been on this earth a whole 18 years and truthfully it feels longer. i'm set in my ways, set in the rhythm of rigid days, set believing morality is an endless maze and people are never who they say.

break! monotony is a dream! monotony is only real on the days you don't scream

you know two months ago i was still trying to make these rhyme and now i'm using a scalpel just to extract the words from my lungs, fumbling and failing to fit them together on the page, wondering if writing is killing me or keeping me sane, fitting thoughts into so-called poetry almost as easily as the rings i fit on each finger before i leave for the party i'm not wanted at. i could keep drafting these and waiting a day to publish each or i could accept the fact that my habits and realities will never coincide with the apathy they hope to see in me (even though really they hope i'm never wanted because then i'm a threat, or a tease) and while i may never be self-aware enough to cease i see enough of me in your eyes to know i shouldn't care anymore what you think of me.

i've spent a lot of time in social scenes, and between laughs and looks and the way people look down when they want to cry i've yet to grasp whether i'm meant to shrink or stretch in a group conversation. eye contact seems dangerous sometimes. is a smile safe? how long can i listen without talking? how loud do i have to laugh to seem carefree? before you look at me and think of all the people you'd rather me be?

if i am supposed to love myself before you do why don't you care either way?

i guess i'll keep stretching myself to wrap around all the people i want to be, want to love, want to love me, and between my thinning hair and the way my skin looks after a whole day i'm less and less sure i'll ever be someone worth being.

i stopped thinking about big things a long time ago. i can't tell if i'm any healthier or cooler or if the apathy has improved my complexion. i feel lost, though. lost like a minnow in the wrong body of water, lost like i should be asking "why" instead of "where," like maybe the world is spinning like a top and i'm the fleck of dust it's spinning on. i feel like maybe the security is getting to me, like it's a trap, like maybe everything they told me i was looking for was a lie, a gold-painted idol placed in my hands when i reached for the sky. the sky doesn't show itself to me anymore and i can't figure out why, can't decipher the patches in my ceiling---why are there patches? if this was supposed to be picturesque where are the cameras?

why do i feel just as incomplete as i did before?

i spend a lot of time changing, changing clothes and changing earrings and glasses and world views. my opinions leave me quicker than my eyelashes do, and i don't know how to stick them back on because false eyelashes aren't cheap but they don't sell fake opinions at the dollar store. i don't even know what currency i'd use to buy them---my energy? morals? creativity? all spent and gone months before now. i spend most of my energy trying to become the kind of person people like, or at least admire, or are at least intimidated by. if i can't care about you at least i can make you want me to. is that fair? does my loneliness justify the pedestal i put myself on? pride is my only currency left and i don't know how to diversify. at this point all i know how to say is i'm sorry, i'm sorry i'm constantly a changed person, constantly ridding myself of the baggage tugging on my skin, baggage that sits quietly until i am finally comfortable in my seat, quietly until it screams and i have to start over again. unclipping luggage was never so difficult as a child but then again i didn't have this much.

my hands are trembling with infuriating intensity and she just stands there, eyes shining and hands fumbling like they always do. looking at me like she always does—like i am someone, or worth something, but she’s always been wrong.

esi moves her hands towards the candle again, and i hold my breath as the flame flickers, turning from a warm glow to a bright light to almost nothing, a mere spark dancing and flickering on the black wick. incredible. i look around, from eliza to dessa to desmond, and all i see is fear in their eyes---the deep, vacuous fear you see in the eyes of someone staring a tsunami in its face.