I Hope You're Happy

A short story I wrote for English. I used the first two chapters of my book Doomed and turned it into a short story. So I hope you enjoy!

Music blaring, tears streaming, no life in or out, laying with my knees to my chest knowing nothing will ever get better. I look around with hope of a last-minute hero to save me from this pit I'm in. I keep looking until I see what I've been wanting; a bottle of pills. Exactly what I want. I roll out of bed with a thump to the floor. I slowly regain my strength from laying down for days without getting up. I slowly plod over to my desk full of unused pens, old homework, my phone, and the pills. I reach out to grab the open pill bottle but as I do I drop them and they scatter all over the floor and I let out this wail that could kill. I fall to the ground to try to manage to pick up the pills. I just want to die I say to myself. I don't wanna be on this planet anymore. I locate 28 pills of my moms strongest medication and fall to my butt. I don't swallow them right off. I wait, and I cry. I cry and I cry. To be honest with you --and myself-- I didn't want to die. I just want things to be different. But all choice is gone, I have waited what seems like forever for someone to save me. But I'm done trying, I'm doing this.

I swallow the pills one by one. Drinking them down with flat Pepsi I got the day I isolated myself. “This is it” I say as swallow the last one and climb into my bed. Tears rolling down my face and shame filling my soul. I take the last look around my room; my eyes burning. I close my eyes and I think of this. This mistake. I let out a sigh, but then I hear my phone ring. Which hasn't happened in weeks, months even. I get up and answer the phone, barely being able to say 'hello'.

“Hey, Cassidy? It's Caroline. I realized that you haven't been in school for the past week now; I was wondering if you were okay?” The sweet and girly voice says over the phone. Why is Caroline Granes calling me? She hasn't talked to me in weeks. “Cassidy? Are you there?” Caroline breaths into the phone.

“Yeah. Yeah, I'm here.” I say unstable.

“Are you okay?” She says, actually sounding concerned.

“Yeah, I'm fine. I just got over the flu, today actually. I'll be back in school tomorrow.” I say, expecting her to say 'okay' and hang up.

“Okay, good! I was worried. Well since you’re fine, I was wondering if you'd like to come to a movie with me? It'll be fun.” Her offer catches me off guard.

“I would, but I have no money. Sorry, maybe another time?” I say, trying to get out of it because going to a movie is the last thing I want to do at the moment.

“Oh, totally okay! I have money to pay for both of us and popcorn or candy if you want.” She's convincing. I think about it. Why not go out with a bang?

“Okay, fine. What time am I meeting you there?” I ask.

“No need, I'm gonna come pick you. Be ready! Thanks for agreeing to come.” Her voice ends perky and alert as the tone clicks and I am left with a small monotone humming sound. What did I just do?

* * * * *

“Caroline?” I whisper, so the people next to us won’t hear.

“Yeah?” She says, confused that I said her name with such question.

“I really need to talk to you. Not just you, but you as in I need to talk to someone, and you happen to be the closest victim.” I jokingly say the last part and she chuckles and starts walking to the door and I follow her. We end up going into the alley behind the theater and I sit down.

“What's up, Cassidy?” She says, I can tell she's nervous. But when she asks that I just start crying. She comes over and she hugs me. She doesn't let go ethire. “Cassidy, what's wrong? Please don't tell me nothing because this, this isn't 'nothing'. Okay? Please just tell me?” She says nicely but harsh at the same time.

“I took pills.” I choke out. Right after I see her face I know I shouldn't have said anything. She starts stumbling for her cell phone, but I'm going out. Everything starts to fade and I'm dazing.

“Cassidy? Cassidy! CASSIDY?! DO YOU HEAR ME?! Cassidy, please!” I hear her crying as she repeats my name, over and over. I see flashing lights and I hear “We need to get her in NOW!” says a paramedic. Suddenly I'm lifted off of the ground and put into an ambulance. Caroline is holding my hand, rocking back and forth as she cries. I am witnessing this all but cannot move. Cannot breath. And I black out, thinking I'll never see daylight again.

"Hurry! She needs to go to the hospital!" "Hurry!" "Com' on!" I have voices shout around me. The blaring sound of the ambulance lights are painful. I think about what I did. Why did Caroline invite me to the movies. Just a month ago she was throwing popcorn and candy at me while chanting harsh words. But why did I kill myself over not belonging? I keep hearing the paramedics yelling to the driver. Abruptly I am getting wheeled into a large hospital. People running alongside my stretcher trying to keep me alive long enough to pump my stomach. We push through doors as things get connected to me and I have a tube going down my throat. It's nasty.

Everything starts to calm down a bit. I only have a few nurses in the room with me. I see Caroline ask the nurse if we could have a moment alone. They said yes but they would need to stay by the door.

"Cassidy... I didn't call you to the movies to be nice.. There were people there waiting for the movie to finish.. We were going to egg you.. We were going to beat you up.." She said low and shameful. She didn't look me in the eye. I couldn't believe it. Why was she freaking out so much then?

"You're a b***h. Get out of here. You don't deserve to be in here." I said looking straight at her.

"Cassi-"

"OUT." I scream and the nurses rush in to rush her out.

"What was she doing to you?" One of the nurses asks. I wait a minute to answer. Trying to find the right words to say.

"She just didn't know when to shut up. She didn't know when to give up. So I didn't want her here." I say calmly. The nurse looks at me shocked and then slowly nods her head. She whispers to one of the other nurses.

