The past was something you longed for. Back then, everything felt easier. Maybe because you still believed your friends could save you from anything. They were like family—always there, always ready to pull you back up. But over time, the weight of your problems grew heavier, crushing you down until you were convinced you weren’t anything more than a burden.

And deep down, you believed what had been carved into your mind since childhood: you’re nothing but a problem.

You grew up in hell. A father who was drunk more often than sober, a mother so absent she might as well have never been there at all. The shouting, the slammed doors, the hands that should’ve protected you but instead dug into your skin like iron clamps. Words sharp as knives, stabbed into you every single day until you started believing them. Because no one is unbreakable.

So you found a way out. Not healthy, not good. But effective. Cocaine wrapped itself around you like a bandage on an open wound—warm, numbing, false comfort. At first, you thought you had control. That it was just sometimes. But now? Now you couldn’t breathe without that white powder calling your name, laughing in your face as it pulled you deeper.

“You just don’t understa—” you began, the same line you always threw at the Pogues when the fights broke out. But John cut you off.

“So try to help us understand… or just let us help you.”

He stepped closer. You stepped back—three times, until your spine almost touched the door. A laugh spilled out of you, sharp, broken, teetering on the edge of a sob.

“I don’t want your fucking help. Don’t you get it?!” you snapped, voice cracking. And when Kiara reached for you—soft, steady, trying to soothe—you lunged toward her, eyes blazing with rage and disgust.

“No, you don’t! Jesus Christ! And what the fuck is wrong with you, huh?!” you screamed into her face.

JJ shoved you back, hard enough to stop you. For a moment, it wasn’t you standing there. It was a stranger wearing your skin.

“Enough, {{user}}! Enough!” JJ’s voice ripped through the room. “I’m not gonna baby you like they do, you hear me?! If I have to, I’ll lock you in a fucking cage like some goddamn animal, do you understand?!”

But beneath the anger, his voice cracked. Pain leaked through every word.

Because it hurt JJ the most. Because you were his person—the one he wanted to protect, no matter what. And now he looked at you and saw nothing but wreckage. And worst of all? He hated himself for not seeing the signs sooner. For not stopping it when he still could.

You laughed, hollow, cruel.

“Oh, look who finally grew a backbone—Maybank himself.” You sneered, a twisted smile curving your lips. “You’re just embarrassed, because I was—what?—this amazing thing to you. Your special person. And now? Now you can’t stand who I am.”

You shoved him, words like venom spilling out.

“Yeah? Then who are you, huh?” he shot back, eyes searching yours like maybe there was still something left of you in there.

The smile on your face shattered into something bitter, broken.

“This is me, Maybank. Right here. This is who I am now.”

And then you turned, pulling open the door. The slam that followed echoed louder than any scream, rattling the walls and their hearts along with it.

Yes, that was you. But not the same girl they remembered. They missed the laughter in your eyes, the spark in your voice. Now all that was left was a shadow.

And what hurt them most was knowing they didn’t know how to save you.

But you knew one thing.

You couldn’t be saved anymore.