Let me escape to the sea

Looking through the window of the airplane, the Girl thought to herself if things would be different this time, although ultimately she knew that no matter the country, the people she surrounded herself with, the things she’d buy and the scapegoats she’d use, she was still her. The same person who’d grown up in a loving home, with a father that was always present but whose depression turned him into a ghost of the man who came home from work trips with gifts. A mother who put up with such a man because she loved him, and because without him she couldn’t really support herself unless she found another man. A mother who accepted to be treated as rubbish, knowing that eventually her lover would return, slightly dazed by the weeks or months he’d been away. 

The little girl that lived intertwined in that relationship, learned how to harm her loved ones where it really hurt, but she was also taught to forgive and overcome the hardships of living with others. But sometimes such hardships made her realize that deep down, the only presence she truly needed was her own. After all, what are others if not people who serve you in one form or another?

Your parents made you and gave you the essential rules and morals to live and society. Your teachers teach you things your parents can’t and your classmates keep you company and gossip alongside you. As you grow, another desire grows inside you (although deep down it’s always been there and it’s more so your consciousness that recognises such desire and wants to act upon it), the one of so-called love, that’s actually only the natural animal instinct. 

So you use people, attractive or not, to satisfy the urges and surges and leave them once you realize they are too much or not enough to satisfy your needs. But the touch of another’s lips lingers on your mouth, sometimes leaving a trace, like a scar or a scab, other times it’s only the haunting scent. It comes to taunt you at the worst moments possible, reminding you of the encounters and what you so much as felt. 

Because although you pretend that you only use people, and would love to believe that everyone fits in an orderly box you placed them in, each having a specific role with boundaries they are forbidden to cross…well they are humans, and each have their own box for you that they try and mold into a statue of the imagined version of you. A version of you that you sometimes contribute to, a version of you sometimes you could never fathom of yourself. 

You know you do the same, as the longing for another soul that feels too similar to your own and whose pains and fears mingle with your own become overwhelming. You paint them in your head, you stalk them as the prey that they are, you hear them in your head, their touch still grases your skin and you still know their taste. So in missing them you turn into them. 

The person whom you liked because of how much you were alike, or maybe they were nothing like you, so you rebrand yourself until you no longer recognise yourself. The bags under your eyes are darker than you can remember, your clothes start to fall off you, you whore yourself up for attention or hide behind layers of clothes, fearing other people’s eyes, far more telling than their eyes.

So deep down, loneliness is the way to go right? An escape where only you exist with you coven of designed entertainment, few individual and scares visits, food that’s safe and that easy and a bed so comfortable you never want to leave it. Music reminds you of what you felt, what you would want to feel again but fear and tiredness has overcome you and now your floor is covered in miscellaneous items. A sea of memories and things that fill up space you must cross to find yourself again. You know that examining every one of those items will hurt you. You pick them up and feel weak, memories overflowing of better or worse times. Because in the end they are too similar. Good times now feel bad because you miss them, who you were, how careless and cheerful. You find yourself embarrassing and ugly but you know that she was happier than you think you’ll ever be again. Sometimes you don’t think about yourself though, and it’s the people who surround you that have changed or left, and then the void is bigger and stronger and you’re about to return to your coven but something forces you out. Knowing for certain that things will be this way, that there’s no light other than the one from your phone. So you pull yourself up, feeling the bones from your body crack, your muscles cramped from staying in bed so long and your head dizzy from being so up above. 

You fear the mirrors because you don’t want to know the sabotage you’ve done to yourself and you rush to your old habits in hopes to find who you were. 

But all these weeks, months haven’t disappeared, and the people around you have felt them gone by. Some wondered where you were, others look at you surprised by your now unwelcome presence. 

“You are not the same.” 

Oh, believe me. I know far too well. 

I know best.

They know nothing. They know not of what I’ve been through. The heart shaped scars they formed all over me. Hearts I do not want, hearts I did not accept, hearts I didn’t create. I returned because they missed me but now they no longer do because I’m no longer the same. I know too well and I want to say that I’m sorry, but I’m tired, oh so tired. They don’t know what it’s like to play a role as a living, the role of the “better version you were”. The one you wish you could be again…but they’ve tainted you. You are haunted by yourself and how they loved you, how they gave you up, how they no longer care. You pretend to be like before, but it’s a facade so fragile everyone can see through it. 

They see through it so well it’s like glass, glass that shatters as they tell you : “You’ve changed.”

You want to own up to the change, and be proud of it, as if it’s a choice, as if it’s some sort of rise from the ashes. So you do. You say: “Yeah, I know.” Because you do, and so a new character takes the place of the other. A “tougher” one, one who doesn’t care about others opinion, one who sinks into nihilms to justify the now immoral acts you commit for the sake of feeling something, anything.

*

Detached from all you’ve ever known, you find yourself in a new land, a new place. So many opportunities, not only to meet new people, discover your favorite overpriced coffee shop and bakery, but more so especially to rebuild yourself into a mix of who you used to be, and how you changed, and finally, how you grew from all that and became the person who stands in this place today.

People say the opposite of love isn’t hate but forgiveness, and ultimately they are right. As hard and painful it is to admit, as you stalk their profile and yell and cry horrid tears about them, you don’t hate them. You tell yourself you hate them but deeply all you want is for them to feel the pain you feel. 

So once the numbness hits, the deep hollowness that fills your days and drains your brains, you finally get to the point not so desired : apathy. 

It’s not desired because in the end it’s the hardest part of all : letting go.

This is the time where you come to terms with the situation and where each of you stands. You give up on tarot cards, astrology and “destiny” and douse yourself in the saying “if they wanted to, they would '' as balck and white as it may be. You’ve fought enough and suffered enough so now you prepare yourself to say goodbye. 

You learn to appreciate the time you spent together (although deep down you always really loved it) and admit that things weren’t easy and that it probably wouldn’t have worked out. 

So now you look ahead, healed and yet pained, tained and yet brave to face what lies ahead, the people you may meet and the hurt you’ll feel again.

So ultimately, thank you, for making me feel all these emotions I thought I could never bear, thank you for the pain and tears, the rage and hate, the tangy longing and bittersweetness of it all. With you I shone and blinded those around, as my eyes turned to saucers and my hair flew around. You cupped my bruised neck with your large hands and placed your brittle nails in the depths of my core.

You were my first and I’m happy for that,

 but you don’t want to be my last

 and I’ve come to terms with that. 

But don’t come back when I’m flying high,

 all you’ll do is bring back lies,

 sweet as honey that’ll keep me in your web

I love the taste but you won’t share your bed

Let me escape to the sea, 

and be the me I want to be.