The next four weeks went slowly, repeating inside my head the scene over and over again.

“Don’t go? Just tell me the truth!”
“I-I can’t!”
“When you can, call me, I’m sure it would hurt less”

Why didn’t I speak up? I wanted to tell him! You did the right thing, you used your chance to push him away. Now he’ll be broken and confused, but he’ll move on and forget about you and his life will be settled again. Now you have to fix yourself and then maybe he’ll be interested in you again. I kept repeating to myself those same words everyday, every hour, trying to believe them, but I just couldn’t bring myself to believe them. I didn’t want to believe them.
After leaving Montpellier we went to Dublin and after two weeks to Cardiff, where I did cross and dressage competitions. Surprisely, I ended up being the runner-up in the cross competition in Dublin and got the forth place in the dressage competition in Cardiff, Adriana won the first place in that one.
I slightly reduced my food intake and I sometimes felt sick and about to pass out when training. Oriol had to tell me to dismount and then drag me out of the training arena twice from low blood sugar. Thankfully, I didn’t have any problems during the competitions, except my lack of focus.
Stella noticed my lack of interest soon enough and tried to make me happier, giving me a friendly push every now and then. She didn’t look pissed, she looked confused more than anything. Normally she’d be pissed and completely intolerant but not now, what was up with her?
Tonight everyone was going out to celebrate Adri’s first place. All except me, I just wasn’t in the mood, so I decided to go to a bar and have a couple drinks, forget reality for a while and have fun. So I waited until they were gone for fifteen minutes before picking up an outfit and leaving the bus.
I walked until I came across a bar called Bar Floyd. It seemed nice so I decided to go there and lose myself. I walked in and sat at the counter, the bar keeper walked to me with a smile.
“Good evening, miss” he greeted me. He was tall and had sandy blonde hair and navy blue eyes. He was kinda cute, to be honest.
“Hi” I said with a small voice. He gave me a questionating look, asking me to order something, “Vodka shots, please” I said, more confident this time. He nodded.
“Bad day?” he asked whilst he started to place the tiny glasses in front of me and turned around to grab the bottle of vodka. I payed him advance, knowing that I’d be far too gone to pay him later.
“More like bad month” I said to myself aloud. I felt him frown but gave me a small smile.
“What happened?” he started to pour vodka into the glasses. When he saw I wasn’t answering he looked up at me and said, “I’m not a specialist, but I’ve heard that talking about your problems kind of helps. And don’t worry, tonight I’ll be your brother, best friend, your shoulder to cry on or whatever you want me to be, except a nightstand, so you’ll be safe, okay?” he smiled at me, I smiled back before he breathed in and added, “I’m Mark, what’s your name?"
“María” I answered. I picked up a glass and drank the liquid in it, burning my throat before hitting my empty stomach, "Well, I’m this kind of a famous youtuber and an equestrian girl. Six months ago my fans started to “ship” me with this band member a lot. When we met it was all cute and stuff and we hit it off immediately.” I took another shot, “Almost two months ago we went official and it was awesome and all, until two weeks ago, in a show jumping competition my ex, Mikel came and kind of fucked it all up phoning my boyfriend and claiming to be my boyfriend” Another shot, “My real boyfriend was confused and pissed and screamed at me, he asked me if I was cheating on me, not directly, but I knew what he meant, and-“
“Why didn’t you tell him the truth, then?” Mark interrumpted. He had concerned look in his face.
“Because Mikel and I had a secret and very abusive relationship. At first it was all awesome and cute and super nice, but then he started insulting me and hitting me. When he came to the competition, I froze, and I pushed my boyfriend away in the process of ignoring my ex” I explained, taking another shot. Mark frowned.
“That sucks” he said.
“It does” I laughed, taking the last shot and stared at the empty glass. “Another round, please”
“Sorry, but I can’t” he said. W-Wait, what?!
“Excuse me?”
“More than 5 shots in less than an hour isn’t safe, and I just told you I’d keep you safe” he explained to my slowly drunkening brain. “Or at least alive” he murmured. I chuckled and shook my head.
“Give me the bottle at least” I added, giving him puppy eyes and a small pout, he chuckled and nodded. But soon his expression was substitued by concern and sadness.
“Just don’t do anything stupid” he warned. I leaned over the counter and kissed his cheek before grabbing the bottle and leaving ten pounds on the counter, for listening and giving me the bottle.
I wondered around Cardiff, sipping on the bottle of vodka. I walked until I got to the bay and sat on a bench in front of the sea. At the other side of the bay, across that tiny portion of land left in the Uk, was France and crossing France, Spain. I don’t know what I’d do when I got back “home”. Ruben and the rest of the youtubers will go to their houses in Madrid, I’ll go to Barcelona and Olga will go to her house in Girona. I’ll be all alone again, unless Mikel decides to come back and beat me up again. I’ll have to stop YouTube for a few weeks, or months.
What the fuck have I done to derve all of this? I thought to myself, staring to cry. I then remembered every insult I’ve ever gotten, from classmates, friends, family members, haters, Mikel.
Well, if they call me all of these names, it’s for a reason, huh? Maybe they’re right.
I took a long sip from the bottle, crying harder. Unconciously I turned to the packpack I brought with me and looked for my black pencilcase, which I used to carry my makeup and a certain little box. I picked up the small box in the pencilcase and opened it, revealing some of my little metal friends. I picked up a pencil sharpener blade and took off my leather jacket. I looked at the fading scars on my arms in pity but I was reminded what name each one had. Fat, worthless, stupid, sick, fake. Fuck them.
I pressed the blade against my wrist and cut horizontally across my forearm, drawing some vertical lines on top of them. I never cut too deep, but maybe it was the alcohol in my system which made me go deep this time. My arm was covered in a layer of red in matter of minutes and I took a long sip again before blacking out.
Goodbye, Jack.

---

I woke up in the same bench around 6am with a massive hangover, it was a Saturday so not many people were outside. There wasn’t a single person where I was, and I hardly saw anyone by the shops, just some casual people going to buy some breakfast, but they were too far away to spot me.
I looked down to my arms, both covered in dried blood. Why didn’t I die? Fucking platelets and white blood cells. I picked up the small blade from my lap and put it in the small box, which was hidden in my pencilcase again and in my backpack. There was an empty bottle of vodka beside me. What the fuck-? I started to question myself when some of last night’s events rushed into my mind. Bar, conversation, crying, cuttting. No details involved, but they were enough hints to let me know what happened.
I cleaned my arms with some makeup remover wipes and threw them in a rubbish bin next to me. I grabbed the bottle of vodka and threw it in a green container not too far away and started to head the bus (or tried to) when I remembered I had a phone. I pulled it out of my jacket’s pocket and saw eleven notifications. Four were text messages from Ruben; three drunk, one normal. Five were text messages from Oriol; one drunk, four normal. Two notifications were missed calls from Ruben and Oriol. The sobber messages were “Where are you?”s and were send a few minutes after calling me.
I completely forgot we were heading Glasgow tomorrow and had to pack up, so I opened Google Maps and followed the indications to the equestrian club after putting my leather jacket on to cover up my new cuts.
After a few stops to puke and letting my feet time to catch up, I got there. A fake smile on my lips and a throat ready to let go the fakest lies in the whole world.
I already felt my walls building up.

Notes

Two in a day, go me! Maybe I'll upload a third one, but that's not for sure.
Let me know what you think!

Title credit: National Anthem by Lana del Rey.