Human

Humans are exhausting.

Enough said, right? No need for an explanation, no need to elaborate. Because you agree, don’t you? It must boggle your mind that humans have enough space in their brains to worry about such tiny things. 

Seriously.

Pick one, anyone. They are fanned out like cards in my hands. Parting around my fingers like grains of sand, or clay. I like that though, don’t you? That these humans are so easily molded by someone’s inconsequential opinions that they change who they are? 

That one. The one that your eye catches on, there. That single person lives so deep inside their mind that it becomes their world. They all do.

That girl there, with skin like caramel and eyes like dull metal, the one sitting alone, acting like she doesn’t care. 

She does. 

Care.

But the trick is in the lie. The hardest part about it isn’t getting others to believe. It is getting herself. Everyone else will fall for it, one by one, keeling over like dominos brushed with a stray finger. She the one who is out of line. The one who doesn’t fall to their knees for a smile, painted on a porcelain mask.

Each day she gets through, she marvels at the people she’s fooled. The ones who choose to fall for the same easy lies for one reason. Why should I care? Why on earth should I worry about someone else’s petty problems when I have my own to deal with? Each human thinks these words, pulling the same used bookmark from the tattered pages of an excuse.

But why should they?

Care.

Oh, look, there’s another.

He glances at her through the thick fringes of his eyelashes that hide coffee bean eyes. Behind him, a friend chatters pointlessly, his words spilling like water from a leaky faucet. His friend’s words bounce off his skin uselessly, constantly ignored. 

His fingers dance restlessly against his leg, pulling music from his veins, keeping in time with his heart. The ease that he plays with, the careless precision, pales in comparison to the years it took to get there. To the countless hours, and painfully wrong notes. But you can’t see that.

You shake your head saying, yes, I knew those things. 

Liar.

You are human too, you know. Despite how you desperately wish to drift away, to be above it all, you are here. Right. Now. This isn’t personal, know that.

Everything is personal for him though. Every missed step. Every off beat. They tie him down, pulling him deeper and deeper into himself. He glances up at her again, wondering what it would take to talk to her. 

He has seen the way she talks. When her porcelain mask is lowered, not even an inch. She speaks with her hands. Pulling the words with her fingers, twisting until they gain new meaning. Her hair floats in a halo around her head, the sunlight seeming to light it on fire.

Her confidence is magnetic, fake as it is, it draws people to her. It draws his eyes to her again and again, always breaking off connection before she notices.

But eventually, they catch. Snag if you will. In the afternoon light, the dull metal of her irises glistens. She hands him a smile. One stretched weak and brittle by the wind and distance.

She tries to see people. Truly see them. The way people can’t ever seem to see her. She tells herself that she understands what people are going through.

And for the most part, she does. 

She feels too much. That’s what she believes at least. She sees caring as being weak. But does that mean that strength is feeling nothing at all? Because to me, that seems much, much worse.

But I guess I’m not human.

I would have no way of knowing how she feels when begging a friend to help her. Please, just watch, she says, do you think he likes me? I would have no way of experiencing the broken glass of her feelings when she found out a few months ago that he was with someone else. Of mending the shattered fragments. Piece by piece by piece. Until she can start attempting to convince herself that she is ok without him.

I am not human.

I have no way of knowing how he feels, longing to work out the courage to tell her how he feels. To finally beat the regret that lives inside him like a plague. 

A nudge, a nudge is all it will take. A whisper in her ear, walk faster, catch up. A shot of liquid courage in his heart, today is the day.

Her steps begin to pick up their rhythm, matching his racing pulse. 

Hey.

A single word thumps from her lips. He smiles softly, looking for the words he had gripped so tightly just a moment ago. 

The words jump and writhe in my fingers. Trying to reach his lips. Your eyes dart down to my hands. You catch my gaze harshly, beg me to it go, please let them have just this moment. The betrayal in your eyes seems to leak through the atmosphere, heating the air uncomfortably.

In my hands, his confession gives a final attempt at escape before it withers.

Come close.

Closer.

I am not heartless. Cold, maybe, but I have a heart. I know that you doubt it. To be honest, you probably should too, if this is all you know about me. I guess it is.

Your breath flutters around my face. Pulse ticking rapidly you start to back away.

Don’t.

Please stay.

I try to be empathetic; I really do. If not feeling at all is strength, then I must be incredibly strong. It isn’t my fault that you humans have to care so much. That every word must have a hidden meaning because something that simple cannot be true. You can’t blame me for your shortcomings, I have plenty of those on my own.

But, after all.

I am not human.