"Are you feeling any pain? We contacted your parents. They're flying back home right now. They should be here soon enough. We're going to have to keep you overnight so we can monitor you. Rest well, sweetie." A nurse says as she walks out of the room, shutting the door. When every nurse was out of sight I start to cry. I feel so betrayed. What are people gonna think at school? I'm just gonna be that suicidal freak. The one no one likes. That outcast reject.

By the time I wake up it’s 11 o’clock in the morning, and my parents are there. They’re yelling at me for trying to end my life. They’re telling me I am stupid and a disgrace. They’ve always hated me and I thought almost losing me would make them happy. Obviously it didn’t. Then my dad did the most stupid thing ever. He hit me. He slapped me right across the face so loud. I heard the tortuous ping of the slap echo off the walls all around me. It wasn’t the first time he hit me; not at all. Although this one felt different. Like this one didn’t come out of anger, but hatred. A deep, dark hatred.  After a few seconds of silence a nurse barged in and forced my parents to leave.

“Sweetie, are you alright? What happened? He hit you, correct?” Asks the nurse persistently.

All the questions are overwhelming. I have never had anyone know about the abuse. Somehow it felt wrong, like it was a secret that should be kept. The words coming out of the newly joined nurses all just turned into sounds. My body must have just shut down, because after that everything was black.

I wake up to find a police officer and a detective standing in my room. How long have they been there? Why are they here to begin with?

“Cassidy, we have a few questions. Are you able to answer them right now?” The police officer, Officer James, asks me in a monotone voice. I don’t really say anything, just gently nod my head to let them know I approve. As they see that the detective and Officer James look at each other.

“Hello, I am Detective Jordan. We got a report of child abuse from the hospital, is this true?” He claims as he slowly walks to the chair placed next to my bed. I don’t say anything. I don’t know whether I should deny it to save my dad or to say yes to get out of that house. I go with approving the statement to get out of that Hell. Again, I don’t verbally announce it, I just weakly nod my head. Both Detective Jordan and Officer James start scribbling rapidly onto their papers.

“Did you do anything to provoke him to hit you?” Officer James questions. I shake my head no and they go back to scribbling on their little sheets of paper.

As the questions continue I become tired, and ask them if they could be done soon. After they wrap up their questions I am told that without a doubt I would be getting put into a group home. They would go and get my things from my house and within 24 hours I would be living in a group home. Everything is going extremely fast. As I see them leaving I open my mouth to ask a question.

“What if I don’t want to go?” I can tell my voice startled them as they both spun around. They exchanged looks again and Officer James continued into the hall. Detective Jordan hovers in the room a bit more, to tell me that I do not have a choice. Then he turns around and closes the door to leave me alone with my thoughts. So I fall asleep again.

Next thing I know I’m getting ushered into the bathroom where I am getting my clothes on. Apparently a bed was open sooner than they had thought. After I got dressed I was brought to a car, and then a group home. It looked more like a jail to me. My new case manager drove me there and helped check me in. As I walk into the room, 7 girls glare at me like I have a “You all suck” written across my forehead. I continue into the office where a way-too-nice lady tells me all the rules. But to be honest I don’t even care. The entire thing was a blur. She showed me my room with 4 sets of bunk beds. All of them were full except one. I’m guessing the 7 girls occupying these bunks were the girls in the lounge. I ask her if I can lay down for a while and she says I can until dinner which is in 45 minutes.

After dinner we are sent to our rooms and made to get ready for bed. As I was starting to change Abbey comes over to me and starts interrogating me. I tell her to leave me alone and I attempt to walk away but her friends come and block me. As I refuse to answer they start getting closer to me. As I still refuse to talk they beat me. Then they heard footsteps and they all jump into their beds. I am still laying helplessly on the floor. Mrs. Green asks me why I’m on the floor and I tell her I tripped and fell.

“Well you better get up, you have your first day at Princeton Academy tomorrow,” Mrs. Green says as if it is the absolute best thing in the world. They already signed me up for school?

In the morning I go to school. I come back to the house and getting ignored. Before bed I get beat up. And then I sleep and the same thing happens the next day. This seems to be an ongoing cycle with no interventions for 3 months. Then everything changes. It started off as a normal day until we had an emergency lockdown during 3rd period. Apparently it was real but no one believed it. Everyone in the classrooms were making jokes and goofing off until we heard screams, and then a gunshot.

It settles in at that point that this is real. Everybody is dead silent and one person starts crying. The funny part of this is that I’m not even a little bit scared. I get up and everybody is shocked and the teacher tries to get me to sit down. I pushed her to the ground. I don’t have control over what I’m doing anymore. I start to open the door and I walk out. I shut the door behind me. I hear another gunshot and I follow it. My monster is taking over me right now.

I find where the gunshots are coming from and am stopped dead in my tracks.

“You,” The voice roared, raspy, out of breath and stern. I know that voice. It’s my father. After that he starts power walking towards me screaming curse words and insults a mile a minute.
“You did this to me! You made me do this!” He screams. I stay silent. Then he lifts up the gun. He’s going to shoot me. I start to tremble. He is getting louder and closer.

“I hope you’re happy, Cassidy! I hope you’re happy!” And then the gun is fired.

Author's Note

A short story I wrote for English. I used the first two chapters of my book Doomed and turned it into a short story. So I hope you enjoy!

Reviews

[ICantSayIDo]

WHAT THE F**K??????? WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU STOP THERE? WHAT THE FLYING F**K BRO. YOU BETTER CONTINUE WRITING THIS. HOLY F**K. HOLY F**K. WOW.

[.Lost Soul.]

this is the end of the story hun. This is where it ends c:

[ICantSayIDo]

Nope. It cant.

[.Lost Soul.]

Well too f*****g bad niqqa.