You were five when something first happens, when the first hint of what you were to become, that your sensitive gentle soul had feelings for others in not the same way as everyone else. It was your birthday, the cake, festivities, and food enticing the kids of your small Sinnoh town to come together and celebrate, the party carefully crafted and managed by your loving parents. Your elder sister, only just now eight, was put in charge of watching after you, but the childish games and chatter distract her as you wander off and make an escape with your friends, your best and closest friends, to the park where an old rustic and worn down gazebo is. There you hold a pretend marriage, Kenzi—your best blond friend—laughs as he excitedly repeats the words he heard last week at his aunt's wedding. Morick—your favorite brown haired friend—holds your hands as you look at each other, a nervous smile playing brightly on your features as you both grin foolishly, proud. Giggles come as Kenzi announces 'You can kiss the bread!', and you lean in, pecking Morick on the cheek. It's all chaste and innocent in the moment of childhood youth, and shortly your small band return to the party, all holding hands.

It's not until your twelve that you think back on this moment though, and it's while you try not to hyperventilate in the boy's locker room, pressed against the cold of the walls and the lockers as though seeking comfort and escape in their unyielding uncaring surfaces. Puberty hit hard and brought with it a wild rush of hormones, and while you try to pretend to yourself that your arousal and the embarrassing shifts in your crotch are just from the girls starting to flower around you with their fresh angry red breakouts, swelling chests, and sudden awkward shifts in attitude as womanhood comes over them, but know that your feelings for them are not all of it. Morick and Kenzi are still your best friends, and they huddle close to comfort you as you break down in the safe dark shelter of the corner of the locker room. You had not been able to help but to think of how handsome one of the upperclassmen on the ropes had looked as he went through his drills, how strong and attractive he was, how you might like to feel him touching you, holding you, how you might have kissed him if he asked you to. Embarrassed and scared by the intrusive thought, you fled, terrified, but your friends came to help you, there for you. You tell them of the thoughts, of the feelings you are having, reluctant, clinging and yet certain you will be rejected by them, but they tell you nothing is changed and it doesn't matter, they still care about you no matter what. You feel lighter, easier, relief flooding like a wave even as you notice how beautiful Morick's lashes are with the way the light flutters through them.

Still, it's not until you are fourteen when you gather the courage to tell your family, the response what you had feared and expected as you cringe in preparation, stumbling out the truth in a jumbled rush. Joey, your older sister, is shocked and surprised but quick to defend you when your parents' words turn harsh. They aren't happy that their only son is gay, their only son had feelings for guys, for others of sex. They don't like what it could end up meaning in a small town with close-minded people, with tradition and tight-knit community, they don't like how much it impacts your life, what it could foretell and how much you could have to struggle because of it. They speak with only your well being and good intentions at heart, but you still feel like crumbling inside at the pain of their words, at the rejection and anger and accusation as you bring strife to their lives. They want whats best and most likely to make you happy and successful, but all you can think of now is how hurt they looked, how betrayed, how your mother cried while saying "you couldn't be one of them." It feels like a thorn inside, the subject becomes taboo and you try your best to avoid anything and everything to remind them of it, though Joey boldly tries to normalize it. She asks over breakfast at the table about celebrities, about cute boys, about your crushes and feelings, but worried and fearing eyes always notice the tensing of your mothers shoulders and the whitening of your fathers knuckles as you fidget. Still, timidly, after some prodding, you usually answer haltingly and timidly, giving away under the determined fire in your sister's eyes. You hate how much it tears your family apart.... but it is nice to have your sister to talk to it about after hiding it so long.

Its when you are fifteen however, that you are removed from the comfort of the closet permanently and publicly. You had never had alcohol before and weren't used to it, some sips of cheap vodka dumped in a plastic bottle that smelled more like rubbing alcohol and peroxide then something you would drink, and you are drunk enough to do something stupid, your normal timidness and limitations loosened and forgotten. The party is still in full swing, but you hardly pay attention to that as you work your way towards your crush and gingerly try to kiss him, the alcohol making your head fuzzy, making your desires stronger as it burns warmly inside you and makes you excited, susceptible to your impulses. Hands push you back, hard, a look of disgust on his face, and as you sober yourself the first parts of your world begin to crumble around you. By Monday morning the whole school knows, and though you try to hide, try to make yourself inconspicuous, unnoticeable and unimportant, its impossible to avoid the shame of what you had done. Kenzi and Morick are your staunch defenders, but its a shock to find others willing to rally to your plight, willing to step up for you, the world of teenagers much more accepting and open to change, to variation, then that of adults. For every sneer, every name calling, every shove in the hallway as you stumble to stay out of the way, someone else is calling your bullies and your tormentors out, someone is standing up to them, someone is picking a fight with them. The support is uplifting, though you wish it could all have never happened, though you feel shame and guilt and hate the division and fighting you bring, hate yourself, how ashamed you feel, you can hold onto that thought, the weight of the world not left to burden your shoulders alone. People move on, people stop caring as much, people let it fade, and you can finally breath, free to be yourself a little more then you could before.

