struggles, complete guilt consuming him.

"What? No thank you?" Steve mumbled as he followed Aaron out of his room, clearly not understanding the seriousness of the situation.

Sticking the middle finger up in Steve's direction was Aaron's dull response, his heart clearly not in the comeback as he found himself unable to focus on anything but his worry.

It was like he couldn't even recall her telling him she loved him. Well, of course he knew she had written it, but it was as if he couldn't even comprehend what that really meant due to everything else that was packed into the small letter.

He just wanted to make sure she was okay, that he could get to her before she followed through on her outrageous plan.

...

Kimmy took a shaky breath, looking back at her fractured reflection in the mirror with a defeated expression.

She had taken a handful of pills a little while back, the girl hoping this would kick in soon enough as well as numb her at least a little before she followed through with what she had intended.

She'd swallowed the pills in her hand one by one, cringing and screwing her face up at the after taste that was left in her mouth each time.

For some reason, she hadn't cried that day. It was almost a relief that she wouldn't be dealing with her parents antics any longer.

Of course she'd miss her friends, she didn't want to leave them. She hadn't been lying when she'd said that.

But it was either she managed to finally take control of her life, able to decide how she wanted her life to end, able to do it herself. That or she allowed her father to snatch her final chance at some sort of twisted freedom away.

That or she practically allowed him to kill her. She knew it was coming, he was only getting more and more violent as the days went by. The girl almost wishing she could go back to when she'd only get a beating when she'd pissed him off, rather than every time she glanced at him. It was getting too much for her body to handle and she knew it.

Kimmy felt bad that she'd left Aaron with a measly letter, feeling even worse that she hadn't wrote to the others at all.

Even in her final moments she was worrying about what bad things others might think of her after she was gone.

It was like she couldn't move from her spot opposite the mirror, trying her best not to pin point every little thing she hated about herself as she looked back at her reflection for the last time.

The sound of crashing and stumbling from somewhere within the walls of the house brought her to her senses, the girl flinching as she instantly snapped her head over to glance at the locked bathroom door.

Fearing she had less time than she had initially planned for, she knew she had to get on with it.

Squeezing her eyes shut as she placed a hand over her face, knowing she had to get on with what she intended to before she either passed out or vomited all the contents of her stomach up after the pills had kicked in.

Hesitantly, she left the dingy room. Hoping to creep down the stairs and into the kitchen as well as all the way back up to the bathroom without being detected.

Perhaps she should have planned a little better, grabbing the knife she had used so much times before to mark scars on her arms before she'd taken so much pills.

She rushed out of the room and practically ran down the stairs, heading for the kitchen door at an alarming rate.

The brunette still had her cast on her forearm. Meaning it would be a little more difficult than usual to actually cause herself any harm, she'd have to focus all her attention on her free arm, the one with no heavy binding white cast on it.

Another issue was that she'd have to actually cause the harm with the hand that had the cast on it, making it a little harder and more time consuming than it would have previously.

Upon reaching the kitchen, she began rummaging through the drawer she knew for a fact had the exact thing she was looking for resting inside. However before she could actually set eyes on it a voice from somewhere behind her startled the girl, adverting all her attention away from her minor task at hand of grabbing that said knife.

"What do you think you're doing?" A harsh voice behind her snapped, Kimmy physically jumping at the abruptness of it all.

Her eyes were wide and before she could even stop it an expression of great fear burned into her features.

She could feel her heart rate pick up at the sight of a slightly disoriented looking version of her father standing in the doorway of the kitchen. He was most definitely drunk - he always was. The man was an alcoholic, that was no surprise, although he appeared to be drunker than usual - and that was saying something.

"Nothing." Kimmy replied instantly with a shake of her head and as calm of a voice as she could manage, not wanting to give him a reason to cause her any sort of harm.

"Don't lie to me." The man slurred, shutting Kimmy up instantly.

The girl did not move a muscle, hoping maybe he'd leave her alone.

She should have known better.

"I'm not lying." She rushed out in a panicked voice when he stepped fully into the room. "I'm not. I really wasn't doing anything-"

As expected, the girl was cut of by a harsh hit to the face. The sting of the slap didn't bother her as much as it used to, she had grown far too used to it.

Hesitantly, she glanced up at the man scowling down at her, trying to think of what to do next in order to get away.

However with all the pills swarming around her beginning to take effect, she did the first thing she could think of. Admittedly it wasn't the brightest idea, but she knew she had to act quickly.

While still looking to him, she reached behind herself and into the open drawer, grabbing the first thing to touch her palm. She grabbed the rolling pin tightly, reaching up and hitting him as hard as she could in the temple in one swift motion.

