Today I Wore Someone Else's Mask

“Today I wore someone else’s face, someone who doesn’t exist. I created the persona of myself being that person and had made many friends, but sooner or later I realized that everyone is wearing a mask.”

           The girls at school always seemed so happy, they all made plans and hung out. The problem was one of them, you see the girl in question had no reason to be on the planet earth, she was overlooked even though she tried so hard, she never made it. The girl wears a mask every day, she laughs, smiles, and greets everyone, but the main problem was that no one saw who she really was. When she ran away from her group of friends, her mask came off, she was emotionless, tired, and sad. That was her true self.

           She ran back to her friends because her mask was falling off, and she needed to keep it on, no one and she means it, no one must know who she really is, or no one will be willing to be friends with her. “What are the concepts of friends...?” She wonders.

           The girl went back home after school ended and she took off her mask. She plopped on the bed and fell asleep, another day, same mask. Except, the day was different. The air felt off, as if the world around her was telling her something.

           She arrived at the school about twenty meters away and saw police, ambulances, and saw students around the gates to see what happened. She pushes through the crowd and gets to the front entrance of the gate and peers through the opening, and what she saw was one of the girls that were laughing and smiling, dead.

           It was reported on the news later that day that she was being bullied through social media, “idiots.” The girl thought, who would show their true selves across the internet? Besides, the girl that killed herself, she wrote a note of some sorts for the world to see. She wanted one last impact on those who assaulted her and the world itself. She wanted to be remembered for something.

           The school staff kept silent about the whole situation. The school never posted an article, or anything related to the event. That was the real world, no one cared, and no one remembers you, you are an enigma brought into the real world just for you to be diminished, that is what the girl thought. You could become the next inventor or musician, but until you die someone will replace you, someone will be the better you. You will be remembered, but someone will replace you. That is what the girl thought.

           At school the group of friends that were with the girl that killed herself were not happy, their masks fell off. They sat in class, but they weren’t smiling. It appears they realize what life is like, that you could die in an instant.

           Later, the girl goes to the roof of the school and looks down below the railing and envisions what it’s like to die, the same way the other girl died. The girl thinks to herself, I wonder if she found peace in “heaven.” That’s right, the magical place where all souls go being so pure and such, heaven, but no one in this time proved it. Dead people couldn’t come back and say, “It’s amazing up here!” If they did, the girl believes that the world would become a suicide planet then and everyone will go to heaven. The girl believed in science and reality that everything came from cells and molecules, rather than a religious view, you are an organism, and your role is to produce results, that is what the girl thought. If there was a God in this world, she would ask it one question, “Why?”

           In class, the students were learning about mathematics when one of the girls broke down, she cried and sobbed. Her mask had cracked, she couldn’t repair it, nor make a new one, she had lost the reason it was on. Just like the girl that killed herself, no one paid attention. The girl ran out of the classroom, and everyone shrugged it off as a usual outburst, but the girl knew something was going to happen. She wanted to help that girl, but she couldn’t move, her nerves kept her still in her chair.

           Until she looked out the window and saw a figure fall, then blood filled the walkway to the entrance of the school, and everyone then had a reaction.

           Some boys were shocked and mortified, some girls screamed and shrieked then cried, they took the moment and put it to their advantage to lure the boys they liked to comfort them. That is how this world worked, you try to divert what happened and get the attention to have people like you. This irritated the girl, she couldn’t understand any of these people, someone had just died and all they care about are themselves, in the end. Nothing changes.

           The next day, the blood had dried, and the days kept going as they were, no body, no blood, no student ever existed. No news articles existed either. No one reported on the death.

           Today one of the authors that the girl liked died, the last thing the author wanted people to know was that he never knew who he really was, he felt as though he was someone else’s shadow being pulled by will. The only people to ever hear this were his devoted readers, the girl cried that day, her mask fell off. The next day it came back on.

           In the end, the girl lived her life, she kept working, and she kept trying, but as a result, she kept her mask on her entire life and said the same thing as her favorite Author, before she died as well.

           Let me ask you, dear reader, which mask do you have on today?