You'd Better Hide the Bullets

2 months later.

"The Devil's been stuck in my brain and he's been living there seventeen days. He said that I can't do better but I know I'll get better, I'll do anything to feel something." I sung, I looked at Pete who gave me a sad look. He always does when we play this song. "The voices they are loudest at night and they're so loud that they are haunting my mind. Oh but it makes him unsettled to know I'll get better. If I find that something deep within." I closed my eyes. I wrote this song about a month ago, when things began to get really bad. "See I can't find a way out my mind. Breathe in, I'm coming to get you. You need me, but I don't know how to reach you, you know I'm gonna be the one." Pete stood up to the mic stand in front of him.

"But I don't wanna be the one." He sung.

"But I don't wanna be the one." I finished. I repeated the chorus again and I could feel everyone looking at me. "I'm begging him to push me away 'cause all his talk will only drive me insane. I'm hoping just to sort it someday and then it's just me and myself all the way." I grabbed the mic stand and leaned my head on it.

"So try sleeping with a stranger in your home 2ho spends time banging on your bedroom walls. And loiters in the pitch black, letting you know that you're, not alone." Pete sang loudly into the mic. I looked up at him and he gave me a sad look. I continued singing the chorus again and the bridge came up.

"See I can't find the way out of my mind." I sang softly.

"Cause I don't wanna be the one, I don't wanna be the one." Pete sung backing vocals.

"The devil has his claws too deep inside." I screamed, my voice full of raw emotion.

"Cause I don't wanna be the one, I don't wanna be the one." Pete tried to match my emotion, but he couldn't.

The song ended and everyone stood awkwardly. "That was tense." Patrick spoke up.

"Yeah it was." I nodded, feeling so exposed. I could feel them all judging me, regardless of our friendships. "Yeah I gotta go." I excused myself and sprinted out the basement and over to my car.

I got in and started the ignition and drove towards the San Diego psychiatric hospital, where I was scheduled to see Dr Philips for my weekly therapist session.

When I arrived there, I went to the usual spot until I was called into his office. "Scarlett, how are you doing today?" He asked as I sat down.

"Honestly, I feel like running away again." I mumbled, my voice dull and broken.

"Why?" He raised an eyebrow.

"It just feels like everyone is constantly judging me and I hate it." I shrugged, feeling completely and utterly useless.

"Well, I actually have something serious I have to speak to you about Scarlett." He told me, looking completely serious.

"What's up doc?" I asked, giggling a little at my choice of words.

"Your results came back from Dr Hartman last week." He started, looking at his notebook.

"Hit me with it, I'm ready." I sat up, a small smirk playing on my lips.

"Scarlett you're bi-polar." He said softly. And in that moment I felt my whole life crashing down on top of me. My mental stability has been dwindling down recently and this is why, it all makes sense now. Of course I wasn't normal, of course there was something seriously wrong with me. "Do you understand what this means?" He asked me.

I stared blankly at the floor in front of me, unsure of what to say. "I think so." I mumbled, feeling my words fall off my tongue.

"This explains your strange dreams, the paranoia about Vic's ex-girlfriend and your fluctuating mood swings." He told me. I looked up at him, my eyebrows furrowed and my lips tightly together. "I need to put you on some medicine, we will also need to do some more tests to see how severe your case is. Everything is going to be okay." I wasn't even really paying attention anymore. I just nodded to everything he was saying.

He wrote my out a prescription to get me some pills, ones that were apparently going to make me feel more normal. I excused myself for a minute to get a drink of water out in the corridor.

I walked along a long hallway and turned left, which took me into a room that was filled with patients. They were in some sort of recreational room, one of the nurses must have mistaken me for a patient because she didn't even tell me to leave.

There was a boy, around my age sitting at a table. He had shoulder length brown hair and a couple of tattoos on his arms, the most noticeable tattoo he had though was a rose on his neck. I got closer to him and he snapped his gaze up to me. "I've never known anyone to choose to be in here before." He said to me, softly. He had a thick northern English accent.

"I didn't choose to be in here, I took a wrong turn and well, here I am." I replied, looking down at him. "That's a lot of tattoos for someone so young." I nodded towards his tattoos.

He gazed down at his arms and smiled. "I'm 22 actually, that's not really that young." He smirked up at me. I was about to ask him why he was in here but I glanced at his wrist and it became clear. He followed my gaze and he sighed. "It's not as bad as it looks." He tried to cover it with his sleeve.

"You don't need to justify it to me." I said softly, lifting my sleeve slightly to show him the scars that I have. A look of relief spread across his face.

"I'm Oli, what's your name?" He extended his hand to me.

"Scarlett." I replied, shaking his hand. I looked at his wrist again, even though it was covered it intrigued me. "What does it feel like to almost die?" I asked. He thought for a second, and then smiled.

"It was the most peaceful thing I've ever felt, I'd give anything to have it again." He looked so happy.

Suddenly a guy across the room started freaking out. He ran towards me and Oli. "You're not supposed to be here!" He shouted at me. Oli stood in front of me in a protective way. "GET OUT OF HERE WHILE YOU STILL CAN!" He screamed at me and I done what he said. I sprinted out of the room, past everyone and out into the reception. I couldn't face going back into the my therapy session so I just left.

-

I read once that people with bi-polar disorder can sometimes just suddenly turn into the most manic depressive people with a switch of a button. That's how simple it is, and that there is basically no cure. All you can do is take the medication that they feed you and hope to God that it represses the urge to throw yourself off a bridge.

Vic was supposed to be here an hour ago, but he didn't show up. Maybe he doesn't really love me. I stared at the bottle of pills that Dr Philips gave me. Beside me a bottle of vodka, the lid off it and a quarter of it already gone. I can't live with this anymore.

It's tearing me apart to be this broken. No one else has to deal with this much shit. 2 months ago I was happy, now I'm depressed and am bi-polar? When did life get this complicated. It's okay though, maybe it's time it all ends. No one will really be that shocked if I disappeared. No one at all.

I opened the cap of the pills and emptied it out into my hand. There was probably around 40, tiny pills. Moving to San Diego was probably the best thing I ever done, meeting Vic Fuentes and falling madly in love with him, was the most amazing and beautiful experience of my life but he'll move on.

I shoved the pills into my mouth, like a bunch of tic tacs. It was difficult to swallow so I took a huge gulp of vodka, feeling the pills begin to dissolve as they slipped down my throat. I drank more of the alcohol to take away the taste. Vic once said to me 'The only real way to cure pain is to add a little more because everything new distracts the old.'

I never really got it until now, until this moment in my life, as I felt my head begin to lighten. My vision began blurring and I slumped down onto the ground, the last thing I felt before falling into the darkness was the feeling of being free for the first time in my whole life.

Notes

You guys chose option B, so here it is. The start of the end...