Sometimes when I "get up" for school, I don't wake up. I stay in my bed where it's warm and safe from those who wish to harm me, safe from myself. I wish I could stay here forever... but I can't. I've been an hour late to school, I've gotten warnings, and I always go eventually even if I'm sent home later 'cause the other teachers and students don't know what's wrong with me, say somethings wrong. They're just as scared as I am, only they're not scared of the world, they're scared of me . Eventually I have to lift the 5 ton blankets and crawl out however hard it may be. Eventually I give in to the buzzing of my angry alarm clock, always screaming at me, "It's 6 o'clock, 6:15, 7, 7:30" and I have to get up. I have to shut the noise up. I feel like throwing the clock though the window, but my parents will wake and be angry fire breathing dragons dripping hot green lava down my neck. I have to get up, but my eyes stay closed, my mind a vault, a code refusing to be cracked. "Good morning," my mother says. What's good about it? "Mmm," I reply, nothing better to say without a punishment, a locking of the door that only locks from the outside. "Breakfast?"she asks, a fake smile on her face. I know she sees through me. "Not hungry." She glares at me. "I don't care, you have to eat." No I don't. I don't have to but I do anyway, to please her. The cold oatmeal settles, a hard lump in my stomach. I drink my glass of sour OJ. They don't let me drink coffee anymore. Lazily I pull my clothes, mostly black, over my head, my legs. Cover myself in my triple layered sea-of-black safety net. I pull the comb through my tangled hair wreaking or raspberry. I slather my eyes in dark shadows, and toss the unfinished history essay into my messenger bag. My parents burn me with their eyes as I head for the door. I'm late again. "Bye" I groan. "Love you!" my dad shouts after me. I don't answer.

At school Social Studies class has already started, and the teacher, Mr. Fuzz looks at me expectantly. He's used to the routine. "Sorry I'm late." I say this every morning. "Welcome, Mary. Have a seat." I go as long as I can without saying a word, though I want to remark on the jack ass next to me's snide remarks... about my clothes, my "bitchiness", my stupid joke the day before, my unfinished homework. I close my mind as tight as I can, but my eyes stay open so Mr. Fuzz doesn't know how much I don't want to be here. I hold my breath, but his questioning voice falls upon my name. I have to ask what the question was. "What were some of the suspected causes of the civil war?" Dread Scott? Something about Lincoln? Eventually the jackass next to me answers with a snicker so I don't have to. Thanks. I really mean it. I push myself during P.E. Three push ups. I'm not surprised when the 12-year-old laughs at me. Sometimes I just watch, and my P.E. coach, also Mr. Fuzz, is convinced it's because I'm mad at him. He thinks I'm always mad at him, selfish man. Why should you get all of my anger?  The rest of the day passes in a painful but quick blur until I go home. Home is never a good place to be when you share it with "worried" parents and hateful siblings. My 7-year-old sister makes me cry. Mom says "She's 7, suck it up." I spend most of the evening "doing homework"/lying in bed trying to fall asleep. I can't get to sleep on my own, so I do my homework anyway. Mom's making dinner. Smells like meat, but she swears it's tofu crumbles. I drink a glass of tea instead. I stay awake thinking mostly of  nothingness, my head lost in a vast pool of colour that I can taste but not reach. I decide to play my guitar and drown out my parents arguing, probably about me. It's 11:30, and everyone is in bed but dad who's lost in his reading about God and filling his head with how-to-convert-your-children. I slip into the bathroom and climb into the shower turning the water as hot as it gets. It leaves red welts on my skin, but it feels good. The steam pours through my lungs making my heavy and weightless simultaneously. From then on my eyes are closed, and I finally allow my mind to open and wander over my dreams. The only place I feel love and excepted. The only place I am truly alive and well. Trough the ripples of my dreamful sleep, I rest assured. Beep Beep Beep Beep Beep Beep. It's 6 o'clock.