If you learned to laugh before crying,

If you learned to smile before screaming,

You might still be human,

But you will never be normal



The Bunker

Eyn turned the little control box over and over in her hands, looking for the off button.

Some eight year olds, especially Eyn, had a weird quirk of not caring about the worst consequences, like the fact that she could kill herself, in an awfully painful way, if she pressed the wrong button.

Maybe it was the fact that she wanted to get rid of The Bunker so badly...

Or it was because of The Bunker itself, none of the bad possibilities entered Eyn’s mind.

The only thing Eyn saw was the few, golden, Bunker-free moments she would get if she figured it all out.

And this was her perfect chance, Min had to be taken to the hospital, so nobody was home.

Eyn’s eyes glistened as she found what she was looking for, a rubbery black button, the off button.

She pressed it, with more force than necessary. A shrill BEEP came from the box, a shiver ran down from Eyn’s neck, she flinched and inhaled heavily.

The green light disappeared from the control box.

Eyn stood straight and scrunched her eyebrows.

Nothing seemed to have changed.

Oh, why don’t it work!

She folded her hands, but suddenly her face brightened like a balloon being blown up.

“Oh it did work!, I am thinking na-ga-tive!”

The Bunker was turned off, for the first time since the earliest memory Eyn ever had. Eyn had lived an overly protected life till now, she was not locked up in a bunker, but The Bunker was rooted in her. However, it all had a reason, a hesitant reason, a reason that could rob the lives of Eyn and anyone unlucky beside her.

A reason, which the cheery eight year old, who was sprinting towards the door, didn’t know.

Eyn hopped out of the door and glanced back, no alarms were ringing, The Bunker was truly turned off.

For a girl who was strolling towards a few kids, who were playing, to say ‘hi!’, Eyn didn’t look even a bit shy.

She swung her hands and walked in a rhythm.

Probably because she was restricted to happy thoughts, until when she tripped over that stupid stone right now.

She fell hard, and all the kids turned towards her. For a person laying face down, Eyn heard all the giggles quite clearly.

She pushed herself up.

Her eyes filled up and the fresh cut on her knee started bleeding, bleeding out quite dramatically.

But something more dramatic started bleeding too, bleeding in. The Bunker had kept Eyn underground, protecting her, but also making her weaker.

She looked up, her face was getting paler.

Her mind was drowning, it was normal for a girl with a scratch on her knee to cry,

It was normal, if the girl was normal too.

For Eyn, the tears came with blurring sights, heavy breaths and a grave fall.

***

Eyn is fifteen years old now, and she has perfectly disintegrated herself into a coward.

She glances at the little kids playing outside through her window and sighs. Whoever they were, the kids always remind her of her foolishness.

Eyn turns around, but stays in her room.

She glances at the control box on her desk and shakes her head.

Her mother either has trusted her too much these days,

Or was too much absorbed in grieving.

But it doesn’t matter now, as Eyn has already given up, she has accepted her fate.

Eyn knows the reason now, she knows how useless she is, and she knows more about the little device controlling her nerves, keeping her underground, shielding her from the horrors of the surface. 

For a person who can never be sad or angry, Eyn is not even a bit cheery.

She never wanted to be a person who couldn’t understand others, she never wanted to be a person who couldn’t fuss about the tiny troubles of teenage, she never wanted to stand there like that when her mother walked in, shaking, saying that her father and Min had died.

Min..., Min was eight, but The Bunker was not fixed inside her neck, because Min could laugh and cry all day and still stay sane and conscious.

But Min is gone.

Eyn clasps her head in her hands, trying to stop what her mind was doing now. The Bunker can’t stop thoughts about self-destruction, The Bunker can’t stop anything stronger than itself.

But The Bunker can stop Eyn from taking a few steps and pressing that rubbery black button again, because she was way weaker than it now.

***

Eyn will turn the little control box over and over in her hands.

Some sixteen year olds, especially Eyn, will have a weird quirk of not caring about the worst consequences, like the fact that she could kill herself, in an awfully painful way, if she presses the wrong button.

Maybe it will be the fact that she will want to get rid of The Bunker so badly, the fact that she won’t be able to stay in the same way she had grown up anymore...

Or it will be because of The Bunker itself, none of the bad possibilities will enter Eyn’s mind.

The only thing Eyn will see will be the golden, Bunker-free life she would get if she could overpower The Bunker, if she could emerge from the shell she had build for herself, every other shell would have been eroded away, her mother would be dead by then.

And she will know that it was, it is and it will be all her fault. All her fault.

She was, is, and will be, always, responsible for staying underground, for withering away leaf by leaf, petal by petal, because while protecting her from the storms, The Bunker was also blocking her from the sunlight.

Eyn’s hands will shake, when her finger rests on the rubbery black button.

One press and....,

The Bunker will still be in her but she will no longer be in the bunker.

Eyn will walk towards her window before shutting down The Bunker, she will see no children outside, clumsily homeschooled till then, what would Eyn know about exams?

Then she will press the button, with more force than necessary. A shrill BEEP will come from the box, a shiver will run down from Eyn’s neck, she will flinch and inhale heavily.

The green light will disappear from the control box.

Eyn will cry, cry for the second time in her life, she will sob and then she will smile, she will stand straight and smile...

It would not be normal for a girl to smile because she could cry,

It would not be normal, if the girl was normal.