A Safe Place

Cracks In The Glass

Some people think falling apart is loud.

Like screaming in public, throwing things, storming out.

For me, it's quieter.

It's sitting in a room full of people and realizing you could vanish and not a single person would notice the space you leave behind.

Today, the halls at school feel more crowded than usual. Laughter bounces off the lockers, lockers slam shut like gunshots, conversations roll over me in waves too fast to catch.

I pull my sleeves over my hands and keep my head down, blending in like background noise.

It's a skill I mastered a long time ago.

I make it to my locker without having to fake a smile. That's a win, I guess.

I spin the dial — right, left, right again — and the door creaks open, the same way it always does.

And that's when I see it.

Photos taped to the wall across from me — glossy snapshots of a party I didn't even know happened.

Maya is there, front and center, a red cup in her hand, laughing like the world is something soft and beautiful.

Around her are all the people I used to sit with at lunch.

The ones who stopped noticing when I stopped showing up.

I stare at the pictures too long.

Long enough that the edges blur and the sounds around me drain away.

It's not the party that hurts.

It's the fact that they didn't even think to invite me.

Didn't even think about me at all.

I slam my locker shut harder than I mean to.

Someone glances over, but no one says anything.

Of course they don't.

I carry that hollow feeling with me into every class.

It sits in my chest like a stone. Heavy. Unmovable.

At lunch, I sit in the far corner of the cafeteria with my tray untouched in front of me.

I scroll through my phone out of habit more than anything else. Notifications light up the screen — not for me, not from anyone I care about.

More photos.

More proof that life keeps happening without me.

It shouldn't hurt this much.

I should be used to it by now.

When Maya passes my table with a group of girls I barely recognize, she doesn't even glance at me.

Like I'm invisible.

Like I'm a ghost.

For a moment — just one sharp, stupid moment — I want to stand up and scream.

Ask her if she remembers the promises we made in sixth grade to be each other's "always."

Ask her if she even notices that she left me behind long before I stopped trying.

But I don't.

I just lower my head, pick at the fraying edge of my sweater, and pretend like it doesn't matter.

After school, I walk home alone.

The sky is bruised purple, the kind of color that makes everything look softer and sadder all at once.

The cold air stings my face, but I welcome it.

It's something real. Something I can feel.

Halfway home, I pass a broken payphone, leaning sideways like it gave up a long time ago.

It's stupid, but I stop.

I press my hand against the cool metal and wonder how many calls for help were never answered.

How many voices faded into static.

How many of them felt like me.

By the time I get home, the house is dark except for the flicker of the TV in the living room.

Dad's passed out on the couch.

Mom's probably still at work or maybe running errands that are more important than asking how I am.

I slip into my room unnoticed.

Lock the door.

Sink onto the floor with my back against the bed frame.

The silence is heavy here.

Thick enough to drown in.

I pull my notebook out from under my bed — the one no one knows about, the one full of things I'll never say out loud — and open to a blank page.

My hand trembles as I write.

I don't think I'm supposed to be here.

I don't think anyone would miss me.

I don't think it matters.

I don't think I matter.

The words blur as tears I didn't mean to cry slide down my cheeks.

I wipe them away quickly, angrily.

As if crying makes me weaker. As if weakness is the reason I'm like this.

My chest tightens until it feels like I can't breathe.

Until every thought, every heartbeat, every broken piece of me is screaming the same thing:

I want out.

But instead of doing anything, I sit there.

Breathing.

Existing.

Trapped between wanting to disappear and being too scared to let go.

I don't know which is worse.

Somewhere deep inside, I know that this — the loneliness, the ache, the feeling like I'm watching the world through glass — isn't how life is supposed to feel.

But knowing doesn't fix it.

Knowing doesn't make me whole.

I close the notebook, shove it back under the bed like burying a body, and climb under the covers fully clothed.

The world outside fades into the soft hum of nothing.

And me —

I lie there, staring at the cracks in the ceiling, feeling the cracks inside me widen.

Waiting for something to change.

Wondering if it ever will.