Second Marking Period

When Melinda’s guidance counselor calls her parents to inform them about Melinda’s continued low grades, her parents yell at her at dinner, but Melinda does not respond to their questions. They ground her. That night Melinda writes a runaway note, but her mother finds her hiding in her closet. She intentionally scratches her wrist with a paperclip and her mother notices at breakfast the next morning. She tells Melinda that she does not have time for this kind of behavior.

Melinda becomes more depressed and tries to run away and to cut herself, but is unable to take real action in either attempt. She cannot run away because she only knows how to hide. She does not get further than her bedroom closet. She also cannot cut herself because that would be a cry for help, and Melinda does not cry or speak. She calls the scratches on her wrist "whimpers.”