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Brothers

You take the knife and press it into the soft flesh of your wrist. It hurts, but the pain will lead to release. You pull the blade along the skin to slit open a deep cut. You press the blade to your other wrist and repeat the action. You watch with detached interest as the blood pours out the wound like a river of plasma.

Your head starts to get dizzy and you start to feel a little cold when your father walks in to grab a beer from the fridge. He looks over at you and drops the beer to the ground, his eyes wide. He screams, he cries, he holds you. He applies pressure to the wounds in a vain attempt to stop the blood from flowing. He screams for your mother, but she either doesn't hear or doesn't care.

Mikey comes down to see what the commotion is about. You can tell by looking at him that he is high. He sobers up real quick, panics for a second before picking up the phone and dialing 911.

Your mother enters the kitchen eventually and collapses to the ground in a fit of sobbing tears.

Then everything goes black.


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You wake up in a hospital bed. Your father is there, sitting in a chair and staring at the floor. You try to move your arm to see your wrist, but find that you are restrained by straps which hold you in place.

Your dad stirs at the movement and looks up. He grins from ear to ear and walks over to you. He kisses your forehead and vows to pay you more attention. While he apologizes for everything, you can't help but notice the lack of alcohol on his breath.

You get out of the hospital a few days later. Paul comes home to check on you. Everyone is happy that you are okay. Everyone but you.

The days are better though. Your family attempts to show you love more often and interact with each other more regularly as well. The attention makes you feel more than a little uncomfortable, but it's better than before when there was no attention what so ever.

A year goes by and Mikey has graduated high school and even has a full time job that he uses to help pay some of the bills around the house.

You are sixteen now. Your survival has convinced you to be a bit more open to people. You still get extremely depressed at times and lock yourself away, but at least you have a few friends now.

Speaking of friends. One of your friends, Gary, is having a "small get together" at his house on Saturday.

Large groups of people make you uncomfortable, but Gary tells you that he only invited ten people. Ten people isn't so bad and you are strongly considering going.

But do you?