Little Room

I still remember my first day. 

I pushed open the door, an actual door, solid, firm, woody. White, perplexing light shone blurrily from the door, like bits of auras radiating from the tan wood. The door moved like I commanded it, a smooth, compliant movement. Yet time ticked like it was sticky with gum, like the enchantment was too much for me to process. 

How can three silly rhymes capture a speck of my mind, who sprint through like deers of Artemis? I also always despised the word “or”. 

I felt like someone hit my face with a ball of mud. I suffocated, fighting the smothering burden that sinks so deep into my lungs. I was on enemy ground, a place too foreign. I felt like a traitor, yet I didn’t know who I was betraying. They say rebel without a cause, but I’d say it’s more like a rebel in complete desolation. I always kept a pocket knife on me, and I never felt more compelled to take it out. There was nothing even to fight, but a definite coolness in the atmosphere set all my nerves up. The feeling didn’t last, however, as all my adrenaline drained away in an instant. I needed to run away, for every cell in me revolted at the sight. The air felt like acid burning down my flesh. The smell choked me like someone shoved rocks down my throat. My ear rang like an alarm squealing at me to evacuate. I smoldered in flame. I didn't even realize my mouth hung down; I didn't hear anything, and my throat didn't throb. 

Yet I felt refreshed, like I am staring at the face of stability I haven’t seen since I could remember. After years of struggling, always wondering if I will survive another day, this new life felt like sunbeams setting down my skin. The room was bare, but my mind was loaded and striving for more. Euphoria rose and leaped in me, carefree like a child. Dread was a hunter, but joy was a Nemean Lion. There is a way for people who can find it, only if they aren’t dead before they get a chance. I wonder where I will fall. 

A mirror levitated adjacently to the wall. It spies the sun peaking in, scattering its glaze to any of the walls that crave. I glared into the mirror, not to get a glance at Zaine Avery Alevez but everything surrounding her. Her face blurred while everything else fought for the spotlight. I was the one who decided to start again, but the spots of strangeness and repulsion lingered. How I got here and where I came from, I couldn’t answer. Where I can turn back and where I will be going, I did not know. All I knew was that the walls were white with dots of grey, painted on by some mischievous little shadows. 

I never shook my initial disdain, but at least some of my pain subsided over the years. I was always on edge, like a doe sensing the lion prowling in the brush behind her. First impressions leave an impact even if fright was never my goal. Shadows on the wall were my best friends even if they aren’t the most attentive ones. The mirror is still as generous as ever, a hardworking deliverer. Despite all my comrades, I was as isolated as ever. A lone wolf can’t survive, but I did. I don’t have much, and I don’t need much. My little room looked like barren land; the floor was a freezing slab of rock, and the ceiling was always a starless night. Some days I woke up thinking I got abducted, and some nights I felt those teeth sinking in and tearing me to shreds. I knew I couldn’t dwell in misery forever, but I also cannot escape a realm so natural. Mother earth is a malicious monster; that is just the way things are. But just when the tide engulfs everything mother earth feels soft. It was softness like hearth, yet ready at any time to erupt to destruction. I could only try to soak up the tranquillity. I could only try to embrace the grass floor, imagined the cigarette smoke that came from a family barbeque, and saw the cars as families having a good time. The moon really did come out, and the owls will never kill anyone. I ran the clover through my fingers as I wondered if time will take away my rapture or dampen my blues. 

I write this years later, only to once again find no answer. I entered and exited my little room thousands of times, today possibly the last time. It’s still a bare little room, but it is here my loyal companions remain. Grey shadows decorated my white walls, not yet discovering how to dance. I step on the floor, not knowing if I touch the same rocks or the same grass or something different, a lake that froze over or a dirt patch that lost its grass to wildfire. I closed the door behind me, the same bit of white light from the caramel-colored wood. Time robbed some shine, but the mirror wasn’t shy to share. I looked into the mirror, a tapestry I’ve seen too many times. I still recount every little crevice and crack, every stain and smear. This time, I looked straight into the mirror’s eyes, her glowing lemon eyes. Her light brown skin was smooth except for a small break down her cheeks, one older than the room itself. Her black hair frizzed and flowed like willow in the wind, trying their hardest to cover the blemish. Her expression was earthly, austere at her lips but mellow at her eyebrows. 

I smiled. She was raised to not be vain, but I couldn’t help but taste some of that sweetness. She dodged living contact, but I showered her with life. She never felt a feeling of fulfillment, but I fueled her with glee. Before long, her face burst into laughter like a dormant volcano exploding without warning. Paranoia, for a moment, couldn’t even touch me. We were in a different dimension: far from nature, far from mother earth, in the little room. I was a lion springing away from anguish. Grass or rock, I found my ground, and I am here to defend it. 

My watch beeped, a wretched, dreary beep. My time was up. I knew had to leave, to go back to a world of uncertainty. I didn’t know where I will go or where I’m from. How can I just tell people I come from a little room? 

Time slips into a river and floats away along with the rapid. I turned to leave, only to turn back again. I needed to, just one last time. 

I saw Zaine Avery Alevez.