**

She watched the red rivulets crowd around her fingers, forming droplets and falling on to the white tiles, on which she stood. The soft sound of continuous dripping of the red liquid was comforting – ridding her of the vicious voices in her head. It lessened the throbbing ache in her mind, scattering the demons that wanted to claim her soul and drink her dry.

They blamed her for what had happened to him, and they were right. She was responsible for it all.

The warm sensation around her wrist was welcoming and she no longer felt the dead cold on the inside. She couldn’t hear the muted beating of her heart – a heart that didn’t deserve to live after the grievous crime she had committed. It was simply there, pumping blood into her veins because she was still breathed the same air as him. But it would end soon, maybe sooner then she had planned.

Countless foul words, and curses, had pierced her skin – burying their poisonous claws into her soul and polluting the thoughts. It made it hard for her to believe anything else.

They were right weren’t they? She had hurt him knowing well of the consequences. She had destroyed him, crushed his soul and yet lived on as if she didn’t care. That was a crime wasn’t it? She didn’t deserve to live…right? She stared down at her weapon of choice and couldn’t help but chuckle darkly. It was such a small thing, so easily obtained and so easily used to cut off the strings that tied her soul to her body.

She caressed the blade, letting her finger cut over it and enjoying the sharp pain that filled her hand. It hurt, but it wasn’t fatal. Nothing she had done until now was fatal.

“Not yet…” she whispered.

She needed more of it, before she drifted into the lands of the undead. She needed to inflict as much pain as was possible. Maybe then, they would forgive her…he would forgive her. She could only hope.

A smile tugged at her lips, as she lifted her hands to the dim yellow light of the bulb. Her artwork was moving on from the learning curve and inching closer to perfection. The lines crisscrossed over the skin, near her wrist. The pattern meticulously planned, and the blade drawn with a force that delivered the result with surprising ease.

The first few marks had been baby cuts – the kinds that were made when one was unsure of oneself.

But they had changed over the past few hours, as she concentrated on them, focusing all her rage on the small razor she held in her hand. Each cut was equivalent to her atonement for the hurtful words she had said to him, and each dragged out line of blood for the fights she had started.

They were endless, and her cuts were endless.

It was funny how she had never really thought of doing it before, of paying for her sins in the way she was doing now. She hadn’t been particularly fond of the blade before, her mind countered and she agreed to it, up to a certain extent. During one of the talks they had discussed self-harm, but never had they talked in-depth about it.

But now, she finally understood why it was easier to give in to the physical pain then become a victim of that grueling mental pain. The physical pain distracted her, and made her aware of the surroundings – the forlorn wallpaper of the bathroom she sat in, its bathtub and the mirror that she never used. It liberated her, and carried her away to a place were her problems couldn’t touch her. However, the pain didn’t last for long.

It was addictive, like a drug and she had to come back again and again for her fix. It felt like she had been doing it for days instead of the few hours she had spend in her bathroom. But even without being a practiced player, she had enjoyed it.

‘You cheated on me,’ a voice whispered and the guilt came back, with more hunger and more vengeance then before.

She cried out, not wanting to hear it again, to be labeled as the culprit when all she had done was saying the truth. Wasn’t that enough for them to distance themselves? Was she really at fault here?

Her mind couldn’t come up with a plausible answer, but her hand moved. It slid over her wrist, dragging the blade over a recently healed wound and pulled away the bandages. They came apart like pieces of silk falling under the sword’s wrath – one swipe and they all come unbound. None of her cuts had healed since morning nor did she want them to.

She deserved all the pain she could get, so she cut. Her hand pulled at the blade, letting it satisfy its hunger for her blood. It severed the tissues holding her cuts together, in the hopes that she wouldn’t do it again.

Her senses instantly flooded with fierce pain – the kind of pain that destroyed what little thoughts she had, about the things she had done, the mistakes, the guilt. It eliminated it all, and her mind became blank. Only the strange buzzing filled her head, a white noise that had no connection to what she felt.

It grew louder, confusing her and forcing her to cower under it. It was unbearable, frightening her with its intensity and her sluggish mind began to wonder whether this was the end.

Had her body reached its limit? Had it lost so much blood that it could no longer survive the abuse she kept inflicting on it? She didn’t know. But it made her happy. The thought of ending it all, was the reason why she had resorted to this method – the art of self-harm.

Her hands felt sticky, and wet. Her fingers slipped against each other, smeared with her life-blood. Even though she couldn’t see much, her fading eyesight could make out the big red blotch on her body. Her t-shirt soaked in it and her hands coated with the red liquid. She couldn’t feel anything, yet there was an unsettling fear, that it was ending all too soon.

She wasn’t finished with her atonement.

But the white noise wouldn’t let her move; it wouldn’t let her sense the blade that had fallen from her fingers a few moments ago. It still hummed on the inside of her head, growing ever so slowly and distorting her thought process.

Her sight darkened, forcing her to remember his face one last time before she was pulled away by the slithering black tentacles appearing in her peripheral vision. Were they even real? She wondered. They seemed to be, since they kept moving, pulling the inky black blanket over her eyes. They snuffed out all of her light, leaving her blind and senseless.

Was this better then her current situation? She wanted to ask.

‘Yes it was’ her conscious whispered and then left, taking with it her last ray of hope and light. To her, it didn’t matter if she wasn’t coming back, if she could no longer see him. Only one concrete thought surfaced in front of her, painting the words that she wished had been true.

She should have let it be…she should have pretended to be happy with him. Maybe if she hadn’t ended it, she wouldn’t be like this – so lost

…and drowning.

**