#chtask006

i’m so tired, and i’m not sure even the longest, deepest of sleeps could fix it anymore. the only time it seems i do sleep peacefully is when i’ve been drinking beforehand, the booze knocking me out before my thoughts can keep me up for hours. it fucking sucks. i’m so tired.

i have a kid to take care of and i can’t even take care of myself. maybe i should see a doctor or something, but that feels like admitting defeat. i hate that my father instilled this fucking damaging pride in me, i hate that i’m too afraid to ask for help.

the only person i feel like i can talk to about any of this is finn, and we both know that shit’s complicated. maybe i could try danny, or frankie, but i don’t want to worry them. i don’t want anyone worrying about me.

shit, i’m not good at this.

when i first found out i was pregnant, i thought my goddamn world was over. i was barely equipped to take care of myself– let alone this helpless little thing. my mom had just died a few months before. i decided to quit my only source of income and pursue something that had such low success rates, and now, now there was a child.

god, i always knew karma would catch up to me. it was one minor slip up. one fucking night and here i was: pregnant and alone and unemployed.

the first ultrasound changed everything though. i heard the heartbeat, i heard her heartbeat, and then something in me shifted. i could feel it. an instinct kicked in that i didn’t know i had, it never showed itself before. but between the grief i was feeling and the panic, a maternal instinct reared its head. for the first time, in a long, long time, the situation didn’t seem impossible to face.

it wasn’t the easiest. god, no. being pregnant fucking sucks, everything hurts. but i found myself more and more excited to meet her. i found a job, and i began doing sets. i began getting confident. i began making money doing something i genuinely love.

and then she was born, and my entire world, again, changed entirely.

i am terrified she will think i am a bad mom. i am terrified i cannot do this. but even though i am terrified, i can do this. and i will.

so harper, my love, you can’t read yet, and you will never read this, but i love you to the moon and back and the moon and back a second time. i love you more than ice cream, and sunny days, and all the good things in the world.

you might be difficult sometimes, you might fuss a lot or throw a tantrum, or make a complete mess. to be fair, i do all of these things too. but i wouldn’t trade you for absolutely anything in the world. you are perfect, and i am legitimately saying that. you’re not even a year old yet, and you’re the coolest kid ever. i wish your grandmother could have met you.

this isn’t a song, but i’ll try to write as best as i can, anyway. i’m sorry if it doesn’t make any sense. i’m sorry that i’m apologising to a fucking inanimate object right now.

when i moved to cape hazel, i made it a personal goal to befriend as many people as i could, to surround myself with good people to repair the damage my hometown had done to me. i wanted to be around people who were accepting, kind, funny, and i found all of that.

and more.

i fell in love. that wasn’t on my list of goals for cape hazel, but i guess it is true that love hits you out of nowhere, and it fucking hit me hard. maybe i should have been more careful, more guarded with my heart. maybe i shouldn’t have let myself get so attached to someone who doesn’t seem to have an interest in anything beyond heated make-out sessions and a best friendship. maybe i should be happy with whatever i can get.

i can’t stop thinking about why — why he did what he did, why he didn’t want it with me. i keep circling in my thoughts, coming back to the fact that i’m just not good enough. i’m not attractive enough, funny enough, spontaneous enough. i’m not enough, ever. the people back home made that clear enough.

i can’t give him what he wants, he can’t give me what i want.

1) my heart is fickle and constantly seeks affection or intimacy. i’m still unsure how to differentiate between the two.

2) i don’t think that i’ll ever stop feeling exhausted.

moments of joy feel fleeting and very temporary. i worry that i’ll never stop feeling like i’m being crushed by an invisible weight. the burden of memory is something that i’ve carried all of these years -- will i grow lonely if i shed the weight? i don’t want to forget my sister, but i don’t want to think of her every single night. i haven’t been able to sleep a full night without waking up in a panic. i fear that i’ll forget what her voice sounds like. i barely got to know my own sister when she was taken from me. she was so young and full of life. sometimes i wonder why a higher power took her instead of me, a child who was afraid of his shadow.

when will i stop mourning her? will i ever be able to stop?

the circumstances of her death have made me afraid. afraid of emotional attachment, afraid of recklessness, afraid of life itself. it’s hard to maintain relationships -- and perhaps that is why i am being so fickle. i hate to digress, but whenever my mind starts to wander, it falls in front of two faces. sometimes i’ve thought about other people, but i always end up thinking about these two. why two? why them? one of them smiles and it’s as if the world has been sapped of its negativity, replaced with softness and comfort. i make eye contact with the other, and i can feel my heart start to accelerate while everything around me skids to a stop.

not to sound like a prepubescent middle schooler, but have a crush on people sucks. there’s no other way to describe it. i can barely form words vocally as it is, but being around these certain people shuts my brain off completely.

maybe that it’s not such a bad thing.

maybe i’ll try to talk to them more. it’s time i try to set my burden down, right? alexis wouldn't hesitate, so why should i? because i'm scared of what might happen to me

I don’t know

I’ve never

What does love feel like?

