I woke up to the sound of beeping again.
I was connected to a bag of blood and had bandages over my forearms and my upper arms and shoulders. I was wearing a loose white peter pan dress, which I supposed someone grabbed from my closet when the ambulance took me.
Ambulance? Oh, fuck! I can’t fucking believe you failed again! That was your last chance!
I opened my eyes and let them adjust to the light coming from a big window to my left, covered with horizontal pieces of iron in case someone decided to break the glass and jump. The walls were pale blue, paler than last time, and the furniture was either white, blue or light grey. To my right, I had a wall leading to the room’s entrance and walking there, before going out of the room, there was the bathroom door. I fucking knew this room too well. I’ve been here too many times.
There was light knock on my door and someone opened the door softly after knocking and an old, short and a bit chubby nurse entered the room with a bag of blood.
She had shoulder-lengthed curly brown hair and she had green eyes and had a pair of red squared glasses hanging from her neck. She then turned to me and smiled.
“Well, look who’s woken up after being 24 hours sleeping” she said, faking a chuckle.
“Morning, Gloria” I greeted my favourite nurse.
Let’s just say that we knew each other since I started horseback riding and started attempting suicide.
Unlike other nurses, Gloria didn’t make a fuss about what happened to her patients and when she talked to you, she talked like you knew each other for years, even if it was the first time you came.
“How are you feeling, sweetheart?” she asked, changing the empty blood bag for a new one and throwing the used one.
“Honestly? Like a fucking failure” I said. You just couldn’t lie to Gloria and if you did, she knew you were lying to her. “I just wished it fucking worked” I added with a thick voice. Gloria sat on my bed and leaned to hug me, sighing. I sat up.
“You need your rest, you lost a lot of blood. Just sleep for a bit”
“I don’t fucking want to sleep! I want to die! How many times do I have to attempt suicide for you guys to notice that!” I started to cry. I don’t know where the tears came from, but they managed to make their way down my face.
Gloria pulled me closer but I couldn’t feel anything. As much as I adored Gloria, I wanted to be hugged by someone else. I wanted to feel Jack beside me and rub circles on my back with his fingers to calm me down and then hug me and kiss me and never let me go. But that wasn’t going to happen. There was a knock at the door and someone walked in. Even though it was surreal, I was sure it’d be Jack who walked in my hospital room, but my face fell when I saw it was Ruben.
He had puffy eyes and had purple bags under his eyes. His face lit up when he met my eyes and threw himself on top of me, pulling me into a big bear hug and I hugged him back.
“I thought you were gone” he sobbed, pulling me closer to his chest. His voice held sadness and I saw Gloria stand up and I sent her a thankful glare. She smiled at me and left the room. When Ruben pulled away I noticed I was crying again.
“Hey, Mari, don’t worry, it’s-“ he started.
“No, it’s not okay! I’ll never be okay!” I shouted.
Ruben just looked at me with sad eyes and a very concerned look in his face. He opened his mouth to say something but he closed it again.
“Whatever you were going to say: say it” I commanded, not shouting anymore.
He hesitated before talking. Uh, oh, bad sign.
“You need help, María. I’ve been thinking about this for a very long time but this… this just proved me that you need serious help. This is not a game anymore, you’re hurting not just yourself, but everyone around you, and you need to stop” I pulled away from him, giving him a questioning look.
“I’m sending you to psychiatric center” he stated, not looking at me, “I’m so sorry, but this needs to stop” he added.
I froze and my breathing stopped. He fucking what?!
I stood up quickly, making me almost faint due to my lack of blood and sudden movement, but I recovered easily. I started to pace around the room (or as much as being connected to the bag of blood allowed me) and crossed my arms in front of my chest.
“You did what?” I asked with my eyes closed and the words coming from between my teeth, trying to control my sudden anger.
“Like I said, you’re not only hurting yourself, you’re-” he replied much calmer than I was. I turned to him furiously, visualizing myself as a pissed off Stella with her fierce eyes eyeing whatever pissed her of and her ears pinned back.
“You are so fucking lucky you don’t even know” I spat, “When we were on tour I tried to kill myself again several times, I relapsed, I purged again, I did it all again. I even got beaten up by Mr. Iglesias again and I said nothing just to keep the pain from you guys” I said between teeth. He froze in place and I regretted saying that for a second, “AND YOU FUCKING COME HERE TO SAY TO ME IN MY FACE THAT I NEED TO STOP BECAUSE I’M HURTING YOU PEOPLE” he was looking at me a bit scared, he’d never seen me like this before. "EXCUSE ME, BUT I THINK I’VE BEEN QUITE SELFLESS ALL THESE YEARS AND I THINK I NEED SOME FUCKING TIME TO BE SELFISH FOR, AT LEAST, TEN SECONDS!” I took a deep breath, closing my eyes in order to calm myself down before adding, “Out of my room. Now. I don’t fucking need you or anyone or anything’s help. I just need Jack and Stella and a bottle of vodka, so leave me fucking alone” I said coldly. I opened my eyes and he was staring at me, shocked. Good.
“Pack your things, tomorrow they’ll be coming to get you” he said quietly. My eyes went wide but before I could shout at him again, he stood up. “I’m sorry” and walked away.
I had a competition in three days and I had to plan something to get away from here. I wanted to trust Gloria, but I knew she wouldn’t help me.
I just needed to get out of here as soon as possible.

