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Prologue
Dear Lara,
I’malmostfree.
I know the last time I wrote to you I was in a really bad place, but I promise, I’m trying really hard to move on with my life. I am.
I still feel like I’m locked in my own personal prison, surrounded by the same four walls. But those walls, Lara, they continue to make me feel safe. I know them, have memorised them, and I love the comfort they bring me. Yet lately, they’re no longer the same.
I’m starting to believe those four walls are what are keeping me from moving forward. I know if you were here you’d be sitting next to me, trying to cheer me up, and if you were here, it would work. But you’re not here, Lara. I don’t even feel you in our room anymore. It’s like you’re completely gone, or maybe it’s because I’ve started to open my eyes. I don’t know.
After I found you lying in your own vomit, no longer breathing, my world changed. My life altered in a way I can never explain. Not really. Not when my problems seem insignificant compared to you no longer being in this world. I feel like I’m being selfish, unfair, but it’s hard when all I have is Mum and Dad bringing me down.
I’m not you.
I’ll never be you.
But more than that, I’ll never bemeagain.
I don’t know who I am anymore, Lara. I’ve lost her, and every time I try to dig deep enough to find her, I can’t breathe.
I’m broken.
I’ve become someone else.
Someone I don’t recognise.
Depression hasn’t just changed me; it’s changed everything. It’s changed my views on life. Nothing is the same anymore. It’s jaded, broken, and depressing.
It’s not that I’m unhappy?although I am?it’s more. I wish I was just unhappy; I could change that. I’d have the control I need to work towards the life I want, the life I had. But that isn’t the case. Not with me. I feel numb all the time. I no longer care if I wake up in the morning, no longer care much about anything. It’s like someone has seized every emotion from my body. I’m like a robot.
It’s exhausting.
It’s weakened me, mind, body and soul. Hell, a month ago it took everything I had in me just to shower.
I hate feeling like this. I do. Depression is a gut-wrenching, soul-crushing disease which leaves you wide open and exposed. It changes you in ways you don’t even realise. You stop caring, the process slow, until gradually, you don’t even cry at those sad TV ads anymore. You die a little inside each day. Everything you once loved, you no longer have any feelings for. All the small things you enjoyed in life, slowly disappear over time.
Even after those changes, it could take weeks, if not months, to notice them because you’re blind to it, swallowed by the heart-aching numbness.
It’s been over a year since I lost you—lost Lake. A year since I was attacked. I should be better by now. I should be doing something, anything, with my life. But instead, I’m still sitting in my bedroom, day in, day out, listening to Mum and Dad just tear me down further.
I swear to you, I tried. I really did. At first, I thought they were being protective, not wanting anything to happen to me, not wanting to lose another daughter. But I wasn’t even close. They do nothing but tell me how worthless I am, how I’m not you and I’ll never be you.
And I know I’ll never be you. No one could ever be you.
I miss you, and I wish you were here. They always listened to you. I can’t breathe with them down my neck constantly, their poison taking root and spreading through my body like wildfire.
It’s why I’ve decided to change my life, to get out from under their roof and away from their cruel words. I know you’d want this for me. I just wish you could be by my side as I do it.
I do have some good news to share, though.
Lake came to see me. I know, I know, I thought she was gone, but she came back. She tried to see me, but Mum and Dad sent her away, blaming my attack on her, which was so not cool. It’s one thing for them to be mean to me, but to Lake? Nuh-uh.
So anyway, I snuck out of my window early one morning and met her. We spoke about everything we missed, and I didn’t blame her for leaving me. I understood.
It was great seeing her again, Lara. I even smiled. I smiled so wide and cried so hard I thought my face might crack. It felt good. I felt alive again. But I knew the minute she left to go home that the numbness would work its way in again, just like it does every time Banner leaves me. Which is why I decided right there and then, I was going to leave and attend uni.
I’m petrified and scared of what this big change will do to me mentally, but more importantly, I’m worried I’ll still be the same broken girl I am inside.