I’m hiding in the closet with my pillow pressed against my ears, trying to block out as much sound as I can. I can feel my hands shake slightly, and my breath hitches every time I hear that tiny ‘ding’, which I’ve come to associate with a feeling of never being safe, fear of not knowing who my enemy is. I’m pressing the pillow so hard against my ears that the blood circulation in my hands has cut off, leaving a cold and empty feeling. I just sit there for about ten minutes, but it feels like I’ve been here many days already. The sound slowly stops coming, and as I start to relax a bit, the adrenaline going away, I fall into a fitful sleep in the small and dark closet.

I wake up at three in the morning, drenched in sweat, my limbs sore after being so tense all the time. I slowly stand up, and open the door to the closet, to make my way to the shower. I can see my phone laying on the bed at the corner of my eye, but I quickly look away again. I’m scared of how many comments I got this time. It seems to have been increasing lately.

I try to be as quiet as possible as I come out of the bathroom, fully clothed, and tiptoes down the stairs to go outside. Without realizing it, I had ended up taking my phone with me too. It is still dark outside as I feel the sting of cold air on my cheeks. I don’t know where I’m going; I just know I want to get away. Away from everything.

When I arrive at a store in the middle of town, I sit down on a bench, and hesitantly take out the phone from my jacket. I unlock it and see that I have 236 new messages. That’s a new record. I can’t help myself as I go to my Facebook profile and look at all the new comments I have on my timeline. It still hurts that even though everything is in plain sight, no one tries to help. They just ignore it to save themselves any trouble. I can feel my chest and throat restricting as I read through the comments on by one.

‘You’re disgusting,’

‘Nobody loves you’

‘Kys’

‘Your life is meaningless.’

Without realizing it my breath has started to become shallow, and my body trembles slightly. Maybe it’s because of the cold, but I don’t think so. When I get to the last messages, one in particular stands out among all the others.

‘Hey, you okay?’ Just these three words makes my whole body feel warm. My eyes widen as I just stare. Is this real? Does someone actually care? Just as I was beginning to question if they’re just playing with me, a message pops up fro