Arshiya - Between Lines

It’s all a blur. Has time ceased or have I simply stopped existing in it? It’s quiet. It’s deafening. The void that surrounds me has me questioning if any of this is real. I can hear them, chattering at a distance, muffled by something I cannot quite recognize. Still, I’ll admit, I have grown quite comfortable with it. It makes a loyal companion.

What are they laughing about? Well, I suppose that doesn’t concern me. What time is it? I don’t know. But the absence of sunlight is enough to tell me that another day has slipped, passed in a blur.

And now…                       I….

                             fade… too…

*****

Observation is far more convenient than speaking. Speaking demands consideration, observation does not.

That’s where my heart and I disagree.

Have you ever heard people regard the brain as the “thinker” and the heart as the “feeler”?

That the brain is logic and the heart is emotions?

That the brain knows and the heart understands? But—I don’t think that’s true.

Both the brain and the heart feel the same emotions, endure the same hardships and break under the same weight.

It’s just that the heart lets itself feel it. It allows itself to break.

The brain? It doesn’t have that luxury.

Even when it hurts it suffers in silence.

Even when the thoughts spiral, it stays quiet.

Why? Because it has responsibilities.

It doesn’t get to shatter.

It doesn’t get to rest.

It is the only anchor for the heart.

Just like that, I have to be the brain here. I cannot let my feelings ruin me. They need me. He needs me. I cannot afford to fall weak when I have people to care for.

When I have a life to look forward to.

Friends and more to take care of.

I can’t fall short.

He’s hurting. And I can’t do shit to stop it. “He’s behaving like a robot,” they say. But they don’t say that they made him this way.

They don’t say that they are the one who stripped him of his originality.

It hurts seeing him this way.

He says he’s okay. But he’s not.

He says it’s fake. I know it’s not.

“How do I help him,” I repeat to myself again and again and again, hoping that repeating it continuously will give me an answer.

I’m helpless. I’m supposed to help him. I’m supposed to be there for him. I’m supposed to make him happy. I’m so useless. Useless useless useless.

Till I become blind to the truth.

I love them. But I don’t like them. I want to be everything that’s not them. Yet, everyday– I feel myself turning into a reflection of them. Controlling. Apathetic. Harsh on the people who don’t deserve it.

I feel… nothing honestly. Not even pain anymore. Just acting up sometimes.

Each time I promise myself that I’d react differently this time, I find myself doing the exact thing they did to me. I swore. I promise I still do. But I don’t know. I feel myself becoming the monster I feared. And I hate myself for it.

Monsters aren’t always beasts with horns or tails. Sometimes, they’re the ones who love you, but didn’t know how to show it properly. So instead, they taught you love was pain. And worth– a payment for it.

I hate the fact that I’m so aware of that fact yet can’t help but behave that way. I hate bringing gratitude into question, it reminds me how that question made me feel insufficient, as if I was supposed to be grateful for giving birth to me. Was that supposed to be a favor? I didn’t ask for this. They didn’t either. I know. I understand.

But we keep fueling that cycle of abuse. As if someone else, someone innocent is supposed to pay for mistakes in our upbringing. 

I want to break that cycle.

Today it is my turn. Tomorrow will be my brother’s. One day my kids. It’s just DNA. Or maybe we’re just trying to shift blame onto it when it’s really conditioning.

Perhaps I need isolation now. From people. From emotions. Until I start thinking with my head. Until that cycle is broken.

What is it to wish? I never knew how to ask for them, Yet I had tons.

I wished that time would last forever, And so would the happiness it brought, Alas it has turned to crushing sadness I can’t overcome.

I wished, that maybe someone would, See past the fortress I built, But how would they? When my walls were so impossibly high.

I wished they would stay, Without begging with my self esteem in my knees.

I wished someone would love me, The way I did them.

I wish someone would hold me, The way I did.

I wish they would acknowledge, That I’m not okay, and I can’t do this alone.

Is it just a fantasy, Or will these wishes ever come true?