Am I free?

“You need to grow up” My mother always told me that. So did my father, and the kids at school. Even the teachers told me so. They all told me that I needed to grow up. So I did.

I stared at myself in the mirror, my hair was no longer in small braids with butterfly clips, it was curled and in a pony tail. my lips was no longer covered in bits of chocolate but tainted light red. I looked into my own brown eyes, ‘Who am I?’. Because I was no longer the girl who laughed when I was running, who found everything pretty, who loved to dress in all kinds of color. Now I’m the girl who found everything annoying and irritating, who only dressed in baggy clothes, who never laughed anymore. Every time I walk through the halls, people stare and point, some laugh, some whisper. Others just stare like I was a alien. Those were all the ones who told me to grow up. To stoop acting like a child. Every time I go home, my mom looks at me with a sadness in her eyes, my dad looks down ashamed, maybe at me or at himself.

Tears ran from my eyes and dropped into the sink, my hands grip the counter harder that my knuckles turn white. I mean, what did they expect?! They told me that I was to childish, to noisy, to hard to deal with. I wiped away my tears and changed into new clothes, I re-did my makeup, brushed and curled my hair. Why? I don’t even know, because where I’m going to night…nobody will ever stare, point, laugh, or tell me “what happened to the old you?” The place where I'm going is where I’ll finally be free from everyone.

I left the place where I called my home, and walked to empty field. The wind had blocked out every sound that there was, everything except my screams of anger, sadness, hate. I screamed until I couldn’t feel the pain that started in my throat, I screamed until my voice cracked. I screamed until I couldn’t anymore. My throat burned like a thousand campfires together. For a silent moment…everything was quiet and peaceful. No wind blew over the trees and grass, no birds chirped, no sounds of cars driving by or planes. And for a moment or two, I saw the same empty and dark field except…there were more buildings, tall and big. A white table with two chairs were in the middle of the field, a old women stood a few feet next to me but she wasn’t looking at me. She was looking at the two children that ran through the tail grass. A young boy and girl, the the lady turned to me and said… “Don’t give up yet…there is still a future for you. A future that you created. A future that you made by accepting the fact that you grew up. Not by force…but by choice” and then, she put a letter into my hands and she was gone, so were the 2 kids, and the buildings. It was dark again, no buildings and no table and chairs. Just pure emptiness. I opened the letter and the only thing that was written onto the piece of white paper was

’grow up’ they all said. And so I did. But what I didn’t know was that one day, I would choose to grow up. By time and patience, you will to, grow. But for now? Live your childhood before you can’t.

-Signed by you

And so, I waited everyday, week, and year. And it was when I re-visited the same field, did I realize. I was in collage, and I was happy that i was. I had grew up by choice. And now, I stood in the same place, now I was old, my brown hair had faded white and gray. Instead of a tear stained face, it was a wrinkled smile. Instead of a all dressed up young girl with a tear stained face, it was a old lady, with white and gray hair and with a smile on my face. I watching my niece and nephew run around in the same field I almost ran away in, I looked to my left and standing there was a girl with straight hair, tainted tear face, all dressed up in a dress and confused as I was 45 years ago. It was now that I realized, that I’m not gonna let a girl like I was suffer. Walking over to her, she was still confused “How am i here? Why am I here?!” I only smiled, I grabbed her hand gently and gave her a small leather box. She held it like it was glass and before she could say anything, she disappeared back to her dance, little does she know. Her future will be the greatest of all of our futures. Her future will be the one where all of us will be reunited, where all of us can be free. Where all of us will succeed our duty. And I could have avoided all of the pain in my teenage years if all I did was to wait and grow up by choice. And when our duty is done, we will finally be free and then, we can finally rest and find peace in the afterlife. I’m glad I was told to “grow up” even if it hurt to hear, because without it, I wouldn’t got to have the future I have now. So thank you to all of the ones that told me that, even if it hurts for me to hear that or even say that it was the best thing that happened to me. Thank you.

”No matter how hard life gets, just remember that if you make it through that. You can make your own future for yourself and inspire others to do the same” -Quote from anonymous.