---

Once I disconnected myself from the beeping machine and the blood bags, I grabbed my wallet, phone and keys and changed into the clothes I wore when I tried to kill myself.
It was 11:32pm to be exact and I still had eight minutes before the next nurse shift.
I popped my head out of my room and looked around. No one in sight. María, you’re not 6 anymore, stop trying to be a spy. Oh, shut up, let me have my fun.
I walked quietly down the squared hall and stopped when I saw a nurse in front of the elevators and the stairs.
She was staring at her watch constantly, when it was 11:40pm exact, she looked around and sighed but walked away, trusting the next nurse to come soon.
I took my chance to go to the stairs and rushed down quietly. I kept going down until I realised I was in the hospital’s parking lot and I rushed outside. There were probably security cameras down here, but I didn’t care and continued running.
My legs started to hurt and I felt dizzy, but I continued running until I got to a taxi stop. I got inside one and gave the driver the directions to the equestrian center.

---

Once I payed the driver I rushed to a side ramp in the entrance and jumped over a small wall, leaving me in front of the outdoor corridoor. I trotted down the ramp and to Stella’s paddock as fast as I could.
When I got there Stella turned to me and I entered her paddock quickly and hugged her tightly. She curled her head around my body and pushed me closer to her neck. I guess she already guessed what had happened to me when I pulled away with teary eyes and she sniffed my arms.
“We need to get out of here” I stated. She pinned her ears forward, listening. “Ruben wants me to go to some mental institution tomorrow and I’m not staying here to get caught. Are you with me?”
Stella shook her head and I turned around and opened her paddock. I walked to the little house and grabbed her stuff. Saddle, head stall, bridle, body and tail brushes and the brush to do her hooves. I put them all inside one of my bags I left there in case there was an excursion and tacked Stella up. She followed me to the changing room, where I had my things in a locker and shoved them all except my competition clothes inside of my bag. I changed into my riding clothes, put on my boots and helmet and jumped on Stella.
We trotted all the way through the cross course in the forest and started to canter until we got near a familiar railway.
Ten years ago, in this same railway I saw my best friend’s dog die and I was only three metres away from him. We were going to this wonderful field at the other side of the railway we were Stella and I standing on, and my friend had two dogs. In the morning, we brought her french bulldog, so we thought that we had to bring her labrador in the afternoon to be fair, but we brought both of them in the afternoon. Everything went fine until we decided to head back home. Everyone had crossed the railway and my friend and the labrador were by the fence, I was two metres away from the railway and the bulldog walked beside me. We heard the electricity going through the railway, which warned us the train would be here anytime soon. Suddenly the bulldog went back and stopped in the middle of the railway listening closely and looking straight to the field, but he didn’t move. I moved a bit closer but when I called his name the train had already got to him. I froze in place, literally, I couldn’t move, but my head was spinning and thinking I should run to him, but my legs didn’t respond. From the bottom of the train, where the wheels were, you could see his shadow rolling underneath. Once the train passed I rushed to him and when I turned him a bit, I saw blood in his ear and he was missing a front leg, which was still connected to his body thanks to a tiny bit of skin. The only thing I wanted to do right then was push him away from the train or put myself in front of it and I regretted not being able to move right then.
I didn’t noticed I’d zoned out until I looked at Stella and saw her with her head turned to me with sad and concerned eyes. I swear this horse looked like a fucking human when you stared into her eyes.
I heard the electricity run through the railway and lead Stella away, but she refused to turn and kept walking beside the small hill of the railway. She was planning to show me something, I knew.
She then stopped and kicked the ground, indicating me to hold on and as I pressed my legs around her sides, I heard the train a few metres away from us.
I tensed even more when Stella galloped as fast as she could beside the train. I knew she could run faster and caught her hint: she wanted me to realise that instead of putting myself in front of a train to end my life, I could run faster than the train because I was much better than that.
The thought of my horse doing that gesture to teach me a life lesson brought tears to my eyes and I raised a bit from the saddle and I encouraged her to go faster, patting her neck.
She shook her head happily, knowing I knew what she was doing and galloped faster.
We were now going much faster than the train and I continued encouraging her until we got to a green sign that indicated we were about to cross leave the province of Barcelona and she started to slow down and stopped right beside it.
The train passed beside us but we were going into the field. There were daisies all around us and I jumped off Stella to untack her and put on her head stall. I left her saddle and briddle on a low tree and patted Stella’s shoulder.
It was 2am and I was about to fall asleep when I fell to my knees. Hopefully, Stella saw this and quickly lyed beside me, so I fell on top of her. I moved to her neck and she curled her neck around me.
It felt like home.

Notes

I put the trigger warning because I thought it could be a bit triggering, just in case.
So I'm in L'Escala, that village I talked to you about, so I'll be updating a bit less, due to my lack of Internet, but I'll continue writing, so don't worry and I'll upload as soon as I can.
The part of the train thing I put it because I lived it, it's a true story and I put it because it's been a year since that happened, so yeah...
Leave your comments down below!

And, by the way, I'll be editing some chapters, correcting spelling mistakes and maybe adding more detailed descriptions, just in case you guys recieve any notifications, so you know.

Title credit: Stella by All Time Low.