Scarlett

Warning: This story contains themes of Depression and Suicide.

*****

I met her in tenth grade.

It was the kind of summer that has a frustrating, unavoidable heat and I had the type of depression that steals smiles and gift wraps self-hate. It was accompanied by the sort of anxiety that strangled my vocal cords and made my heartbeats as deafening as a gunshot. Suicidal thoughts often crept up on me like shadows in a candlelit room.

She was in most of my classes and for seven months straight I wished I could be her.

A Monday in January

The first day of the school year was like any other, filled with fake reunions and faker smiles.

I was in English, rubbing sleep from my eyes and shrugging off my friends' subtle neglect and disregard for me when the girl appeared beside me. "Can I sit here?" She asked the question with a confidence that made it obvious she knew I'd say yes.

I nodded, half expecting her to change her mind and move away. She had onyx hair that fell over her slim shoulders in perfect waves and bright verdant eyes that looked like they might house rolling hills and lush trees. She looked more like a movie star than a school student and I found myself inevitably wondering why she would sit next to me.

I thought I must look the polar opposite, slouched in my seat beside her. My short blonde hair stuck out at odd angles and insisted on frizzing in a way that no hair spray or google techniques could tame. My school shirt was too big for me, because I felt an illogical sort of naked vulnerability if an outfit was small enough to fit properly. I'd given up ironing my uniforms long ago since I usually pressed more creases into them.

"I'm Scarlett," she said. She even spoke like a movie star. Absently, I wondered how long she'd stay before getting cast in the newest chick-flick.

"Eliza," I answered, smiling in a way that made it painfully obvious how shy I was.

"How was your holiday?" She somehow managed to ask in a way that made it seem like more than the obligatory words everyone asked out of politeness and an attempt to avoid an unsettling silence. When I answered, she surprised me by actually listening. Her eyes were intently focused on me and she offered interested comments in place of the distracted subject changes other people usually did. I instantly changed my mind about her seeming like a movie star. She was more like a book character - part of a world that offered escapism from this one.

During the lesson, my gaze wandered to Kayce, as it always did. Something in my stomach fluttered at the thought of finally having a class with him. His eyes were focused somewhere out the window.

Usually I didn't pay attention to his friends, but in that moment my focus was pulled to his best friend who sat beside him. Chase was staring.

For a single uncomfortable second I thought he was looking at me, but then I remembered who was sitting beside me, in the centre of his stare. Scarlett.

I didn't know much about Chase, other than the fact I was pretty sure he was dating one of the 'popular' girls who had a personality about as exciting as a desert. Yet there he was gazing very obviously at Scarlett.

I looked to her and realised she was completely oblivious. For the first of many times, I wondered how many other guys looked at her like that - as if she was the only genuine piece of artwork in a museum full of forgeries.

That was the first lesson in a long time that went by as quickly as a good TV show. When the bell rang I was shocked to find that I was actually disappointed.

A Tuesday in February

Scarlett sat at the back of the room in Math. I sat at the front with a group of people who talked over me, only acknowledging me out of poorly concealed pity.

I often heard her laughter filling the room like music notes. She sat with girls who came from different friendship groups, not knowing anybody else in the class. It was a combination of completely different girls - a patchwork of people. I couldn't help but wish there was a spare seat beside them so I could be sitting there, amongst the genuine joy, rather than here, amidst the stale, counterfeit conversation.

The only times I really smiled in math class was when Scarlett said hi to me or called something across the classroom to me. My friends paid her more attention than they gave me. I still couldn't figure out why she bothered to notice me when everybody noticed her.

A Wednesday in March

Science was always boring. I sat next to a girl I knew well enough to talk to but not well enough to want to talk to. Scarlett sat behind us, next to a boy named Oscar.

Oscar was known as 'weird' and 'nerdy'. I'd never actually heard anyone describe him with those words, but that was because nobody ever took the time to discuss him. He wore thick, angular framed glasses, had very noticeable braces and acne that covered more of his face than shells on a beach. I'd never deliberately avoided him, but when Scarlett sat next to him months earlier, I realised I'd subconsciously stayed away in the same way people evaded me.

Scarlett would often bring my friend and I into their conversation, causing us to spend the majority of the lesson turned around in our seats. Oscar slowly but surely became more involved in the chats and after awhile I found myself focusing more on his unexpected humour and less on his stereotypical geeky appearance.

