I am rotten and shattered. There is no salvation for me, no hope. I keep kidding myself with speeches of optimistic days that await me, but it’s all bullshit in the end. I’m beyond repair and even the joy of my life thinks it.
He sees how broken and bruised I am and even he can’t soar beyond that sickening reality.
No matter how much I smile and how much I laugh and try to convince myself that I’m whole again, it doesn’t change anything. I’m still the same, still ruined, still broken.
I don’t know where I’m going. I just run until my legs give out, until I gasp for air. It’s cold outside but my body’s blazing. My phone rings against my back pocket but I ignore it. Whomever it is, I don’t care and neither should they.
It’s not even Visha’s fault that I want to rip off my skin and jump in a pool of acid. He was telling the truth and that’s why I’m furious. The worst is that I’m not even angry, I’m more hurt than I could ever be mad. I’m just so frustrated by my own stupidity and ignorance. I have the ability to change, to get better but I don’t try.
I wallow in my self-hatred and selfishness in hopes that the tide will wash me away and bury me in the depths of the ocean.
What do I want? I don’t know what I want but I know that it isn’t this life.
Icy wind blasts into my face, slithering through my nostrils. I hate this. I hatemyself. And above all, I hate how I manage to destroy everything good in my life.
It’s not the universe that takes people away from me, it’s me. I cut myself and bleed all over them until they’re so tainted that they have no other choice but to leave me behind.
43
Aoi
I don’t know how I end up near Lake Washington, but I somehow do. Matter of fact I should check my location because I’m not even surewhereexactly I am.
It’s frisky and now I feel stupid for wandering around for hours on end like a ghost. I should go back home but I really couldn’t care less about sleeping on the side of the road like a beggar.
Right. I lost my goddamn mind, haven’t I?
Too busy, strolling through this unending city I can’t remember how many drinks I downed in the mere four hours I’ve been out of the bar.
My fingers are rosy and rough from the low temperature which is strange because we’re in March and it’s not even that cold usually. It must be because I’m drunk. Yeah, that makes sense.
I still feel like absolute crap and no mount of tequila helped my fucked-up brain move on from the straight up assault of Visha’s words.
Among the hundreds of useless thoughts wandering through my head, one strikes me like a good idea. And it most definitely isn’t one but who cares? I’m already lower than hell mentally. As if it could possibly get worse.
I fish out my phone and call the only person I think I can talk to without judgement.
It rings for a while and since it’s two a.m. I’m not sure if she’ll even pick up. Honestly, she should just tell me to fuck off alrea-
“Aoi? Is something wrong?” Her voice is rough as though she just woke up. “Are you okay?”
Fuck, this was a bad idea. Tears well up in my eyes and I hate how glad I am to hear her voice. “Amira. Sorry to wake you. I shouldn’t have called.”
“Why, love? It’s alright, I wasn’t sleeping.”
She always calls me by sweet names, treating me like I’m one of her younger siblings. I think among my friends she’s the only one able to make me feel like a child in his mother’s arms. She reminds me of how I used to behave around my little sister.
I bite back a sob. “I wanted to talk. But now that you’re here I don’t know what to say.”
“Where are you? Are you outside?” she asks. I hear sheets ruffle beside her and the familiar voice of a woman. “Tell me what happened.”
I wonder what she’s thinking. I never call and especially not to talk about whatever crap is putting my mind to the torch.
I stifle a breath. “Do you think I hate myself? Is that how you girls see me too?”
“Why are you saying that? Of course not. Did someone say something similar to you? That you hate yourself?” Her voice softens. “Do you?”
Do I? Do I hate myself? Is that what she’s asking?
