The Memoir of Antonia Boots

The First Cut
In late October, the cross-country season ended. With it, so did the only thing in high school I seemed capable of succeeding in. I did okay in English and history. I had always liked those subjects, but as I failed at honors geometry and making friends outside of my grade school circle, I began to care less and less about, well, everything.
My defense against my social failure was that it didn’t matter because I hated everyone. I hated the people who didn’t want to acknowledge my existence. I hated the teachers. I hated the administrators. I hated the school. In fact, I hated the whole damn world. That’s how the hit list was born.
A brilliant idea, really, I think it began with a girl who I thought was my friend, Kristen. She suggested that I might as well make a list of all the people I hated. It started out as a single column and, over about the course of a month, it grew to five columns on one side of a piece of notebook paper.
It included everyone from the girl who had picked on me in grade school to the cast of Sesame Street. I wasn’t the only contributor to the list. Kristen and Rebecca, my best friend since childhood, also added to the list. Eventually, it received the title “Hit List,” as a joke. Kristen kept it in her notebook and we would pull it out whenever we thought of someone to add to it.

It was a few days after my birthday in November when I was summoned to the Principal’s office. On the walk from my study hall, I couldn’t think of what I had done. Usually when I got into trouble, I knew why. The only thing that crossed my mind was the editorial I had written that had been published in the local paper. I had written an editorial calling the administrations method of dealing with bomb threats ineffective, but I knew that I was protected by freedom of speech on that one.
Cold. When Principal Stevens pulled out the hit list, I felt cold. “ Does this look familiar?” he asked.
I have often wondered why I didn’t play dumb and pretend that I had never seen the thing before. I’d lied plenty of times before and thought nothing of it. Why I chose to be honest that time, I don’t know.
The list had been found in the Spanish room and the Spanish teacher (an old bat of a women) had recognized my handwriting.
“Is this your handwriting?” Mr. Stevens asked.
“Yes,” I admitted. I think it was in that moment that I began to feel nothing and everything changed. All the little things, the tiny blows to my self esteem grouped together and it was too much. The words that poured out of Mr. Stevens' mouth seemed to circle around me in the thick air. I could almost see them there, meaningless. I knew that facing my parents would be worse, the disappointment and anger. And they were all right, I was nothing but a failure.
As I was escorted out of the principal’s office, Don was waiting to go in. He was there for throwing a book through a window. I didn’t say a word to him as we passed, but I think he could see the change.
“Antonia, what happened?” my friend, Jen, asked as I slumped down into the cafeteria chair across from her.
“The hit list. My parents are going to kill me,” I muttered.
“They are not,” Jen assured me, “You’re overreacting.” I laid my head on the table and stared at the strange, splotched pattern. The noise of students chatting washed over me. I heard nothing. I saw nothing. I was nothing.
“Antonia, what’s going on?” Don asked the anxiety evident in his tone.
“She’s been staring at the same spot for fifteen minutes,” Jen informed him.
“Do you know what happened?”
“She said something about the hit list and her parent’s killing her. I told her she was overreacting.”
“Antonia?” Don questioned as he shook my arm, “Will you talk to me?” I didn’t respond. He sighed to himself.
“She’ll come around,” Jen assured him.

That night, I found a new best friend. My parents had yelled at me and questioned what I had been thinking. I can’t remember the details because everything was a blur. I just wasn’t there. In my room I sat on the floor and hugged my knees to my chest and rocked back and forth. The darkness surrounded me as I cried. I gasped for air, desperate to fill my lungs. It seemed like hours before I fell to my side exhausted. I wanted nothing more than to sleep, forever, but sleep wouldn’t come.
It must have been midnight when I finally snuck downstairs. The house was still. Only a cat slinked in the shadows. I could hear the whirr of the fan that my mother insisted on using all year long in her bedroom. For me, that fan was wonderful. It meant that my parents never heard when I snuck around the house at night.
The medicine cabinet was located next to the sink in the kitchen. I pulled the cupboard door open, careful not to let it bang against anything. I moved the different bottles of pills around until I saw what I wanted; the giant brown bottle of melatonin. It had been there for several years since the pediatrician had recommended it to my mother to help my then four-year-old baby brother to sleep.
I took down the bottle and placed it on the counter as I searched in a drawer for a plastic bag. After opening a sandwich baggy, I poured about thirty or forty pills into it. Then, I poured out another five and downed them with a glass of water. I replaced the bottle of pills and slowly closed the cabinet so that the door wouldn’t slam shut. I returned to my room and placed the plastic bag in my backpack before returning to my bed.
During the day, I would take every chance I could to down a handful of pills. The feeling, or rather lack of feeling, which I got from taking the melatonin was like a high to me. I was awake, but I felt like I was asleep, everything was a blur. Nothing mattered to me. All I wanted to do was sleep and leave the world behind.

“Hey, Antonia!” I turned to see Don approaching me one morning as I emptied my backpack into my locker. “How are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“How can you not know?”
“I don’t know, I just don’t.”
“We have a study hall in band today,” he began, “ Do you have any work you need to get done?”
“I don’t know,” I responded.
“Do you know anything?” he growled in frustration.
“No, I am an idiot, I know nothing.”
“That’s not true. You know it’s not true,” he insisted, grabbing my wrist to keep me from walking away from him.
“Fine, whatever,” I muttered, trying to pull away.
“Don’t,” he warned, tightening his grasp, “you need to talk to me.”
“I talk to you,” I knew I was making him angry, but I didn’t care.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” he stated between gritted teeth.
“I know,” I conceded, “but there’s nothing to talk about.”