It was strange how Scarlett did that; changed people's opinions on others. More people spoke to me since Scarlett has started to, especially when she was with me. I often wondered if she deliberately did it; if that was the reason she talked to so many people nobody expected someone like her to. Yet, it seemed more likely that she simply enjoyed talking to people like Oscar and me, always seeming interested in what we had to say, even when we were hesitant to voice it.

After science, she walked with me to my next class. On Wednesdays we always crossed paths with Kayce and Chase. I looked forward to those moments, because sometimes, when Scarlett saw Chase, she started up a conversation.

I found it extraordinary how his face lit up and glowed like a lantern every single time she spoke to him. Sometimes all she asked him was if they had homework for French class. Other times she simply said hi. He always looked breathless when he saw her. Kayce never said much in those conversations but I held my breath anyway, waiting to hear his voice.

Other times, Scarlett didn't seem to see the boys as they walked past in the crowded corridor. Chase always noticed her, just like I always saw Kayce. On days like those, I wanted to start up a conversation, but Kayce's eyes fixed elsewhere made my words catch in my throat. I wondered if Chase felt the same about Scarlett. His face always dropped when we walked past without a word.

A Thursday in April

History classes always went equally as fast as English did. Scarlett and I sat at the front of the room. She never told me it was her favourite class but I could tell by the way she animatedly mentioned dates and people and events the way other people discussed gossip.

I was the kind of academic where I spent ages thinking of an answer, only to be unsure of it, but somehow usually got it right. I'd quickly learnt that Scarlett was the kind of smart where she always knew the answer off the top of her head and was absolutely certain of it. I might've been jealous had she not been so consistently humble.

We had History last on a Thursday and when the teacher told us we needed to work with a partner Scarlett invited me over to her house.

I'd had no idea that Scarlett's family was rich, until my mum dropped me off. There was a large security gate somebody remotely opened when I arrived and an actual fountain in the expansive driveway. The house was four stories. Four!! I couldn't decide what to focus on. It must have cost a fortune, and I didn't think anybody even knew that Scarlett lived here.

The inside was even more impressive with polished tiles and floor to ceiling windows. Scarlett strolled through it all as comfortably as she wandered the halls at school. She looked more at place here than I would ever look anywhere.

"Let's sit by the pool," she said to me. It was bigger than my house.

A young man was already lounging on a deckchair. He had coal black hair and emerald eyes. He could've passed as Scarlett's twin if he hadn't clearly been a few years older.

"That's my brother Austin," Scarlett said, grabbing a cushion from the deckchair beside him and playfully tossing it in his direction.

I'd never realised how private Scarlett was about her life until that moment when it occurred to me I barely knew anything about her.

"And who might you be?" Austin asked, catching the cushion with ease. I tried to focus on his face and not the bare skin of his tanned torso but the perfectly sculpted jawline was just as distracting.

"She's Eliza," Scarlett said for me. "And you can't flirt with her because she deserves a lot better than you."

"That's never stopped me before Scar," Austin said with a lopsided grin.

Scarlett rolled her eyes good naturedly and gestured me over to the pool steps. "I know. Now go away and leave my friend and I to enjoy ourselves."

"Nice to meet you Eliza," Austin said to me. "If Scarlett gets too annoying, come find me."

I laughed nervously. Scarlett splashed water at him as he ambled away.

"Is this where your history study happens?" I asked, looking out at the sparkling water.

She smiled. "History can wait." She dove into the pool with a mermaid's grace and, when she surfaced, said the last thing I expected to hear from anyone . "First, I want to hear all about you and Kayce."

My startled confusion must've shown on my face because she gave an amused laugh and said, "Oh come on, you like him! I figured it out in English class on the first day of school this year. Tell me all about it."

I swam further into the pool, barely noticing the cool touch of the water.

"I like him. He doesn't notice me," I lamented. "That's all there is to it."

"Nonsense," she said, "He's just shy. He looks at you when you're not looking."

My heart swelled at the words. I wanted to ask more but another question was more pressing. "And Chase? He stares at you constantly."

I expected her to act surprised but instead, she shook her head dismissively, if not knowingly. "He just zones out a lot."

"His face lights up like all the stars combined whenever you speak Scarlett," I told her.

She shook her head again. "That doesn't matter. He's with her." There was something in the words that sounded an awful lot like the noise a heart makes when it breaks.

"I doubt he will be for long," I admitted. "I'm pretty sure he's completely in love with you."

She was looking out at the horizon when she said quietly, "I asked him that once, years ago" I stared at her in shock. I hadn't expected that. I'd thought she was completely oblivious to Chase's affections. "He said no."

