I pressed the blade deeper into my wrist. Watching as the blood dripped onto the floor, completely transfixed by the rich red color. The way it pooled on the tile, falling into the grout and flowing along the pathways as if it knew where it was going. It was beautiful, stunning, the blood. The blood was a distraction, from the pain in my head, the pain in my heart. The constant noise and yammering that I call the voices. They tell me I’m ugly, they tell me I’m too fat, I’m too skinny, I’m not smart enough, not popular enough, not good enough, I’m a w****, a bad person, and that I have no reason what so ever to be here.

The blade slipped off my wrist because of the blood, engraving my arm further, adding to the numerous scars. Each out accounting for a time where I lost control, when I couldn’t take the noise. The incessant clamoring. Most people don’t know this side of me, yet they see it everyday, and they ignore it. How long will it be before they notice the short stories I write are about me? That I only change the names of the characters, but the actual story, is mine? My sorrow, my tears, my heart break! My. . . insanity.

Most people would not think themselves as insane, they would try to reassure others of there sanity, but not I. I know I’m slightly insane- how else do you explain the voices? At least, that's how I’ve been taught. I’m just some stupid freshman girl who knows nothing off life, of love, and is not worth anything.

Tears fell from my lashes, mingling with the blood on the tile. The blade dropped from my hand, for the shaking that started in my mind traveled throughout my whole body. Did it hurt? Yes, yes the blade hurt, but not as much as the words, the treatment that I’ve been subjected too.

I made my way feebly over to the first aid kit kept under the table, picking out a bundle of gauze and some tape to fix my wrist, yet again. Routine.

My mother doesn’t understand, I tried talking to her about my problems, but she tossed them aside again and again; just a stupid childish cry for attention, she said. I was making a scene she said. I was a disgrace, a bad scene compared to my brother. The perfect child; perfect grades, popular, fit, beautiful. Everything I’m not, right mom? I’m a worthless waste of space.

I cut the gauze off and tapped it down, and sat back down against the fridge. When my mom started to notice the cuts, she didn’t care, told me it was a cry for attention, that it was only going to make me uglier, so it was my problem not hers. I’m nothing to her.

The turn of a key, the click of a lock, and the twisting of a knob signified my mother’s arrival home. I panicked, if she saw the blood she’d send me away, send me to my uncles. I can’t go back there. No! I won’t go back there!

“Anna, where are you? I need you to get the rest of the s*** out of my car,” My mother’s voice came from the door way. Filled not with love, but said as though talking to a slave, someone so completely lower than you that they could not possibly even be considered human.

I scrambled to clean up the blood with the rag I grabbed of the counter, scrubbing away my sin, as the tears continued to fall relentlessly. Small sobs escaping from my chest, echoing my mother’s foot steps.

“Hey, you awful girl! I’m talking to you, you little s***! Don’t ignore me! What did I tell you about-” the bag she held slipped from her grasp as she took in the sight of me on the floor. I yelped, and scrambled to get away from her claws, but she took hold of my pony tail, yanking me to her. The fake nails she wore dug into my scalp, to keep me in place, and her other hand came around to grab my face, turning it toward her. My blue eyed, blond haired mother did not look like the beautiful princess she thought herself to be, but instead she was an ice queen. Rage filled eyes glowed, but did not melt the sharpness of her voice that cut into me like knives.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!?” She snarled, and I felt her breath on the nape of my neck.

“Nothing, Mother I swear!” I choked out at her. My voice distorted with pain. Her expression did not waver.

“I see the blood on the floor you little lying b****! You’re been cutting again, I know you have, I can see! Didn’t I tell you not to lie to your mother!” Her shrieks pierced my head, as well as my heart. She didn’t know how those words hurt me. I was nothing to her.

“Mother I’m sorry! I tried, I really did try,” I pleaded with her, I couldn’t go back. My mother took hold of my wrist, and pulled up my sleeve to reveal the gauze, through which blood seeped.

“This, you little b****, is going to cost you!”

She clutched my wound, sending a wave of pain throughout my arm. I screamed as she dragged me out of the kitchen, taking me up the stairway into her room. She kicked the door open and threw me to the ground at the foot of her bed. She just tossed me aside like trash, then turned on her heel, and went to her dresser, opening the drawer, taking out a blade of her own. I cowered, away from her, ignoring the protests from my wrist I tried to crawl away, but has no luck, as her vicious claws dug deep into my arm.

I screamed again as she held my arm against her nightstand, and with one quick motion cut of the gauze. She was going to kill me, I could feel it. The way she wielded her blade with such certainty, such vigor. I knew she was not afraid to hurt me.

“Mother please, I’ll do anything! Anything!!” I whimpered, for she twisted my arm at my words. She put the blade against my wrist, and held it there, pressing on the cut I made earlier, making the blood ooze out. I screamed in agony.

“Oh really? And why should I listen to you! I already know you don’t follow orders! You will learn to do as you’re told our I’ll just ship you off to your uncle!” As she threatened me she swiped the blade along the cut, deepening it, widening it. Another wail escaped from my chest. One cannot imagine the pain of this, though not of the blade, but of the person whom manipulates it. A mother, the very one who cared for you as a baby, who fed you, bathed you; held the blade to you, not afraid to kill you.

“NO! NO, NO, NO! Mother you can’t give me to him!” I tired to break free from her grasp but the blade bit deeper into my flesh, almost touching bone now, another scream.

“See what happens when you’re a bad girl, darling? Don’t you want to please your mommy?” Her voice losing rage, gaining a sugar sweet tone, but keeping its malice. I don’t understand her mood swings, but I know she is worse than I.

“Mother, you don’t know what he’s like when you’re not there! He beats me, mother!” But my pleas did nothing but make her swipe the blade again, a fresh line of scarlet forming on my arm. I cried out, hoping for someone, anyone to hear me, for anyone to care enough to save me.

“Ha! And why is that a bad thing? You need punishment you little s***! You are nothing! You are a horrible daughter, and I am ashamed to call you mine. Why can’t you be more like Mason?” She slashed at my arm again, another cut. More blood, so, so much blood pooling on the table. Beautiful, rich, dark blood. The more blood pooled, the fuzzier everything became.

“Why can’t you be popular!” She cuts the blade into my flesh. “More beautiful!” Another. “Why can’t you be smarter!” Another. “Why can’t you be a good daughter, you filthy, ugly, stupid, poor, defenseless, attention seeking, insane, b****!”

Every word, another line, another cut, another piece of me dying on the inside. Another black dot added to my vision. Another scream emitted from my dry moth, my broken lungs. Another stab to my already broken heart.

“Mother please!” She laughed at me, and pulled the blade up, drops of blood falling from it. I closed my eyes.

“You made my life a living hell! You were supposed to be the perfect daughter! But when I look at you all I see is shame! All I see is-”

I waited for her to continue, but her voice got quieter and quieter, and soon faded completely. All that blood, all my blood, gone, the blackness, the screams, the laughter, all one. All melding together into nothingness. The pain was gone from me, I felt nothing, nothing at all. No stinging, not heartache. I knew what had happened but I refused to believe it. Refused to believe. I could finally be free, free from pain, from sorrow, from her. But, then again, there is always a lie in Believe, am I wrong, Mother?