It was shortly after I served my three-hour Friday detention that I began cutting. I was watching Seventh Heaven with my parents one night and the episode was about Lucy making friends with this girl, who they later discovered cut herself. I don’t know what about it made me think that it was a good idea. I think I was looking for anything that would help. That night, I was getting ready to head to bed when I “accidentally” knocked over a juice glass, causing it to shatter on the kitchen floor.
I snuck a few large shards into the pouch of my sweatshirt before cleaning up the rest with the vacuum cleaner. In the safety of my room, I took out the large shards and held them up one by one to examine them. I looked to see which one had the sharpest edge. One was pointed like a dagger, another had a long thin edge. I thought that one would be best.
I pulled up my sleeve and examined my wrist. I had always been thin and the blue blood vessels stood out against the paleness of my skin. I ran a finger along the smooth skin. It was too smooth, too perfect. I hated its falseness. I wasn't perfect, I was disgusting. A mistake.
I waited until everyone had gone to bed. Once again I snuck down to the kitchen to get supplies. I took guaze, band aids, and sterile tape. On my way back to my room I took an old ratty pool towel from the bathroom. In my room I climbed up to my loft bed and arranged my supplies in the small space between my mattress and the wall. From under my pillow I pulled out a Kleenex. Pulling back the edges of the tissue the glass within gleamed in the light.
I laid the towel beneath my left wrist and held the glass in my right. I drew the glass lightly over my wrist, small beads of blood bubbled up. I moved down a few centimeters and pushed the edge of the shard into my skin before drawing it across. It burned beautifully as the glass tore through my skin. I felt relief as the blood ran down my wrist in rivulets. It was a release. I could feel something and it felt good. I made five more cuts before wrapping my arm in the towel and falling asleep.
The next morning I wrapped my wrist in guaze and secured it with the sterile tape, before picking out a long sleeved shirt to wear that would cover my wrist. I had gym that day so I made sure to pack a long sleeve shirt to wear for that class as well. As I went through my daily activities I was constantly checking to make sure that my wrist was not exposed. I continued to cut every night. It was the only way that I could fall asleep.

We were studying Romeo and Juliet in my English class. I had read the book in my eighth grade English class and felt no need to pay attention during class. Don and I, as usual, were passing a notebook back and forth, in which we had a written conversation going.
“I can’t believe what Amber (his step-sister) gets away with. I know my step mom doesn’t like me. I just wish she would go away,” Don complained.
“Yeah, it’s not right,” I agreed, “It’s too bad your Dad won’t stand up for you.”
“Well, he won’t. I’ve tried. He doesn’t give a crap about me.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, “ I responded. As I passed the notebook back to him my pen fell to the floor. I leaned over to grab the pen with my left hand. While I stretched out my arm my sleeve went up revealing the gauze I had wrapped around my wrist that morning. I pulled my arm back and yanked down the sleeve, but Don was already scribbling in the notebook.
“What happened to your wrist?”
“Nothing, I scraped it,” I responded.
“Doing what?” he asked not satisfied by my response.
“I don’t remember.”
“Tell me the truth.”
“That is the truth,” I lied.
“Don’t lie.”
“You have to promise not to tell anyone,” I begged.
“I promise.”
I took a deep breath. My palms sweated. I didn’t want to admit what I was doing. Not to him. Not to anyone. “I cut myself.” I watched his expression as I passed the notebook back and he read those three words.
He scrunched up his eyebrows and his eyes grew dark. It seemed like he was angry. He passed the notebook back to me after jotting down a couple of words. “How long?”
“I don’t know. A couple of weeks. Please don’t tell anyone,” I begged again.
“I won’t tell anyone. Why are you doing this?”
“It feels good,” I answered truthfully.
“What are you using?”
“Glass shards.” The bell rang as I passed the notebook back to him. I shoved my pen and papers into my bag anxious to escape. As I sped out the door I knew he was behind me.
“Antonia!” he shouted as I weaved my way through the crowded hallway. I wished that I didn’t have to stop at my locker before I could leave. I knew that he would catch my there. And he did.
“Why didn’t you wait for me?” he demanded pulling me away from the lock I was trying to open.
“I have to get my stuff and catch the bus,” I lied.
“You have time,” he began, “ We take the same bus.”
“I know, but I don’t want to have to hurry.”
“You are hurrying,” he stated, “ I want to see your wrist.”
“What?” I twisted away from him surprised by his request.
“Show me or I’ll tell.”
“Fine, I’ll show you on the bus,” I conceded. He watched me like a hawk as I opened my locker and stuffed my belongings into my already bulging teal backpack. It was if he thought I was going to escape into the wilds of the small city. When I stood up with my backpack he grabbed me by the elbow and led me outside to the bus. Together we tumbled into the large brown seat.
“Show me,” he demanded as I slouched down into the seat. I was glad that he had allowed me the window, so that I could hide myself from everyone else on the bus. I felt ashamed as I rolled up my sleeve keeping my arm close to my body. I wanted to make sure that no one else saw the angry red marks that beautifully marred my pale white skin. I unwrapped the gauze and then turned to stare at the window.
I felt his fingers run over the red lines that sliced across my skin. I didn’t want to know what he thought. I didn’t want to see what his face would reveal to me. I looked out the window, but didn’t see as the buildings flew by. I allowed myself to slip away to the nothingness in my head.