The razor looks so small and insignificant as I carefully wrap it up and place it back into my wallet for next time. I’m not naive enough anymore to tell myself there won’t be a ‘next time’. I can’t even remember why I do it these days except that there’s a kind of elegance, a tenderness that seems to radiate from the blade as it bites my flesh, as if the ugliness of what I’m doing doesn’t compare to the beauty I feel after self-harming.

/Every time I walk out of the suicide ward the same eyes are watching me, full of pity, fear and disgust. I treat them all to a smile and a ‘I feel just fine thanks.’ The drab doctors in their off-white coats all ask the same questions, (are you on medication? Is there a line of mental illness in your family?) The shrinks are just the same with the exception of an occasional ‘and how does that
make you feel?’ /

/‘Yes. No. Just fine thanks.’/

/ /

I throw on an already bloodstained shirt, leaving the buttons undone and walk outside. It’s cold and the tiny hairs on my belly stand up like little soldiers ready to defend my body from the weather. I light a cancerstick and take four quick drags before changing my mind, stubbing it out on the wall as I skulk back indoors. I remember a time I used to do that just to feel independent, (fuck you mother I can do whatever I bloody well want.)

/I cried for my mummy the first time I put myself in hospital, my ex called me a whiney, emotional bitch and walked out. I broke the metal dinner tray and cut myself with the jagged edge./

/ /

I take a cruiser out of the fridge then slide down the door until I’m sitting on the bare floorboards. This insomnia is killing me. From here I can only just reach the TV remote which has fallen from the table, I hit the on switch and am bombarded with late night/early morning Rage. The music makes me think of a time when my life was more than just a destructive cycle, golly gee, those were the days.

/I was sixteen and made out with Roach in his garage while his band played the most god awful shit and his parents hit the roof./

/‘They’re just a couple of silly old cunts.’ He told me one day because they’d really named him Gabriel and wouldn’t let him legally change it./

/‘When I turn eighteen I’ll do whatever I want and you and me babe? We’ll run away together an’ have kinds an’ shit.’/

I find it strange now that I once considered that a beautiful future, (kids an’ shit indeed) but any little change is welcome these days…

/ /I take a box of Nembutal out of the draw and choke on twice the recommended dosage, washing it down with the last of the vodka. As I stumble into my darkened room and crash onto the bed I wonder if I’ll wake up tomorrow.

Staring at the empty ceiling I whisper into the silent space, ‘I fucking love my life.’

And sink into the deepest sleep I’ve had in ages.