Celeste’s POV https://youtu.be/dvXluCH1_7o?si=h0Z9yvy1X5_fNcrX
I’ve been wishing I could be unconscious. I deal with so much pain all the time, from small things like dealing with Jake making fun of me to bigger things like suffering Maggie’s abuse. I feel so incredibly worthless and unable to make change in my life. Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I were to try to fight my problems, like by defending myself or something like that. But ultimately I don’t think I can. When I’m able to sleep is one of the most comforting times for me. That’s the best thing to do, since I can’t hurt my friends by killing myself. Their love for me is the main thing still giving me a will to live.
I get to school, I go to class. We’re reading a graphic novel in class, but I’m unable to pay attention. I continuously put my head down on my desk, and our TA, Ms. Grace keeps telling me to lift my head back up while Ms. Layla reads. When we’re told to get our computers to start working on an assignment, I write a poem instead.
Night Night
My life is bad at school and at home
Worse at home, but still not ideal at school
Dad’s wife Maggie hates me
But she’s the one who ruined my life, not the other way around
At school Skyler and I get bullied by that ugly and stupid kid named Jake
I get insulted and get my feelings hurt
Both at school and at home
When I’m just existing and minding my own business
At home dad is oblivious
At school the teachers are oblivious
My self esteem has gotten so low
I feel insecure all the time
My friends and my grandmas are the only reason I can manage to feel happiness sometimes
I’m so exhausted and sad and angry and stressed all the time
I always blame myself for things
Kat says everything is gonna be ok
That we’re gonna get through this
But I don’t feel that way
I’m such a pessimist
But I have a reason to be
More than one reason to be
And all of this is precisely why I don’t want to be awake
I can’t run away from my problems so I hide in the world of my dreams
I can hide, but I can’t run
When I go to sleep
I won’t have to be stressed in the real world
I will be in my dreams
Kat won’t have to see me cry
She will just see me sleeping
Maggie won’t have to tell me to shut the fuck up
Because she will notice that I am silent
And my pillow won’t have to hold my screams
It will just have to hold my head
Because I’ll be saying night night to everyone and everything.
After class it’s time for nutrition. I sit with Kat, Dante, Skyler and Sugar. Dante never even has to ask if I’m ok, he just immediately gives me a side hug because he knows I need sympathy and comfort.
“Do you wanna talk about your feelings, Celeste?” Sugar asks me
“No, I’d rather not” I respond. I don’t wanna burden my friends with my feelings, especially not Sugar since she already has had problems with Jake treating her like she’s his therapist.
“We’re all here for you,” Kat says reassuringly
Them being here for me makes me feel warm and comforted, but I still have to question why they want to be here for someone like me.
At the beginning of lunch…
I got through every class feeling bored, depressed, and exhausted. As usual. At least I feel safer here than at home. I feel myself get aggressively shoved, and a millisecond before I can process that it’s Jake I squeal in fear. He laughs and mocks me, like he always does. I look at him with hatred in my eyes.
“You look so fucking stupid when your angry,” He says, still laughing at me as he walks away
I can’t deal with him anymore. My legs start running toward him before I can give it any second thought. Then suddenly I punch him on the arm. He turns around and looks shocked. I try to pull myself in the other direction, I should be running away, but something makes me stay here in front of him. Then my mouth seems to have a mind of its own.
“Fuck you!” I shout, “I hate you with every fiber of my being! You have no idea what I’ve been through, you wouldn’t survive five minutes with my home life, being the pathetic loser you are! You act like I’m just a weak retard, and maybe I am but I guarantee you’re even weaker!”
For a second he just looks uncomfortable, but then he looks like he’s about to laugh again. I get even angrier and punch him on the arm a second time as a kneejerk reaction. But to my horror, the principal walks by right as I do that.
“Hey, Celeste, that is not ok!” Ms. Cara says.
After lunch Ms. Cara talks to me in her office for a few minutes.
“Jake pushed me before I did that,” I explain, “he’s been pushing me a lot. It scares me to be pushed,” I decide not to tell her the specific reason it scares me, “And he mocks my reaction every time. I know it wasn’t right to hit him but I didn’t do it for no reason,”
“I’m sorry Celeste. i didn’t know he attacked you first. Do you know if he treats other people like this?”
“He does, he bullies other students all the time. Early in the school year he threw snap n’ pops at people in the hallway, and he made fun of Sasha’s speech impediment. I never told you because I was scared to,” I explain
She says she’ll look into the situation and I leave. Maybe I’m not so worthless after all, this had a positive outcome.
After getting home and having dinner…
I wash the dishes before Maggie can even yell at me to do them. But I can feel her creep up behind me as I’m scrubbing a plate.
“You’re doing it wrong,” She grumbles
I feel more confidence to try to stand up for myself, “You just want to always have something to be mad at me for, I’m not doing anything incorrectly”
“Just let me do the dishes, you little bitch!” She shouts
She pushes me out of the way, then I push her back, then she pushes me so hard I fall back onto the floor. She presses her foot down on my arm as she looks down at me. Once I apologize, she lifts her foot and lets me get up and leave.
I can’t ever be confident for too long. I can’t ever fix everything in my life. I fix one problem and then something else bad happens to me. I really am helpless and worthless.
At 11:00 PM…
I’ve been feeling suicidal, like I do every night. Normally the time I turn the lights off would be peaceful, the time when I can escape the real world and go to my dreams. But for some reason my body has different plans for me tonight. I toss and turn, eventually I give up. Kat comes into our room, she’s stayed up later than me lately so it’s not a surprise she’s up. I ask her to redo my braid for me since it got messy, and then I turn the lights back on. I sit on my bed, and Kat sits next to me. On my phone I play the song please put me in a medically induced coma by carolesdaughter, and I sing along with it. I’m looking down as I sing, but I can feel Kat looking at me with concern.
After singing the whole song, Kat and I decide to say goodnight to each other. I try to sleep again and still can’t. I have overwhelming feelings of wanting to die. I’m too weak to keep dealing with the pain that life throws at me.
At 3:00 AM…
I finally decide I can’t handle this anymore. I get up and walk to the kitchen. I take the melatonin jar out of the cabinet. I pour the gummies into my mouth. I take a while to chew all of them, and gag a little as I swallow them. I finally feel exhausted. I stumble back to my room with blurry vision, and collapse onto my bed. As my eyelids get heavier, I think about my friends and how grateful I am to have them. I don’t really want to die, because they make life worth it. I fall asleep with this positive realization in mind.
Broken Minds 