First Cut is the Deepest

He looked around. Sitting in the back, no one was giving him any attention; just what he wanted. His eccentric year 7 English teacher with short, buzzed hair and ape-like hairy legs sticking out underneath her wavy skirt left the room for a moment.

He scooted the small pencil sharpener closer with his foot, and proceeded to smash it to pieces with the heel of his uniform boot. The plastic was in bits leaving behind the blade. Perfect.

Once his mother brought him back to the lair, he dashed into the restroom. Using a combination of hand sanitizer and rubbing alcohol, he did the best he could to clean the blade and make sure it wouldn’t give him an infection. He wanted to do this, but he didn’t see any reason he had to potentially die from it. He wrapped it in toilet paper and stowed it in his pocket for later.

After dinner – right on what seemed to be a developing schedule – one of his classmates phoned him. He took it to the basement, as he already knew what the deal was.

He was about an hour into the call now. He really needed to get to bed, this was taking much longer than he wanted. Once again, she was crying about how awful her life was. He never really understood why her life was so bad – in fact, it seemed a lot more fun than his own – but he pretended to care and lent her support as he could. She wasn’t depressed, she was just a hormonal middle-schooler. Next, as always, she brought up how she wanted to cut.

“No, please don’t..” he rolled his eyes. He never understood this part, but hopefully tonight was the night he’d find out why they always insist on this, what they got from it.

He managed to convince her not to cut (or at least to tell him she didn’t) and got off the phone. Finally. He escaped back to his room and went to “bed,” meaning he was shutting his door and turning off most of the lights, just to have some privacy and alone time before actually falling asleep.

Now it was time to try out this activity that he was told made people feel “alive.” He just wanted to feel something. Not physically, but emotionally. He’s so used to the other feeling.

“M.T. I thought you were going to bed?!” his mother yelled from her bed. He can’t do a single thing that goes unchecked by her.

“I will in a minute!” he shouted.

Now it was time. He laid his bare arm up on the desk, wrist facing up. He unwrapped the blade and blew off the toilet paper bits. He looked his left arm up and down. Doing any damage too close to the hand could cause permanent damage, and would be more easily seen. He picked a position and gripped the blade.

He felt nothing. He tore into his arm numerous times – which was more difficult than he had imagined with this tiny blade – and yet all that he felt was confusion. There was some pain, a weird tingling, wet sensation, and some itchiness, but no such feeling of being more “alive.” It was all a lie. All he felt was –

“M.T.! BED!” came from the other room. He turned off his light.