Your Daily Dose #15: Eternally smiling, waving, unknowing of the path ahead.

[stephie_nhbg]

I don't care about anything. Not school, not my family, not my friends, not myself. I don't want to talk to anyone. I don't want to see anything. I'm so apathetic it should be illegal, except for one thing. Except for one person. And all I want is to see them, talk to them, hug them. That's it, every time I fall asleep I keep replaying old times, I couldn't piece together the nightmares before, didn't understand why I kept waking up with tears on my face and shortness of breath. I didn't realize it. And now that I do, I wish I didn't. I wish that I still foolishly thought I was scared of the monsters under the bed, the shadows on the walls, the sounds that have no source. I'm afraid of the past, no more and no less. I miss that person so much. You might think I miss him, but that's not who I'm talking about. Some part of me still misses him yes. A bit of my psyche will always miss him. Always. But it's more than that, he's just the target I'm forcing myself to project these feelings on. I'm trying to fix the hurt I can see. I'm trying so hard, but it's not about him. Not this time, I don't think it was ever really about him. God, it just hurts so much to know for sure. Each breath feels like a chore, each blink labored. I miss you so much. So much. I don't even want to sleep, because then I'll see you, and you'll wave and smile, and talk, but I won't be able to hear you. I'll start walking but I won't get closer, I'll be screaming and you'll just stay there smiling, forever silent, and happy. And as much as I want to get closer I won't, and because of that, you'll stay happy. You'll turn away and turn into him, and then another person and then another like a rolodex full of my mistakes. Reminding me why I'm so unhappy, and then it'll be you again, and finally I'll hear you, It'll be different, you'll be happy now, you'll be whole, you don't need them, things will change. You don't need me, you don't. You don't need him, you don't need anything. Just run away. Run away, don't look back You'll be okay. It'll all be okay. It isn't Ryan, it isn't it's me, it's who I was, that naive little girl, the blond haired blue-eyed ten year old, the past staring me in the face. The past that thought that leaving would be an adventure, that believed Mommy and Daddy were right, that going away would be fun. That leaving Sarah and Paul would be worth it. That leaving Stephen wouldn't hurt. That you'd see them all soon. That phones would still connect you all, that you could make it. That everything would be fine. I don't want to sleep, I don't want to watch myself anymore. I don't want to be in A Christmas Carol. I DON'T. Because I'm not fine, I put that past in a box, I put it on a shelf, I did. I never thought it would come out. That I'd see my broken dreams sitting out in front of me like nesting dolls. I still miss Stephen, I still do. I haven't seen him since I was fourteen. Fourteen. Even then I knew I'd regret letting him turn into my past. I knew it, and I still let it happen. I still forced it to happen. He's the reason, the reason why at ten years old I turned into an adult. Because I missed him, missed Sarah, missed Paul, and Aunt Mel. And because I couldn't miss them anymore? I grew up, I stopped being a child. And every time someone made me sad, made me regret, I stuffed them into that box, and moved on. Until I stuffed Ryan in there. And suddenly the box opened up, so I duct taped it closed. And now I'm crying on my bed surrounded by the whys, the reasons why I messed up. I tried to forget it all, and now I can't. I can't and I miss someone I never had, miss every person I put in that box. Because hiding them away didn't work. It didn't save me from the hurt, it just made it grow stronger, strong enough to break me. I put all those years of pain on Ryan, I did. Which is why I could never leave him, I didn't want him to be like all the others, I didn't want to abandon him. So when I finally did, I put him in that box, and now I have nothing to show for it. Nothing, except the me I used to be. Eternally smiling and waving, not knowing that she'll never be the same again. That the second that car pulls away from Aunt Mel's house she'd lose everything. Everything.

"Alone.
Yes, that's the key word, the most awful word in the English tongue.
Murder doesn't hold a candle to it and Hell is only a poor synonym."
- Stephen King.