“When I was thirteen I discovered that when I cut myself, or burn myself with a lighter...I felt, I don't know...better somehow. That it stopped the craziness in my head and helped me focus. It became sort of like an addiction. I needed the pain to feel something close to normal, as weird as that sounds.” Clay slowly peeled his shirt over his head and he stood there, bare chested in front of his window. He took my breath away at the sheer beauty of what was before me. But then, upon closer inspection I could see something else.

I stood up and walked over to him. I could see white scars crisscrossing his chest and down his arms. How had I not noticed these before? I reached out and lightly touched my finger tip to a particularly large scar that ran from one side of his chest to the other. “How did you do this?” I whispered, touching the raised skin.

Clay shivered under my touch but didn't move away. He closed his eyes as I continued to explore the map of scars on his body with my eyes and fingers. “That one was made with a piece of glass. I was high on cocaine and needed the pain to feel grounded. The cutting wasn't my only addiction. I already told you about that.”

I dropped my hand and took a step backwards. Dear God, how could he destroy himself like that? I just couldn't wrap my mind around someone driven to hurt themselves in that way. It was completely outside my realm of experience.

Clay put his shirt back on and turned away from me again. “By the time I was fourteen I was pretty heavy into drugs and drinking. There wasn't a day that went by that I wasn't loaded...and cutting. I was so deep into my self- destruction that nothing else mattered. My parents were never around. My so- called friends were only there for the drugs I could score with my parents' money. I really didn't have anyone that gave a shit about the fact that I was slowly killing myself. And I hated myself, Maggie. I mean really hated myself. I thought about suicide every day. I wanted to die, but was too much of a pu**y to outright do it.”

The agonizing pain in his voice was unbearable. Without thinking, I wrapped my arms around him and leaned my cheek against his back, feeling the steady rise and fall of his chest as he breathed. “You weren't a pu**y for not killing yourself. I think it's much braver to keep on living, in spite of all that stuff.” I said sincerely.

Clay covered my hands with his and held on. He stood rigidly against me. “So how did you end up here, with Ruby?” I asked after he paused. Clay leaned his forehead against the glass of the window. “It all came to a head about six months ago. I had been partying pretty heavily. I was hanging out with my group of druggie friends and was so strung out on heroin and liquor that I never knew what the hell I was doing. I knew my parents were having a dinner party with some of my dad's constituents, but I just didn't give a shit. By that point, my parents had kicked me out of the main house. They were sick of seeing me drunk and high all the time, so I was living in the apartment over the garage.”

“Your parents knew you were having problems? And they never tried to get you help?” I interrupted, aghast at the lack of love he received from the people who were supposed to give it to him unconditionally. Clay laughed, a hurt and humorless sound, almost a snarl. “Oh they cared about the fact that I was strung out...but only when it affected them. You know, like if I was supposed to go to some function with them, but was too wasted to make an appearance. Then they'd get pissed. But, other than that, their solution was to get me out of their hair. I guess in their minds if they weren't seeing it, it wasn't happening.”

“God Clay, that's horrible.” I couldn't help myself. I thought of my own parents and knew that if I was in a dark place like that, they would do everything in their power to help me. I felt a new appreciation for my mom and dad and all they did for me.

“Yeah, well they won't be winning parents of the year anytime soon.” He squeezed my hands and pulled my arms away from him, putting space between us once again.

“Well, I took this girl back to my apartment. Lacey.” Oh no, here came the jealousy again. I tamped it down with effort. “Lacey ran with my group of friends and was as drugged out as I was. We had just done lines of coke at a club in downtown Miami and we wanted to be...well alone.” He looked over at me, as if gauging my reaction. I simply nodded, encouraging him to continue.

“We had sex, did some more coke and broke open the bottle of gin I had stored in my kitchen. I have no idea what happened, but the next thing I knew I was freaking out.” Clay took another deep breath, running his hands through his dark curls over and over again.

“I remember smashing the mirror in my bathroom. And Lacey was just sitting there in her underwear, on my couch doing lines as I'm tearing the apartment apart. Then the hurricane in my head just stopped. Next thing I knew I had a piece of glass in my hand from the mirror and I was cutting my arm. Then my chest. Then my wrists.” He turned his hands over and showed me two deep scars, one on each wrist.

“Lacey must have come into the bathroom and seen all the blood. I heard her start screaming, but I was way past caring. The next thing I remember was waking up in a hospital room, my hands strapped to a bed and my parents looking at me with absolute disgust. You see, my little issue ruined their dinner party. Was quite an embarrassment for them.”

I was shaking by the time he finished. Whatever I thought was going on with Clay, this was the farthest thing from it. This guy had been to hell and back.

Clay opened the drawer at his bedside table and pulled out a bottle of pills, tossing them to me. I caught them and read the label. Lithium. I shook the bottle. “You take these?” I asked. Clay nodded. “I was hospitalized in Miami General's psych unit for ninety days. After that, my parents shipped me up here to stay with my mom's sister, Ruby. I hadn't had much to do with her over the years. She's not close with my mom anymore, particularly after she came out and got together with her girlfriend Lisa. But she is the complete opposite of my parents. She actually gave a shit and offered her home to me. She and Lisa are the closest things to parents that I've ever had.”