It's 2 pm on a Saturday afternoon and I'm sitting cross-legged on my unmade bed, my Macbook in front of me and a medium iced pumpkin spice latte with whole milk and sugar balanced in the space between my legs. The window is open on the far side of the room while a cool October breeze is blowing inside, and instinctively I pull down my long sleeves over my hands while the photos tacked up on the small cork board over my bed move slightly with the wind.

My eyes travel to a photo taken in December of my 7th grade year, with two of my friends and our favorite teacher at the time at the "Winter Ball" which was actually really stupid and I honestly hated being there. The longer I stare at that photo, the faker my smile looks, and the bags under my eyes look more and more prominent. My blue Fender Stratocaster guitar is in the corner of the room, propped up against the shelf holding the PC computer my brother taught me how to build for gaming and my TV, and I consider picking it up and attempting to learn more of my favorite song but deciding against it when I realize that the only musical talent I possess is playing the flute because I played it for five years and actually practiced, while my guitar collects dust and looks sorry for itself cowering in the corner.

Eventually, my eyes travel back to the computer in my lap, which was given to me with firm instructions to "only use for school" as I check to see if my homework is open in another tab, just in case. After confirming that my computer is indeed safe for display, should my parents decide to come check on me upstairs, I reopen the word processor and begin writing again. Nobody quite understands the extent of my love for writing; a select few of my friends know about the secret band fanfictions that I occasionally write and post online for fun, but they've never seen my collection of poetry and writing that may or may not be based on my own life. Journals fill my bookshelves of stories and logs of important days, and if I ever decide that killing myself is in fact necessary, I'm going to have to remember to burn each and every page beforehand.

Death has always been an interesting subject to me. Some days, death sounds very unappealing and I want to stay alive; I think about all of the great things life has to offer yet that I have not yet experienced. Other days, death is enticing and inviting, and I stare longingly at a bottle of painkillers or a pair of scissors. I've never attempted suicide before though, and I never see myself ever going through with it in the future.

I believe everyone has thoughts of suicide at one point or another in their lives, whether they are seriously suffering or just having a bad day at work and wishing they didn't have to go back for another day of tediously typing file reports. Death is a part of life, really. You live, and then you die. Some people are afraid of death, other people welcome it with open arms. Personally, I just look at death curiously. What truly happens after death? This question probably appears in my mind far too often to be considered healthy.

A knock on my door pulls me out of my thoughts as I quickly swipe a trio of fingers to the left on my touch pad, opening the digital version of my history textbook opened to the pages that I should be reading for class, but I honestly just don't have the motivation required to learn about what kinds of "advanced" stone tools the Mesopotamians invented. United States history is something that interests me, not ancient and medieval stuff that I'll never remember once my freshman year is done.

"Come in," I shout lazily, not wanting to be bothered to get up and open the door for whoever was on the other side of it. My mom strolled in and sat on the side of my bed, and I feigned interest in the book in front of me.

"Doing your homework?" she confirmed, and I nodded tiredly. If there was one thing I hated, it was my mom's obsession with me getting my homework done, but I suppose I couldn't really blame her after my issues through middle school with not getting my homework done. I understand that she just wants the best for me in school, but the more she asks me about my homework, the more wary I am to actually do it.

"I'll leave you to it, then," she said, walking back out into the hallway and, of course, not shutting my door, just as any mom is known to do (or I guess not do?) and I groaned and weighed the pros and cons of getting up to do it myself. I wondered briefly what the point of that checkup was as I returned to the poem that I had began writing.

~~

Sickness.

Sickness was a common theme in my household. If one person starting coughing or sneezing, another member of the family would start coughing or sneezing. Not all diseases are contagious through the air though, and breast cancer is one of those things.

My mom had been cancer free for months, and I really, truly thought we had finally gotten over that bump in the road and everything was going to be normal again. She had a full head of hair, food tasted right to her again, everything seemed okay. I was sitting on the couch on a Wednesday evening after soccer practice when my mom came in and told me she couldn't attend my next game on the upcoming Friday. I told her it was okay, that I didn't mind, honestly, because I really don't expect them to come to all of my games. I hardly get to play anyway as a freshman, so honestly it would just be a waste of their time to come to the games. If they want to be supportive, however, that was up to them.

I wasn't expecting, however, the reason why she couldn't come to the game.

"I have to start chemo again."

And basically, my whole life fell apart again.

Notes

Really short, but I felt like updating this idk
Comments and subs would be super nice <3
((new chapter of Coffee Shop Soundtrack should be coming out soon))