Chapter I

I didn't want to die. God, god, I didn't, I thought as I typed yet another smiley face. There were so many things left to do...I had an English test tomorrow! I had to take the dog out! Why the hell was I already flying higher than Everest, then?

Maybe it was that I knew I had no solace in people. Nobody could know or would ever know about this. By the time they did, I'd be gone, and if they did find out before that happened, it wouldn't be long before it became their reality. I'd make sure of that if I wasn't sure of anything else in my life.

"Shouldn't we be working on the project?"

I jolted from my stupor. "Uh...yeh..."

"You're high, aren't you." 

"What?!"

Zac gave me a pointed glance. "You are. I know it. Let me see your arm."

I made a noise of protest, which he blatantly ignored, gently pulling up the sleeve of my discolored, black-and-white plaid flannel while I tried not to look him in the face. Something was choking me, dragging me down. I knew about Zac's problem. He didn't know I was in the same boat. There was something infuriating about letting one friend- not even a particularly close one- know something not another soul on Earth knew.

"I knew it." He pulled the sleeve back down and looked up at me from his sitting position on the edge of my bed. "Izzy, look at me."

I couldn't. 

"Izzy."

"No."

"C'mon. It's okay."

He wrapped a big hand around mine and pulled me to sit next to him. I felt a set of goosebumps over my skin- not the lovey kind, the kind you get when you're extremely out of it and someone decides to touch you- and shook my shoulders a bit to cure them. My heart in its drug-induced stupor pounded thickly and quickly in my chest, like a leaden race car. I felt like throwing up and crawling out of my skin.

"What happened? I mean...uh...I don't know. I just want to know what happened."

"Long story."

He flashed me a half-smile. "I have time."

I nodded and pulled my knees into my chest. My throat was sore by the end of the night, from laughing to crying to screaming out what I had to say. By the end of the night, we were acting as if none of this had ever happened. It sounds cheesy, but by the end of the night, we were best friends.