I don’t think I’ve ever been in love, but maybe I just don’t know what it feels like. The only idea I really have comes from rom coms, and I’ve definitely never wanted to kiss anyone in the rain before. Seems soggy tbh.

Sawyer said he fell in love with me. I don’t know how he could. Okay, actually. That’s what Sawyer’s good at…loving people. I just don’t know why he’d pick me. I’m just a shithead who doesn’t even know what love feels like.

I miss him. At least I figured out that much. I haven’t really had anyone to talk to the past few weeks. I have so much to tell him.

Thomas’s Melissa gave birth today. I haven’t cried about anything that happened to us when we were overseas because really there’s no reason to, but when I held that perfect little girl in my arms, I swear there were tears in my eyes. Her daddy should’ve been the first man to hold her, not me. I don’t know the first thing about babies. Hell, I thought I’d break her how tiny she was, but Melissa insisted and who can say no to a woman who’s recently given birth especially when that woman has recently lost her husband?

She has her father’s deep green eyes. I took one look at them and couldn’t look away. They were Tommy’s eyes but so different, so full of life. It was weird seeing them on her face when only three months ago I’d held Tommy’s hand as the life leeched out of his.

The first thing I did when I got home a few weeks ago was talk to the VA doc. He said something about the way that traumatic memories work, about why I can remember plain as day just how sticky Tommy’s blood felt on my hands and how the breath had sounded raspy as he coughed and asked me to take care of his girls, but can’t remember the feeling of the shrapnel in my side. He said “that’s how our brains work. We remember things that are visceral.” And suggested that maybe sometime in the future I’d remember the attack in full on technicolor and the pain that came from the injury. Maybe even the surgeries that followed. And when that happened I should come back and talk to him.

Fuck that. I wanted to ask if he’d ever been to war. If he’d ever looked into someone’s eyes, knew that they had so much more to live for, and hated every god that ever existed for taking that life from them? I’d wanted to ask but instead I sat back and listened to him drone on and when he was done, I thanked him, signed my name for Athena, and told him I’d call if anything happened. 

Not that that’s ever gonna happen. I’m fine, and if the doctor couldn’t understand that going to war meant that I was already ready to die and that I would switch places with Tommy without thinking twice just so he could stand in that delivery room and see the miracle that is his little girl, then he can’t possibly help me.

Anyway, I’m fine. Went to the funeral and everything. Even smiled a bit and held Mel’s hand as they saluted her husband’s sacrifice. 

ROSES ARE RED

violets are blue

i think i might

be falling for you...

leaves are green

my handwriting is terrible

you make my heart have

palpitations unbearable

ice is cold

water is wet

why can’t i get you

out of my head

poems are dumb

writing is stupid

you make me think

there might be cupid

pens drip ink

or so i think

for mine is dripping

after my last entry, i thought i was done with this diary thing. feelings and vulnerability aren’t my thing, but this might be the safest way for me to let off steam. it’s the only way i can do it without having to face the worry and pity on the faces of the people i love, anyway.

last time, i talked about my family. this time, i want to talk about my friends. well, one in particular. cara is the sweetest person i’ve ever met — she’s kind, helpful, loved by so many people for the light she brings to the world. she’s everything i’m not, everything that i wish i was. sometimes i wonder why she ever decided to be my friend — where she brings happiness, i bring poison. i feel completely inadequate whenever i so much as stand next to her, but lately, it’s gotten worse. lately, we’ve been a little bit more than friends, going on dates and kissing, and i don’t know what to make of any of it.

i don’t know if i like her like that. i don’t know if what i’m feeling for her right now is a normal amount of affection that one feels for their best friend or something more. i don’t know what she sees in me, or if she even does see anything in me. i don’t know if i deserve her as a friend, let alone a lover.