Teddy's Last Text

Life happens, but sometimes we aren't equipped to handle how to react.

It’s 6:30 AM. The bus leaves in 30 minutes. Why isn’t he answering his phone? I refuse to pay the fine if he doesn’t show. The jackass is standing me up. I’ll call Spencer, she will always be up for a free day at the zoo.

“Spence, it’s me. I’m sorry, I know it’s early but want to go to the Zoo? We have to leave in 30 minutes on the bus, I’m coming over to pick you up. Thanks, love you!”

She knows I can’t take more disappointment after the last couple months I’ve had. When I get to her apartment she is just about ready to go.

“So what happened to Luke?” she asked when we were driving to the bus.

I told her about how since I refused to sleep with him he decided not to be bothered with my life. Whatever, I didn’t like him and he couldn’t accept that. I’m not over Teddy yet, despite that he’s clearly over me. I spent a year of my life devoted to him and we shared different religious values. It wasn’t a big deal to me but his ‘mommy’ didn’t approve. Since she basically told him I was no good for him, he began finding things that were wrong with me. An excuse to justify being an a*****e and breaking my heart.

I’m a big girl. I’m 18 years old and I just moved away from home. I’m going to suck it up and move on with my life.

Teddy and I still talk. We are trying the let’s be friend thing; after all he was my best friend before anything else.

We just got to the Zoo. Spencer is meeting Jessica. I have plans with her and some other girls tonight. Dinner and club type of thing, so I really want Spencer to get along with them, this way she can join us sometime too. She’s anti-Teddy, but I’m sure she won’t notice if I text him while she’s talking to the other girls.

*Good morning Teddy (:*

No response. So I brush it off.

“C’mon Spence, let’s see the monkeys.”

Thirty minutes later:
*Why the f**k do you keep talking to me? I saw you went out drinking again. God, you are such a f**k up.*

Spence saw something was immediately wrong. I tried to hide it but that’s just not me. I can’t keep things hidden. Not anymore. You would think I would be really good at it by now. She knew that his family didn’t approve of me but she didn’t know much else. About how he kept me a secret, that he maliciously convinced me that he loved me so when we were together I would show him what he wanted to see. To please him. To make him happy. It didn’t matter that I felt violated. That I felt belittled. I felt the attention. I felt needed. So I did what he asked. No matter how uncomfortable it made me. He was too vain to notice the newfangled furrow each time I lay before him defenseless and bare.

Teddy believed in waiting until marriage for sex. I wasn’t a virgin when we started dating. He never let me forget that. “oh, you can have sex with someone else but you can’t even get naked for me?”

Spencer tried everything. She even got me a goofy hat to cheer me up and convinced me to attempt feeding a llama. Nothing worked. I didn’t eat lunch, having lost my appetite. The rest of the day was a dud.

I was so taken aback. How could someone I found so important easily just be so mean. He was my best friend. We met when we were eleven years old. To have the capacity to think so little of someone you thought so much of, simply just to please your mother, is somewhat absurd to me. I don’t know if I’m more hurt or angry. The stress to impress him, to be perfect, to show him I’m worth it, is too much.

What got me through the rest of the day is knowing I still had some control left. Knowing I had the power.

I got back to my place around 4:00. It didn’t take long for me to find the all too familiar pair of scissors. I took the edge and carved a ditch. Four to be more specific. Four lines to the upper left arm. Deeper than ever before. The blood didn’t cease. I lay there until the pressure faded away.

That’s when Jessica came in. My sweatshirt’s sleeve contained a deep red circle. My own blood. The tension and stress of perfection dripped away with my consciousness. No more perfection.

Just me.

And it feels good.

Author's Note

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