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“I’m not. I’m just talking to my brother.”

He shoots me an unconvinced look before saying, “Well, I found some stuff for our paper, and I need you to take notes.

Me: I have to go. Talk later?

Sebastian: Yeah.

I tuck my phone back into my bag, and not two seconds later, Noah’s mom walks in.

“Were you being rude to your sister?”

“Mom, she’s coming in here every ten seconds and asking stupid questions while Harlow and I are trying to work on a paper.”

She glances over and gives me a soft smile before telling Noah, “Try to be a little nicer to her, will you?”

“Fine.”

“Harlow, are you staying for dinner?”

“No, not tonight,” I tell her. “My dad’s coming home.”

When she steps out, I look over at the clock on the desk and sigh. “I should probably get going.”

“Already? We haven’t even gotten anything done.”

“I know, but I haven’t seen my dad in forever.” Honestly, I haven’t seen him in five weeks, and last time I did, I was still at Hopewell.

“We really need to work on this,” he says when I start packing up my books. “What about tomorrow after school?”

“I can’t. I’m busy.”

“With what?”

I zip up my backpack and sling it over my shoulder. “With stuff.”

“Why are you so busy all of a sudden? You never have any free time to hang out.”

“We hung out last week.”

He cocks his head in irritation. I get what he’s saying. Thing is that I give most of my time to Sebastian, but lacrosse season doesn’t start until February and he hasn’t been hanging out with his friends that much, so he has tons of free time.

“I’m sorry,” I tell him, feeling a twinge of guilt. And even though I don’t really want to do much of anything these days, I offer, “How about we get together this weekend. You want to go down to Seattle?”

“Yeah, we can do that,” he says as he stands and walks me out.

As I drive home the urge to cry takes over. There’s no reason for it, but it’s there, completely out of the blue. Lately, it seems that if I stop moving for a second, I’m fighting back tears. The sadness is overwhelming at times. I thought about telling Dr. Amberg when I see him tomorrow, but I don’t want to raise any concerns.

I’m doing everything I should be: attending weekly therapy, taking my meds, and journaling. Unlike before, I’m extremely cautious with what I put into my notebook, which makes the exercise pointless. I don’t find myself turning to it often, but I do talk a lot with Sebastian. Yet still, I’m depressed. Likereallydepressed right now.

I’ve forgotten what it feels like to take a breath—a real, solid breath—because there’s an incessant tightness around my throat. Emotions lodge there, and no matter what I do, they won’t go away.

It was only a few hours ago that I was sitting in class and it all became too much. I had to run out before anyone saw the tears in my eyes. I wound up locking myself in a bathroom stall where I buried my head in my hands and silently cried for a while over nothing.

Existing is painful for a person like me.

It hurts all the time.

Some days are more manageable than others, but the pain is always present.