"That was years ago," I said insistently when I processed her confession. "Things change."

"Not Chase," she said certainly. "What good is his love if he can never admit to feeling it?" Her eyes were glazed over as she spoke about him.

"Do you love him?" I blurted out, suddenly overcome with curiosity.

She smiled and I couldn't help but think it was the first time I'd seen her wear a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "I don't have time for love."

I kept thinking that of all the people I'd met, she was the one who seemed to have the most time for love, not just for a boy, but for the whole world.

Scarlett had never been one to talk about boys though, and just as soon as she'd brought them up, she changed the topic.

We'd been talking for hours when a car pulled up outside the house. A Lamborghini, I realised after a moment.

"Dad's home!" Scarlett exclaimed with a kind of glee that was usually reserved for little kids on birthdays. She tugged me back inside, saying to her brother, "Race you there!" when she saw him wandering in the same direction.

I was left to cluelessly hurry after them as they sprinted down the spiral staircase. It looked like a moment someone would photograph or paint or pen poetry on. Every moment of Scarlett's life did.

When they half stumbled out the front door, Scarlett threw her arms around a tall man that looked just like her and her brother. "You're early!" she squealed.

"And I brought presents," he said, looking at her with more affection than I thought I'd ever seen on one person's face.

"But not mum," Austin said dryly. "Where is she?"

"She had to stay a little longer," their dad said calmly. "Got caught up with work."

"Of course," Austin said, turning away. Scarlett didn't seem bothered though. She eagerly accepted the large box wrapped in pale pink tissue paper.

Her dad kissed her on the cheek and said something apologetically about having to make some phone calls. He didn't even seem to notice me standing there as he walked inside their mansion.

Scarlett practically skipped inside, telling me to come open the present with her. I wanted to ask where her father had been, and for how long. I wanted to question why Austin seemed so upset about their mother still being away. But Scarlett had never offered up any information about her home life and it seemed wrong to ask, so I simply sat by her side as she tore open the box and gushed over the beautiful dress folded inside.

I longed to run my hands over the golden sequins but instead said, "It's beautiful."

Scarlett was smiling like I'd never seen her smile and my next words were out of my mouth before I could force them back where they usually hid. "I wish I was you Scarlett."

I blushed slightly, feeling foolish for admitting it. She looked up at me with a radiant sincerity. "I wish I was you Eliza." I smiled, knowing it was simply something she felt she had to say to make me feel better.

A Friday in May

Scarlett spent basically every lunch break sitting alone. It hadn't made sense to me at first. She could've sat with any group or individual she wanted to. Eventually, I realised that was the point. I respected that about her just as much as I respected everything else. Despite how much everyone loved spending time with her, she appreciated her own company more than anyone else's.

My friends and I were roaming the school aimlessly on this particular day, with me at the back of the group, only half following the conversation that was barely loud enough to reach me.

I noticed her in her usual spot, back against the trunk of a large Autumn Blaze Maple tree. She was reading a book and seemed completely immersed in it. The fallen leaves around her rustled restlessly in a gentle breeze. They were the colour of fire and a few had even settled in her black hair. I thought again about how she looked like a photograph, a movie star, the main character of a novel.

Part of me wanted to go and sit with her, to ask her if her dad had brought her any more presents and what answers she'd written on the latest history exam. I wanted to ask what book she was reading and where she thought she'd be in ten years time. Instead, I reminded myself that she sat by herself because she enjoyed solitude. Instead, I kept walking. I looked at my friends who chattered amongst themselves and then looked back at Scarlett, and fervently wished I could be best friends with her, because if I couldn't be her, being her best friend would have to be the next best thing.

A Saturday in June

I was at Scarlett's house again, watching her mum arrive home and hug her tightly. She kept gushing about how much prettier Scarlett had gotten since she'd last seen her and I kept wishing people paid me even a fraction of the attention they paid Scarlett.

I knew my friendship group was spending the day at the shops. What I didn't know was why they hadn't invited me. I was pretty sure that was why Scarlett had asked me if I wanted to come to hers though.

"Are you okay?" she said when my smile faltered and my words quietened.

I had the temptation to tell her no, that I rarely was, but it meant the world to me that she'd asked. It was enough that she'd noticed I wasn't. Nobody else ever did.

A Sunday in July

The curtains in my room were closed at midday. They always were on days like today, days when the darkness crept into my brain and devoured my whole body.

Depression was a Madeira Vine, growing mercilessly and spreading relentlessly through my mind, suffocating and smothering any happy thoughts I had.