You are seventeen though when everything is ripped out from under you and your life turned over. Its the last day of your junior year, you stay late to finish practice with the marching band before a short hiatus and the summer practices start. You've always loved music, since you took orchestra and band as your electives when you were ten. A last farewell party was being thrown for the seniors leaving for college, for jobs, for their life. You forgot your backpack in the instrument room, and return to the school, emptied and abandoned now, to retrieve it. You're alone, but there is nothing to be scared of in the familiar place. The sense of safety and comfort is torn from you as you are grabbed. Its Scott, the senior drum major. He pushes you into the lockers for the instruments, trapping and cornering you, his eyes dark and laced with hateful intent. He blames you, for what you don't know, don't understand, but he is kissing you roughly, biting you, forcing himself upon you. It hurts, you try to push him away, try to beg him, plead him, to stop, that hes hurting you, but you can't get him off of you. You are weaker then he is, you are pinned and confused and alone. No one comes to help you, to save you, when you cry out. It takes everything you have to not break down, to not crumble and collapse as you walk home, your face empty, your eyes dead, a limp stiffly hidden. You don't greet Joey when she says hello, just slide past to deposit your bags in your room and stumble into the shower, the scalding water raining on your skin as you sit and cry quietly, unable to stop feeling dirty even after your skin has begun to prune.

It's summer officially now. Not much time has passed, you are still seventeen, and its starting to feel all but impossible to pretend you aren't broken. You don't want to go out, you don't want to interact, you don't want to try to smile, try to keep it together, try to walk around and talk and be in public. You don't want to do anything. Not go out with Kenzi to the mall, not go with Morick to the water park, and not on vacation with your family to Hoenn. But you have to do it, and you force yourself to do it all anyways. You try not to be but you are quiet, and you can see how much your family keeps worrying about you, but you don't tell them what's wrong. You don't admit that weakness, keeping it inside, denying it to yourself as you try to hide the truth from yourself and everyone else, unable to admit it. Morick tries to come over one day and you break inside, the stress of bottling it up inside, the endless nights of nightmares, the constant fretting as you try to pretend you are okay so you don't bother anyone else making you crack. You panic, at one point some small insignificant touch as he brushes your hand reaching for something sending you into fight or flight as you flinch away from him, yelping, terrified. Morick doesn't understand, he tries to move closer, tries to calm you down, to ask what's wrong, alarmed, confused. You shake your head, eyes wide, and cringe away, trying not to break down as you yell at him to leave you alone, to go away, not to ever come near you. You flee to the safety of your room, shutting and locking the door in a rush as you slump against the inside of it. He leaves, hurt and lost. You feel guilty, selfish, stupid, and sick inside. Morick was one of your closest friends. Morick never did anything to you. Except be stronger then you and intimidating, like Scott was. You are trembling but you can't admit to your own fear, even as you find yourself silently crying when you hear Morick close the front door behind him. You come to learn that day that razor blades are more useful then you thought they were, that they can hurt you and punish you for the faults you can't name that made you deserve this and plague you with fear, with nightmares, with guilt. In a way it takes away whats hurting you, but its only ever temporary. You start wearing long sleeves, no one seems to question it though. They don't know, they don't see, the scars you give yourself, slowly growing and multiplying in number to cover you.

