Chapter 1

So I’m curled up with the cold porcelain of this empty bathtub digging into my ass and this tank top fused to my back with sweat.  Across a minefield of flawlessly waxed marble flooring and four entire walls of mirrors, beside the silver automatic sink with golden handles there is a white door and a banging from the other side of it.  I don’t know what’s happening out there – if someone needs to piss really badly, if they’re moshing too hard and bumping into it, of if they’re actually worried about me.  That would be a huge fucking surprise.
Those disgusting socialites don’t give two shits about me.  If anybody even noticed I left, they’d probably think I was just sticking my fingers down my throat or shooting up on something.  They all do it – that’s normal for them.  Disappearing to the bathroom for half an hour in the middle of a party is just a day in the fucking life for these people.  Who am I kidding?  I am these people and they are me.
The only reason anybody might think anything was up is if somehow, they heard the smashing of glass above the dubstep and drunken yelling.  The far wall-mirror has one of those circular spider-web patterns and some smeared blood from where I punched it a few minutes ago.  My hand is draped over the side of the tub, blood thin as water oozes down over my fingers and around the shards of glass embedded in my knuckles.  
You shouldn’t be taking so much Aspirin, Serina, thins the blood right out.  Tell me about the headaches – maybe there’s something else I can prescribe for them.
I came in here to wash some beer out of my shirt – that’s when I found myself cornered by four walls of mirrors all reflecting at me and off me and off each other like a trick room.  Hundreds of reflections converged in on me, on my pink tank top and my tiny leather skirt.  I was bombarded with this platinum blond ponytail my caked-on makeup.  I’m such a fucking fake.  I wanted to carve ‘liar’ into my cheeks with a switchblade and chop off all of this bleach-blonde Barbie doll hair.  All the blush and lipstick in the world couldn’t cover up the innate ugliness in all those reflections - the pathetic, revolting creature I’d become was staring from every angle with every inch as much hatred for me as I had for her.
Music screamed in my ears and my hands shook from dehydration and green eyes stared at me from under a thousand layers of black eyeliner and Daddy’s little narcissist couldn’t fucking take it anymore.  My fist connected with the glass and there was a glorious stinging in my hand – a sensation I drank in like gin.  No one appreciates the nirvana of pain until they know what its like to be absolutely numb.  The monster in the mirror was smashed into a million delicate silver spiderwebs and her lying eyes couldn’t taunt me anymore.  But I still wanted to hurt her.  I still wanted to hurt me.
Then to now is a map on the waxed marble floor.  The blood on the base of the sink, the lingering vomit on the edge of the toilet seat, my little gold sequined purse upside down with the contents dumped out beside it – a mess of lip gloss and mascara but missing the knife Eddy gave me for self defense.  And then there is all the hair – first short strands, and then longer and longer chunks as the trail of dead cells makes its way to the tub.  
Eddy’s knife is still in my hand – blood slick on the bottom like the reddened jaws of a wolf.  I’ve added some new scars to my thighs where no one would find them even if they cared to look.  I thought the liberation of slicing skin would help but the mirrors are still everywhere and even though I’ve cut off most of my hair I can still feel the mousse and smell the product and the bleach and the lies and I want to rip out what’s left and the cuts on my legs are killing me and there is a pool of blood below me but I want to hurt more.  I want to hurt for being such a fake fucking bitch, I want to hurt so much that it blips out reality and I live and breathe the pain and the truth behind it.  Comfort is a fucking lie we tell ourselves to avoid what’s real.  Take the red pill.  Wake the fuck up.
The banging on the door is getting louder.
The harshness of the dubstep slams into me in waves and I can feel the beat and the energy of the people beyond the white door and I just want all of it to go away.
I take a deep breath. I have the power to make it go away. I can take the red pill, I can accept that I’ve failed and I’m nothing but a fucking Barbie bitch, I can make the decision.  This was my life and they took it from me, but I can damn well take it back.  It’s the only way I know how.  It’s the only way to be real.  What little hair I have left is plastered to my head with the rolls of sweat cascading down my face and off my neck.
The knife Eddy gave me for protection is poised at my throat.  
The door bursts open and flashing lights rush in and the music intensifies in volume and my head pounds and it my eyes sting and Eddy’s knife is still at my neck. I can barely make out Lindsay’s figure against the harsh lights.  Her brown doe-eyes stare in horror from beneath perfectly straight bangs.
“Serina?” she whispers.
I lock eyes with her, push the knife into my skin, and pull from ear to ear.