I kept thinking about how people always looked through me. I was tired of feeling like glass and tired of shattering like it. Words like invisible, useless, worthless kept somersaulting around in my head, caught up in a cyclone.

As I waited for nightfall, I continued to remember people saying the words that had made me stay for so long. Suicide is selfish. Then I kept telling myself, It's selfish of them to want me to stay. I thought of people saying, Do what makes you happy, and pictured how the ground would look from enough stories above.

I was exhausted. My spurious smile was fraying; a blanket so unravelled it had completely lost its warmth. I had come to one conclusion above all the rest.

Nobody loved me enough to truly miss me.

I walked to the local shopping centre, taking in the scenery for what I was sure would be the last time. The lift delivered me to the carpark roof slowly and I had the faint thought that I might beat it back down.

Nobody was around when I climbed onto the ledge at the highest part. Nobody was around when I looked down. Nobody was around when tears fell from my eyes, falling in the way I was about to. Nobody was around when I whispered, 'Goodbye' to nobody in particular. Or at least, that's what I thought.

When I looked up, I saw a girl standing on the ledge across the road. She didn't see me. She was too busy looking down at the spot where her own tears had probably fallen.

Panic rose in me. My first thought was to take the lift back down, cross the street and make my way up to her. My first thought was that maybe I could talk her out of it, whoever she was - maybe I could say to her the things I wished somebody had said to me.

But when her foot moved, I knew I had no time.

"Wait!" I screamed, but she was already falling.

I froze. My heart stopped. She plummeted.

For a second she was in the air, arms outstretched like an angel's wings. Fleetingly, I wondered if she was reaching up as if to catch herself, as if to take back what she'd just done. I had the oddest feeling that maybe the girl's last feeling was regret.

Then she hit the ground.

I stumbled backward, nausea and shock chilling me as I raised a hand to cover my mouth, fresh tears sliding over it. Numbly, I dialed triple zero, barely hearing myself as I told them what happened.

Then, caught up in the horror and trauma, I ran. My curtains were still drawn when I came home. Nobody had noticed I'd been gone but I didn't think about that as I climbed under my covers and let the tears drench my pillow.

All I could think about was the girl's parents getting a call. All I could picture was one of her loved ones forced to identify her at the morgue. I imagined her friends, hearing the news, crying harder than I was now.

I thought about the little things that she probably hadn't; that I hadn't until now. I wondered if she had a dog, who would wait and wait and wait for her to come back home, tail wagging at the sight of every opening door and ears drooping when it was never her. I thought that maybe there was an old lady who always saw the girl on a morning walk and would wonder for months about where she was. Maybe the neighbours would take a year to break their habit of waving at her every time she got home from school.

And the bigger things, like maybe her little sister would grow up thinking she wasn't worth staying for. Maybe her friends would start to consider the same fate. Maybe her parents would wake up every single day wondering why, wondering what they could've done differently.

I didn't even know who the girl was, but I was so certain that she wasn't worthless. I wished somebody had told her.

A Monday in July (The Day After)

The whole school was gathered for an abrupt assembly. I didn't pay any attention to my friends as they complained about it. I was still obsessing over what I had witnessed yesterday.

I looked around for Scarlett almost subconsciously, suddenly needing her comforting presence. But then we were asked to sit and the principal was on the stage, promptly addressing why we'd been summoned.

"Yesterday, a student of ours tragically passed away."

My head snapped up to face him. My hands stilled from where they'd been absently fiddling with my shoelace. I didn't dare think this could be the death I'd witnessed, but then he said the word suicide and tears pricked my eyes. It hadn't even crossed my mind that I might know the person.

The words were too painful to take in, so I mostly blocked them out as I waited to hear a name. Could it be someone I knew?

And then he said the one word that turned my whole life upside down.

"Scarlett."

No.

It can't be.

He can't mean...

The words sounded distant as the room turned blurry but it became rapidly obvious what he meant.

Scarlett had killed herself.

Scarlett was the girl I saw die.

Scarlett was the girl I was too late to save.

I stumbled from the crowded hall in a daze, only vaguely aware of the stares and my friends' concerned murmurs. I didn't remember the walk to the bathroom. I just remembered the way my hands shook so hard I could barely lock the door behind me. I remembered how carelessly I'd collapsed onto the cold floor. I remembered crying.

I thought somebody on the other side of the door asked if I was okay but I couldn't remember answering and I didn't know if I'd imagined it. After awhile I heard my teacher's voice but I couldn't even process what she was saying. It was near the end of the lesson when I ventured out of the stall.