It's the end of summer, there is only a week left before school starts for your senior year. Kenzi convinces you to go shopping with him for new clothes, to leave your house a while. You agree, but you can't help noticing how tense he is around you when the two of you go. Neither of you mentions it, but inside you feel an ache, trying to figure out when became so fragile, so on edge, that you were the friend others had to tiptoe around. You know the answer though, inside, yet you don't like it and remain in denial of it, distracting yourself as you find nice shirts and pants to spend your money on. You find Morick by accident as he comes our of the nearby art supply store, a boy by his side that you don't know. He looks hurt, rejected and yet lit up, alert. He approaches, almost warily though there is an urgency in his step as Kenzi smiles and waves him over. The three of you agree to go to the movies, a horror flick having been advertising all summer on TV commercials that Kenzi has been dying to see. You don't expect, while sitting in the dark beside your friends watching the screen, the scene that ends up showing. It's only a side character, yet it's so violent. You freeze up, stuck watching in horror, a hand clamping over your mouth to stop yourself from crying out, and then you bolt, crying. Weak knees find you throwing up in a trashcan, wobbly as you learn over it, then stumbling away as your breath rattles, uncertain feet trying to take you home, to safety, to familiarity. Morick follows you, but when he tries to interact with you you snap, yelling at him, sobbing, and running. Even unsteady and drained your years of track have no problem leaving him behind until you slam into your house. You hurt, everything hurts. It's in your head, what happened, and you can't get away from it, can't outrun it, can't block it out. You feel like you are reliving it, the smell, the sound, the touch, the taste, so painful, so clear, your cradling your head in your hands, everything agony. You shower, your entire being dirty, the hot water scalding your skin until its red and feels raw with angry nerves as you wail quietly and sob, trying to scrub it away until your skin is all but bleeding, but it doesn't help. You can't live with this, the guilt, the fear, the memories, with what happened and what you've become, with the thought of what's stuck playing in your head. The razor you use is under the sink, you snatch at it. The cuts are too deep, it's on purpose though, the tiled floor staining red as you watch your own blood queasily, slumping to the ground. The last thing you remember is the vague, almost distant sound of your mother screaming as your dad breaks down the door.

You wake, bandaged and in a hospital room. Your head feels fuzzy, white walls all around you along with strange nurses and doctors. And your parents. You can hear Joey crying in the hall, see the redness of your father's eyes, and it makes you feel sick with guilt, but you don't give answers. You can't. All you can do is apologize meekly, though for what beyond bringing them pain you aren't sure, the words feeling hollow with what isn't said as you murmur them, scared and riddled with shame seeing them struggle around you. You would do what you did to yourself again, but seeing them agonize over you hurts, you feel selfish, you feel a burden, a source of angst unneeded. Still, when they move you to a new unit you keep pushing it down, you won't answer, you can't answer, you can't share or expose yourself. Kenzi and Morick visit often, Joey all but lives in the hospital with you, but you don't tell them, none of them. Not anything. You can't apologize to Morick either though you want to so badly. You just can't. You don't go back to school, not that semester, or any there after. You can't, you don't care, and it hurts you to think about it.

You are given therapy, they help you realize the razors aren't okay, but you don't stop hurting yourself. Twenty now, you still live with your parents. You feel disgusting, selfish, useless, a waste of resources and breath. No diploma, no job, no license or anything else to make you worth anything. Most days you barely make it out of bed to eat or shower. You are always greasy and dirty. You hate it, you weren't like this, you don't want to be like this, but you can't get back there. You sleep so much, most of your days lost to it even despite your rest often being restless and plagued by unease, by nightmare, but its still better then being awake. When you are awake it hurts, deep, aching. The doctor gives you medicine but it doesn't help. Not really. The medicine you can buy behind the liquor store the next town over works so much better, and though you are disgusted and ashamed, you still buy it, still use it, still hide it, because it makes the pain go away for a little while, makes you feel happy and warm instead of crushed by the agony that is everything else.

Your twenty-one when the suspicions begin, or at least start to come to light. Joey is the first. She starts asking questions, just shy of the mark, as though trying to step lightly, to go around it, as though afraid to learn the actual answer. Joey has no fear of anything. You don't answer her, and when you finally feel the pressures of guilt to say something you just talk circles, refusing to give straight replies. You hate it, you hate the lies, the avoidance, the omission, the secrets, but you can't bring yourself to admit that what meager funds you have are going to the pills you stash away with your things, to the cigarettes you chain smoke when you sneak out late at night, to the alcohol and the syringes. You don't want to see the pain it brings her, you don't want to pain of admitting your shameful actions, and selfishly, you don't want her to try to stop it when you need it so badly to live, to make it day to day. You hate what you've become and you don't want her to know, don't want any of them to know. Your afraid, terrified. When everyone is asleep that night you pack your things, some clothing, your drugs, your money. You try to write a letter,several hours walk to the harbor, and by the time you get there you are weary and sore, but you use the last of your cash to bribe a worker to get you smuggled on board for a cross region trip. It's only a week, most of it you spend below deck sleeping restlessly on hard crates. You don't know where you are heading, you didn't care, and when you land it's a strange place you've never been before. But Inset is waiting there for you all the same.