The Fight

She was drawing. As always, the drawing displayed a dark angel crying. She always drew the same angel, only the background was different every time. This time, she pictured it before her favorite church. The church was actually the most difficult part – the angel came easy to her now.

She fought back her tears. She would tell everyone who asked that the angel was her. It was her past, her present, and most likely also her future. Drawing half complete, she put down the pencil and toyed with the small knife she kept on her desk. Staring out of the window, her mind went blank. There was no thought, only feeling.

The blood in her veins felt like poison, burning and clawing its way through her body. Her heartbeats felt like painful drums, every single one pushing that poison deeper and deeper. She felt like there were ants beneath the skin of her wrists. The only thing that helped against the itch, was slicing them with the knife. She had never dared that before – so she did the next best thing. She scratched at the tender skin with her nails, hard and repeatedly. Only when she felt the familiar sting of the open wound did she stop. She smiled grimly. That wound would remain painful for days.

Only then did she look in the mirror at the other side of the room. Her tear-stricken face. The empty eyes. And she thought "no. No. NO." She flung the knife away that was still in her other hand. Her face contorted in anger and rage. "This… will… NOT… get… me. This will NOT kill me." She slapped herself in the face – not to hurt herself, but to wake herself up. The slap cleared her mind and made her goals ever so much clearer.

She breathed deeply and strongly while she nursed her painful wrist for the last time, tapping in a never before seen source of inner strength.

This depression would not get her. Ever.

She got up, crumpled the angel and threw it in a corner.