I made my way to my lockers, knowing I couldn't last the day at school. I was almost there when I saw him.

Chase was sitting alone in an empty alley, back against the wall, knees tucked against his chest. Crying.

I didn't think I'd ever seen a boy at school shed tears, yet here Chase was. He looked up at me, eyes swollen and face crimson, as if he'd been here just as long as I'd been in a bathroom cubicle. There was no shame on his face, just raw grief glimmering in the tear tracks on his cheeks.

We stared at each other. I thought I should say something. I was sure that if Scarlett was here she would've. If Scarlett was around for a situation like this she would've been the closest thing to an antidote that any of us could find. But I suppose that was the irony. The one who had held our worlds together had fallen apart, and none of us had noticed in time to put the pieces back together.

I walked away, clumsily grabbing my school bag and going home. Guilt weighed heavily on my shoulders but the grief wrenching at my heart was abundantly stronger.

A Tuesday in July

I don't know how I dragged myself out of bed the next day but I did. I thought I'd only spent a few seconds staring at the tree Scarlett used to spend her breaks under but when the bell rang I realised I'd been there for almost half an hour.

The branches were bare of leaves now, leaving her favourite place looking like a skeleton. Strangely, I found myself wishing they'd cut it down. It didn't seem right without her here. Looking at it made my heart clench like a fist.

It was first break when the three of them came to collect her things. I saw them talking to the principal outside her locker area.

Her father's face was marked with a faint red; the tell-tale sign of tears, as if he'd only managed to stop weeping long enough to come here. Her mother hadn't been as successful. I could hear her heart wrenching sobs from where I stood, metres away, clutching my schoolbooks to my chest so tightly I could feel the paper crumpling beneath my fingers. Her brother had a reassuring hand on his mother's back but I could make out the strained look on his face. His shoulders were hunched in a way that didn't suit him. He used to carry himself with the same charisma Scarlett had.

Austin looked up, catching my eye. I offered a sad smile. He came over to me, noticing me, just like Scarlett always had.

"I'm sorry," I said in a strangled voice.

He looked down at me and I had the strongest sensation that he wished he was looking at Scarlett, instead of her friend. "Are you okay?" he asked. He wishes he'd asked her that, I realised suddenly. All I could do was nod, tears burning my eyes. All he could do was mirror my sad smile, knowing what a lie it was.

A Wednesday in August

It took a month before I could sit with the girls at the back of the room in Math class. There was an empty seat beside them that was painful to look at and even more agonising to sit in. When the girls looked at me I noticed the emptiness in their eyes and the dark circles beneath them.

"Are you okay?" I asked. It seemed like a useless question, but I remembered the comfort it had brought me when Scarlett had said it to me and, more importantly, I wondered yet again, what difference it might have made if we had said them to her.

In Science I sat next to Oscar and listened as he told me about the jokes Scarlett had told him on the days he'd needed to laugh.

Scarlett had saved my life. She'd unknowingly saved my life the day I'd tried to end it and she'd saved it so many days before that too. I wasn't sure just how many other people she'd done the same for. I wasn't sure if I'd ever be able to forgive myself for not doing the same for her.

What good is his love if he can never admit to feeling it? she'd once said about Chase. I thought now that it applied to everyone. We all loved her but it was no good because none of us showed it enough.

I still don't know exactly why she did it, what thoughts were going through her head when she jumped, or if she regretted it as she fell.

Scarlett really was a movie star, expertly practiced in the art of pretending; of hiding her emotions; of acting.

I often wonder what I would've noticed if I had looked more closely. Maybe I would've seen heartache flicker across her face when she glanced at Chase. Maybe I would've noticed the abandonment radiating from her when her father kept leaving and her mother kept taking longer to return. Maybe I would've noticed a loneliness accompanying her during lunch and haunting her house.

Maybe I would've seen a breaking heart behind her incandescent smile. Maybe I would've heard a tragic truth in her tone when she told me I wish I was you. Maybe, if I looked more deeply into her eyes, I would've seen a mirror to my own despair.

Maybe, maybe, maybe. But maybe not.

Maybe no amount of searching for signs would've allowed me to see them. All I knew was that now, I would never stop looking for them. Just in case.

*****

This story was written for the Word Hunt Challenge and was inspired by the following:

• The song 'Dark Enough' by Amanda Lopiccolo.
• The poem 'The Morning After I Killed Myself' by Meggie Royer.
• The poem by E.J. found below.

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