New Story... Also Untitled

Sitting on the swings and swinging slightly with the cool breeze helps to sooth me. I do not know why but it does... That's where I am now... Where I alway am... It's quiet like always. Everyday I sit here alone and think about my life. But today is different. Today there is a boy I have never met before sitting on a swing next to me. I don not know when he sat next to me. But I think he has been there for some time now.

"You seem sad," he says to me when he discovers that I have noticed him.

I just look at him, in reply. I bite my lip and lower my eyes to the ground.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asks. I feel compelled to tell him. For some reason, I feel like I can talk to him and open up to him, which is strange because I don't even tell my best friends how I feel these days.

I raise my eyes back to his face. "It's a long story," I say softly.

"I'm not doing anything today," he tells me.

"It starts with my childhood." I'm not sure if he will stick around for me to tell him. He may not realize how long it is. Or he may just get bored with the story and leave me as I am baring my soul to a stranger.

"That seems like a good place to start." He gives me a comforting smile.

I sigh and look at my lap and pick at my nails. "Well, I guess I had a fairly happy childhood... I had two older sisters to whom I could look up to. I had both my mom and my dad... I took dance lessons... I played often and I had plenty of friends...

"But late at night I would be kept up because I could hear my parents fighting loudly... I could hear the dishes crash as my father threw them. Don't get me wrong... He never hit my mom, at least that I know of. He would only hit my sisters and me as a punishment... A smack across the knee when we were loud in public... A spanking when we misbehaved... That kind of stuff... But that doesn't mean I wasn't abused as a child." I glance over at the boy to see him listening intensely.

I quietly stare at my purple flip flops for a few minutes.

"It was my sisters that would hurt me. The eldest would physically beat me for years. And both of them would ridicule me and make cruel comments about me and to me." I pause. "The beating went on regularly for many years. Whenever she would get bored she would hurt me to entertain herself. It stopped about the time she turned 14, making me about 11. Well, it didn't totally stop. Whenever she would get mad at me she would hit me... Kick me... Find a heavy object and beat me with it... At the time, I thought no one knew about it and I knew I couldn't stand up for myself. Whenever I tried to my sisters would just laugh at me and make me feel bad. A few months ago my dad told me that he knew it was going on and he tried to stop it but my mom wouldn't let him. I highly doubt that is true though. I don't think he noticed it until he was almost out of our lives completely.

"See, when I was 8 my parents got divorced. My dad moved out when I was 10. He moved two hours away so we spent every other weekend with him. Not long after the divorce my dad started dating again. His first girlfriend was pretty cool... I don't remember her much. The second one... I can't even remember her name. The third... was my favorite. She understood me, even though I was about 12... She knew just how to act around me... But the relationship didn't last. My dad is now with someone I hate. And he has been for years.She hates my sisters and me... She thinks we were raised horribly and that we can do nothing right." I start swinging a little and dig my feet into the ground.

"I started to get fat when I was about 10 or 11. And it just never stopped. My depression started when I was 13. I haven't been diagnosed with depression but I know what it is. It was when I first started to cut myself and try to kill myself. I remember the first time I tried to kill myself... I hadn't begun to cut yet. I tried to smother myself one night. I don't know where I had first heard about cutting. It may have been from that special on it I watched with my mother. Or that book, Cut, or just from people I knew. But by now I was know to about four or so friends. I was basicly a pariah. Only one of those friends would hang out with me outside of school. But cutting helped me to feel better. No one knew. I didn't even tell my friends until recently.Those people I was friends with back them... I never talk to them anymore.

"About a year ago, I realized I had an eating disorder. I was a binge eater. Normally binging comes with bulimia but not always. My friend though he had it too. I don't know if he really does. He weighs less than I do... And I know he eats a lot but it may just be out of boredom. I found comfort in food. Food and sharp objects were the only things to make me feel better... No person could.

"I can count my friends on one hand. One is older than me. One is the same age as me. And the other two are younger... But not by much... The younger girl feels the same way as I do about a lot of things. So naturally we became great friends. The boy younger than me... Is a bit crazy and likes to goof off even if it means getting into a lot of trouble. The girl the same as me... Well... She is a great friend and is always there for me... All three of them cut or used to. The friend that is older than me... He is in college and wants to be a psychiatrist. He hates cutting... He sees no point in it. And I love him so much... He is one of the best friends I have ever had. These four are the best friends I have ever had." I can feel the tears starting to run down my face but I try to blink them back. "Whenever I would feel bad, I would turn to him to cheer me up... It's because of him and the younger girl that I stopped cutting. The girl was also trying to stop and we decided to work together on it, I guess... But the only reason I haven't cut in the five months I have gone without doing it is because I don't want to let them down." I give up on trying to stop the tears and let them fall freely.

"I know my family doesn't like me. Some of them say it... But they don't need to. The last time I talked to my dad was on my birthday two months ago... He is the reason that my family so poor, but I won't really go into that... I used to cry myself to sleep... But it stopped... Except for last night. Not the oldest sister, but the other one... And I got into a fight. At first it was just an agruement... But then she started to hit me with the heavy glass she had... And she kicked me a few times... My mom blamed me for it. She told me it was my own fault. Which it probably was..." I stop swinging and just sit on the swing. "I cried for at least two hours. I shut myself in my room at 8:30 and refused to leave until this morning..."

Together, the boy and I just sit on the swings, neither of us talk. I cry until the tears stop coming. We stay on the swings until it gets dark. He offers to walk me home. I decline and thank for him listening and I apologize for the crying and the story.

He gives me a hug. "Thank you for telling me the story. I am sorry you had that life." He gives me a reassuring smile. I walk away. When I am almost out of sight, I turn around. I can see the boy still sitting there. I smile at the kindness he showed me. It feels good to have a good reason to smile. I want to run back to him and give him a big hug. But something inside me stops me. I turn around and continue on my way home. As I walk home, I wonder who he is and if I will ever see him again. But I realize that it doesn't matter.