Masks Always Fall

Chapter 15

I woke to the gray half-light of dawn, feeling as though I'd slept not a wink. Sluggishly dragging myself up, I shuffled to the small mirror hanging on the back of my bedroom door.

Gaunt red eyes stared back, ringed by bruised shadows in a wan face robbed of its colors. This wraith could not be me - yet it was. Within days, this stranger had taken up residence behind my ribs, gnawing away at the foundations of who I thought myself to be.

My reflection asked the question burning within hollowed eyes: _how could my whole life fall apart so swiftly, in mere hours?_

It seemed just days ago, my life was finally steadying - Susan's support, Ms. Clarke's guidance lighting my path through gathering darks. But one errant moment, one split-second loss of control had cracked the foundations so severely, the collapse followed hard and fast as an avalanche.

Now I teetered alone atop a jagged precipice, gazing down into yawning abyss with no path back to steady ground. Friends, home, security - gone with the fall of a hand in unchecked rage. Lost too was Clarke's light, snuffed out before it could ignite my spirit anew each day.

The ruin stared back through the mirror, a broken, unrecognizable remnant where a girl had stood hopeful not long past. This was the cost of a moment's fracture, the damage wrought by shattering what fragile trust had been built so carefully over years.

Before, an uncertain future had remained within grasp. Now, no future existed at all beyond this single day -

With listless motions, I pulled on a worn pair of lavender sweats and matching hoodie - comfort clothes, now mere protection from reality's biting chill. My hair went up haphazardly, lacking even the energy for care.

Facing the mirror once more, I saw a figure drained and beaten down, who met my eyes with equal defeat. There seemed no point now in even trying - to care, to hope, to fight what increasingly felt like inevitability.

I sank to the floor, arms wrapped tightly around drawn knees. Had all effort, all struggle amounted only to this - wreckage, ruins, a girl with so much ripped ruthlessly away that she no longer knew how to keep standing?

All I'd wanted was purpose, meaning, a place to lay my weary head with people who saw me - really saw past surface to the tempest within. But that storm had battered shores and foundations alike until nothing recognizable remained, least of all within sickly eyes staring back from fractured glass.

With a heavy sigh, I pushed creaking bones upright once more to face what lay ahead - shattered though I was, unyielding in spirit if nothing else remained.

My footsteps slowed as I descended the stairs, apprehension crawling up my spine at the tense scene awaiting. Susan's voice had carried an grimness I'd never heard before.

In the kitchen sat not just Susan, Dylan and smugly triumphant Jolie - but him too, William. And his presence could mean only one thing; this was irrevocably serious.

As I entered, four pairs of eyes swiveled to bore into me. Susan broke the taut silence. "Emma, we had to contact your social worker. You have a meeting with her at 8am." Her tone booked no argument, hollow and distant already in the face of what was to come.

"We will decide what to do...after." The final word dropped like a guillotine.

My throat closed up, a lead weight settling in my core. This was it - the condemnation delivered, the death knell marking the end of any hope for a future here. One slip, one loss of control, and I'd wrecked not just myself but any chance at stability or refuge once more.

One pair of eyes gleamed in open satisfaction, relishing my utter defeat. The rest watched dispassionately, already dissociating from the problem they'd sought rid of.