You could feel your heart beating loudly in your chest, hands trembling as horror and sorrow swirled in your head, slowly consuming you. How could you ever consider that someone could love you? What made you so sure that you were good enough for Rin?

You stared down at your shaking hands, and glanced up at the mirror that hung still on the wall. The color had drained from your face, and large tears rolled slowly down your cheeks.

You had just started to trust. Your life had just started changing for the better. Things were just starting to look up, and you lost it all. Again.

Your stomach churned, and all the strength in your body seemed to vanish. You fell to your knees, shaking, eyes glazed over like glass. You slumped against your bed and stared down at the wooden floor boards, wishing you could just wake up already.

"It's not true, right?" You questioned aloud, like there was someone there - someone who actually cared - to listen to you.

Then it dawned on you. You had nothing desirable. All you could give him was your heart, and even that was deformed and ugly.

And yet, you could still feel the ache his absence brought.

He lied. He hurt you. He destroyed everything. So why did your heart yearn for him? After everything he did, you still missed the warmth of his body next to yours, the sound of his heartbeat, the soft kisses and the heat they left in his wake, his hand holding yours, the way he said your name; you missed it all, and you hated that you did.

It made you feel sick - the way you always need people who don't need you.

You were just a temporary replacement, nothing special. You told yourself that he was no different. That what you felt was just physical affection, but your shoulders shook, and you knew better than anyone that you were lying to yourself.

"What am I thinking?" You muttered. "He was everything. He's the one thing I can't replace."

Wounds skin-deep always heal, but the scars they leave never disappear.

If your friend was there, they'd no doubt say something like, "there are other fish in the sea," but Rin wasn't a fish. He was the whole fucking ocean.

You turned your gaze down to your arms and the flaws that covered them, each a battle to survive that you fought bravely. They weren't cute, or beautiful, or lovely. They were hideous moments in which you lost a little more of yourself in the sweet agony each cut brought forth in a shed of blood.

You were addicted to the few seconds the pain made you feel alive. Watching the deep red liquid spill from the slit in your wrist offered a kind reminder that deep down, you're human, too.

Your teeth sank into your bottom lip as you contemplated indulging in your cruel habit once more for the sake of feeling better, but the thought provided no comfort - not like it used to.

Your phone vibrated in your pocket, and you slowly pulled it out to view the text your received. It was from your friend.

"Hey, you okay? I just got a mass text."

You were confused, and your phone chimed again. "[Fwd Message]; 'the new girl is a slut! whored herself out after only a week! get in on this shit before rin takes another shot!'"

You paled. The text was about you, wasn't it? Rin was only using you. It took a moment to fully sink in, and you couldn't breathe. Tears of anger burned in your eyes and you threw your phone across the room. You heard a shatter, but didn't bother to look up, knowing the state of which the mirror was now in.

Heavy sobs shook your form as you pulled your knees to your chest, hiding your face in your arms. You couldn't take it anymore. Why was this happening to you? You didn't do anything to deserve this.

"Make it stop," you begged, but no one would come to your rescue now. "I hate this."

Your phone went off multiple times, and you crawled over to where it lay face-down on the floor amidst the broken glass, submitting yourself to the pain.

Your number had been spread throughout the school, and your phone was flooded with messages from the girls calling you horrible names as they blamed you for everything under the sun, and messages from the boys asking sex.

Just when your hands had finally stopped trembling, the shaking began again.

"The feeling of pain is just as addictive as smoking or drinking," your mother once told you long ago, "which is why when you're hurt often enough, it becomes your 'normal'. You start seeking it out, and like drinking or smoking, something always ends up broken in the end."

"Don't let it become your addiction," you reminded yourself, but you needed your intoxicating sip of pain so you could become too numb to remember.

Your phone vibrated with a notification from your friend. "Did you really do all those things? You're disgusting. Don't ever talk to me again, you slut."

That was all it took. That was your breaking point. Your world suddenly came down on you. You couldn't take it anymore.

"What did I do to deserve this?" You rubbed at your eyes with your hands to wipe the tears away. You left your dorm to go for a walk, getting disgusted looks from all the other girls.

"Someone get that nasty bitch out of our dorm!"

"Don't wanna catch her STDs!"

The rumors and lies spread like wildfire until you were all but chased out of the dorms by the other girls. Without looking back, you ran until it felt as though your legs might give out at any moment.

You glanced around, determining if you recognized any of the buildings, but you didn't.

You thought things couldn't get any worse, but the most horrible things were yet to come.