OWEN'S POV-----

Tuesday morning, Brinley doesn't come over when she's supposed to. Her mom specifically told me she was still going to stay at my place during the day. Yesterday, her mom said Brinley would stay with her since she was sick, just a day thing. But now, it's almost an hour late, and she's still not here.

Either they lost track of the day, or something's wrong. And I'm willing to bet there's something wrong.

I hurry down to my car, still wearing my sweats, and begin driving the distance to the Shane's house. Anxiety is filling me quickly, even though I don't even know if anything really is wrong. I just have that feeling.

I pull my phone out of my pocket to try calling again, pressing the 2 on speed dial.

"Hi, this is Brinley, I'll call you back when I get the chance."

It doesn't hit me until I'm about two minutes away that I can call Clarin too, since she'll most likely be with Brinley.

She picks up after two rings.

"Owen?" She sounds like she's crying.

"Clarin? Are you okay? What's going on?" I ask, my anxiety at its peak.

"It's Brinley... She's scaring me... Just please-please get here. Maybe you can help." And then she hangs up the phone.

I hardly give myself time to park my car. I'm running up the front porch and into the house. My first instinct is to walk up the stairs and to her bedroom. Her mom and sister are standing outside the door, Clarin against it with a tearstained face. Her mom is standing, hands clasped together, looking concerned.

"What's happening?" I ask as I approach.

"She... She keeps saying..." Clarin tries to explain to me, but fails, sobbing into her hands.

"She's not letting us in. She's thinking irrationally and keeps talking nonsense about herself. I don't understand half of it," she says, tears rising in her eyes. "Please, please try to get her out before she does anything."

"Brinley," I knock rapidly on the door. "Open up Brinley. Please. It's me, Owen."

"What are you doing here, Owen?" She asks, but instead of the hopeful, cheerful voice she usually says my name in, it sounds hostile and mocking.

"I need to make sure you're okay," I say, head resting against the door.

"To make sure I'm okay?" She says, sounding distant. "How am I supposed to know that?"

"Let me in there, Brinley," I say, shaking the doorknob.

"How should I know if I'm okay if I don't know anything else about myself? Who am I? Who are you? I don't even know you," she sounds insane is what it is. She doesn't sound like herself.

"Is there a key to this door?" I ask, turning to Clarin and her mom.

"Yes," her mom says, "But it's in her room. She took it. And even if we could pick that lock, she pushed her desk in front of it."

"When did this start happening?" I ask, eye back on the door.

"I came to get her at six and she was standing at her window, staring out it, just sobbing. Then she was mumbling. Then she was shrieking," Clarin says.

"Brinley, open this, now!" I call, the worry building up in my chest, needing an outlet.

"Everything I'm living right now is a lie," she says. "I'm a stranger to you. I'm a stranger to myself."

"I need to get in there before she does something irrational," I say quickly. "I'll go around through her window."

"Thank you," her mom calls out before I'm down the stairs and in her backyard. I scale the tree that leads up to the window quicker than I ever have before. The adrenaline in my body is kicking higher and higher and then I'm at her window, climbing through.

"I don't know you," she says. I can't believe what I see when I look at her. She has a tear stained face, mascara running down it, her hair a mess around her head. She has this unrecognizable and distant look in her eye. And it kills me to see her like this.

I take a step closer to her. She steps backward.

"Listen to me Brinley," I say carefully. "I know you. You're a wonderful person. I love you. Your family loves you. We all know you."

"But you don't," she says, sounding angry. "And I don't either."

"You do-"

"I do not," she pulls a frame of her dresser and throws it at the wall, and it shatters.

"Don't do that," I suck in a sharp breath.

"I don't," she throws another frame, "think you realize," a glass doll split into pieces across the room, "what it's like," a snowglobe broken, "to live with a barrier in your mind." Tears gleam in her eyes and down her face. Her fragile objects all lay in a pile across a room, scattered in pieces. "Everything dangles in front of me, but just out of my reach. And it's driving me crazy."

"I know," I say, "I know it's hard. But I love you. I care about you. I want you to be okay. And I can help you-"

"You cannot help me," she slams her hands down on her desk. "You don't love me."

"But I d-"

"And I was a fool to think that you could," she tilts her head to the side, holding a little glass statue in her hand. "You're in love with Brinley." She throws the statue at the wall as well, with far more force than the others.

"You are Brinley. I do love you," I say, stepping closer and closer. She's scaring me so much right now. I hardly even recognize her.

"No," she narrows her eyes at me, "I'm not Brinley. That's what everyone want me to be, but I'm just not. And I never will be. I don't even know who that is."

"Stop thinking like that," I say as gently as I can. "I understand this is difficult to process, but you truly are the same girl you were before the accident."

"Our entire relationship is based off lies. My life is a lie. I am a lie," she says quietly.

I hear a knock at her bedroom door. I move behind her and pull the dresser away from the door, unlocking it. Clarin and her mom walk inside, looking afraid to see her.

"I don't want to hear what you have to say," Brinley says to them.

"We love you. How can you not see that? I'm your sister," Clarin says, walking towards her.

"Don't touch me," Brinley practically hisses at her. "I can't take this anymore. I don't want to take this anymore. My life is one giant lie that can never be revealed."

And then she turns toward the window, a crazy, wild look in her eye. She walks nearer to it, then turns back to us.

"I can't live in lies," she whispers, "I won't live in lies, and you shouldn't either."

I sense what she's about to do before she does it. I run towards her as fast as I can, yelling for her to stop. She tries to hurdle herself out the window. I barely make it in time to catch her around the waist, my heart beating in my throat.

She starts shrieking and screaming and thrashing. I hold onto her as long as I can, trying to calm her. Clarin's screams mix in with Brinley's and her mom is on the phone with the police.

"Let me go! I can't live with this! Let me go, or I'll never forgive you!" Brinley screams, tears falling from her face and onto both my shirt and the carpet. I've never felt so much pain for someone as I do now.

<•>•<•>

I'm waiting outside the hospital room an hour later. The doctors had to sedate her because of her reckless behavior. She's still out cold. Dr. Randall is talking with Ms. Shane about the medication he's prescribed.

Brinley has been diagnosed with severe depression.

I guess it's a common thing with patient who go through trauma. Fear of the unknown is one of the worst kinds of fear. Not knowing anything can transform someone into a constantly confused and fearful person, either towards others or themselves. Dr. Randall told us that we need to medicate her before it becomes much more of a serious problem.

Of course, what he hasn't mentioned to us yet we all know, is that she attempted suicide by throwing herself out the window. It's far more than her fear. She is trying to get rid of her fear by getting rid of herself.

"She's up," Ms. Shane comes out of the room to invite us inside. "Go ahead, Owen."

I walk in quietly, cautiously. Brinley just stares at me as if in a daze. Her hair is brushed neatly and tucked back behind her ears. Her skin is clean, no sign of the mascara or tear stains left there. I circle around her bed and stop just beside her, sitting on the edge. I take her hand in mine gently and run circles on it with my thumb.

It hits me like a brick in my gut.

I've almost lost her three times.

It's more than a miracle that I have her here with me right now.

I take in a sharp breath, looking into her unfocused eyes. I need to bring her back to me. She has to come back to me. I need my Brinley back. She has to stay safe.