I ran all the way to the cliff that night. When I got there, tired and sore and in more pain, physically and emotionally, than I had ever been in maybe the entirety of my existence, I threw myself onto the dirt path, feeling too much like an actual corpse to go any further towards the outlook. There would be no stars for me that night.

And then I was crying, and wanting him to be there, and hold me, but knowing that he wouldn't. That Phil was gone, and I had pushed him away, and everything that had led up to this moment and this loneliness and this awful, awful sorrow was my fault.

There are so many lies I've told, falsehoods and things I've kept hidden that are meant to stay that way. Not just to protect myself, but to protect the ones I once called friends. Because, no matter what they've done to me, and I to them, a teenage mistake should never be enough to ruin a life. No one deserves that.

Even us.

But, I suppose, I'm a biased judge.

Joe came to our school at the end of junior high. We were already a pretty tight knit grade; everyone, by then, had found a place, and everyone knew better than try to push out of theirs. But Joe was different. I don't know how, or why, he had been as he had, maybe his old school was more accepting, or maybe he had been more popular there, but he'd been...nice. Innocent.

As I said, an easy target.

I like to blame what happened next on Anthony. Because, surely, it couldn't have been all me. Someone could've stepped up, or said no, or even questioned my—our—actions. Maybe they would've gotten crap for it, but...really.

It first started with the Batman shirt.

Joseph wore it every day we had a test. He claimed that it was good luck, a gift from his father. And it may well have been; he aced every test, every assignment, even, that was assigned.

But the shirt was old. Faded. Dirty and torn in the armpits, and really I felt justified in believing that burning it really was the humane thing to do.

Maybe we just shouldn't have burned the rest of his outfit with it.

From there, it only got worse. We teased Joseph mercilessly, and definitely not in the playful way we claimed to. His books were trashed, his food thrown, and his family insulted. And I think the worst part about it all was that it felt great.It felt powerful. It felt like I was on top of the world.

Until I found his body at the bottom of the cliff, floating in the ocean.

Joseph's as useless as a single sock, we used to say.

And, in that moment, he really was.

I cried and cried and cried. Cried until I couldn't seem to remember the last time I'd mourned so hard. Cried until everything was a haze, sound and colors and even the bright headlights and the arms the wrapped around my waist far too tight.

And, by the time my reality snapped painfully back into focus, it was too late.

Surrounding me, carrying me, were Jack the First (I knew a lot of Jacks), Connor, and Ryan. Three members of my exclusive former inner circle. The three of them held my weight easily, faltering only once, when JTF stumbled over a rock.

Facing toward the ground as I was, I couldn't see where they were taking me, until we were there, and I was hanging over the cliff.

The sound of the ocean pounding the rocks rushed into my ears, and I remembered all the nights and days I'd spent here, with friend and foe alike.

With Anthony, always making bets as to who could jump out farther, and then being too chicken to jump into the frigid water, not that anyone would ever know besides us.

With Jack, recently, collecting data for a science project and pretending to agree when he complained about how boring the chess club was, and commended me for dealing with them for so long.

And, lastly, with Phil. Just laughing and talking and feeling like someone who had nothing to hide.

Feeling normal.

This place...it belonged to us.

But mostly, it seemed, it belonged to me.

Until I felt the grip of their hands slacken, and I was tumbling through nothing. 

Ice burns.

The water felt like cement, first battering my body around so much that I remembered Joseph, and I wondered if I really was dead, and then enveloping me completely in its darkness.

There were so many things that water seemed to be that life was not. Forgiving, for one; I remembered learning to swim. The water hadn't cared that I sputtered and I flailed and I kicked. It only sent me back to shore to try again.

It also seemed like an escape, a rest. It promised of darkness and shelter from fear and pain. Shelter from everything I wasn't ready to face, but knew, if I were to continue, that I would have to.

But most importantly, it seemed warm. And the longer I stayed there, the warmer it seemed to be.

And I was so ready to give in. I'll admit it. Because it would just be easier, you know? To let myself sink in the waves, to disappear. To hide from life and mistakes and peering eyes. To finally, above all things, be invisible.

Because that was what I wanted, right? To be unknown? To not stick out? To be one of the normal ones, the ones no one bothered, and that bothered no one?

Invisible is normal, and normal is safe.

But it's also so lonely.

Before I could make the choice and let myself relax, I heard a shout. A wail, almost, and then splashing.

Arms grabbed my waist again, but this time, they did not scare me.

This time, they felt like home.