Kimmy didn't stick around to see what his reaction would be, pushing past him and taking advantage of his crouched over demeanour while he gripped his head.

She began to run. Racing back up the stairs as soon as she could, well aware that the man she had just hurt for the first time would not just let her off easily.

In fact, she began to feel her heart drop when she heard him begin chasing after her, the girl frantically trying to slam the bathroom door closed and lock it before he could get to her.

Despite managing to close the door, she did not succeed in locking it. Her father pushing the door open with such force that it slammed against the opposite wall with a loud thud.

Kimmy could feel her dark blue eyes begin to water with tears of both frustration and fear.

"I'm sorry." She blurted in a small voice, subconsciously taking a step back as she realised what exactly she had done and what consequences would come with it. "I'm sorry-"

It was as if he couldn't hear her, his look of fury never faltering as he stormed closer to her. A slight dripping of blood slipping past the side of his face from where she'd hit him.

Her apologies were cut off by a hard fist to the face, snapping the girls head back as the blood instantly began pouring from her nose.

With her eyes still squeezed shut in pain, she felt him hit her again. And again, and again.

The pain, blood and bruising he was causing her went on for what felt like hours, but had most likely only been a matter of minutes. Until she was on the floor coughing and finding some difficulty in breathing.

She didn't know exactly where she'd been hit, but it hurt everywhere. The girl wanted to yell at him. Tell him to stop, begin to cry, fight back - anything. But she couldn't. She physically couldn't do it.

All she could do was cough. Until suddenly a wave of nausea came crashing over her and she began to regret taking her pills so far in advance.

Vomiting so profusely that she began to choke on it. Kimmy unable to do anything but let it happen, she couldn't stand up from her spot on the floor and she could feel a sense of drowsiness getting the best of her.

Her now pain filled eyes dropping closed on their own accord as she continued to vomit all her stomachs contents onto the floor as well as down herself as it continued to choke her due to how her body had been lying.

Kimmy was almost a hundred percent sure her father had now left the room, he certainly wasn't hitting her any longer and she doubted he'd stayed long enough to watch her struggle in the pain he'd caused.

She found herself wondering where her mother was during all this commotion, surely if she'd been home she'd have heard.

Despite being the weakest she was sure she'd ever felt, she was more furious than she could ever recall feeling. The one thing she'd wanted to do and it had been ripped away from her - just like everything else.

Kimmy knew she'd die there. Alone on the cold floor of the bathroom, in a house she'd spent her entire childhood dreaming about leaving.

She knew this would be her end, she'd die at the hands of her father, just like she hadn't wanted for herself.

Nothing seemed to go her way, even death hadn't been fair to her.

The longer she lay there, drifting in and out of consciousness, the longer she allowed her mind to wonder.

She'd stopped vomiting, now not making a single sound, the girl hardly breathing.

Her thoughts seemed to slip away from her control, moments flashing by without her knowledge. Without even trying to, the last thing to pop into her mind had been a certain sandy haired blond who'd helped her in more ways than he could have known.

Kimmy didn't even know if he'd got her letter, for all she knew he hadn't even unpacked his hockey bag. She hoped he'd got it. She didn't want him to be left in the dark.

Despite things not going exactly to plan, she quickly decided that it was best that Aaron thought she'd died on her own terms. She'd said everything she'd wanted to the boy, and while it did bother her just the slightest bit that she wouldn't get a response, at least he'd known how she'd felt about him at the end. How she really felt about him.

Perhaps it was for the better that she didn't get a chance to hear a response from him. Not thinking she could bear it if he hadn't felt the same back. Kimmy supposed it was a sort of blessing in disguise that she'd never know, his feelings a secret that she knew he'd only be able to share with himself once she was gone.

Kimmy meant it when she said she wished him a good life, she really did. While Kimmy knew she'd never experience all she'd wanted to in life, she knew Aaron could - she wanted him to. Whether she was with him or not, she didn't want to unknowingly hold him back, even if it would be from beyond the grave.

Just as she felt herself drift off for what she knew would be the last time, the girl began to momentarily wonder what would happen to her once she'd died. She wondered what her parents would tell people had happened, what lie they'd spin up in hope to come out of the situation unscathed.

Kimmy doubted they'd care, she knew they wouldn't. They never had - why would they start now?

...

😬😬😬😬😬 it had to happen guys. Kimmy defender for life!

Hope everyone is having a great day and enjoyed the chapter!!

Also 13K READS?!?! OMG THANK YOU! ALL THE SUPPORT ON MY STORY MEANS SO MUCH TO ME!!!!

Hopefully the new chapter is posted soon!!

- AJ :)