song: defenceless by louis tomlinson
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with·er: cease to flourish; cause to decline or deteriorate; weaken.
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DAWN.
Fuck, she thought as she woke up. Fuck, it's 11 AM. Fuck, I feel another pimple on my face. Fuck, I'm skipping breakfast. Fighting against her lack of will, she dragged herself to her bathroom. And instinctively, she stopped in front of the mirror. She stared at her reflection, the person the world saw versus the person she really was.
CLOUD.
Grey: the color of her life. Similar to black, but faint; the faintness of the color conveyed how her today's persistently carried the weight of her yesterday's. The days of the week blended, merged, resulting in the combination of white and black. Her desire for a new day was tainted by her past—past mistakes, past worries, past memories.
CHILL.
Expectations, she hated, dreaded, feared. They defined the key performance indicators she always failed to meet. And the way she always found herself below the bar in others' minds made her lose herself. She wanted to be better, achieve more, prove to be, at the least, average; she wanted to succeed, but the bar was something she could never meet.
FOG.
Blurry. Her vision was blurry. Her parents' anger was already entering her ears after only taking a few steps into the living room. She felt more bodies cave in onto her, and figments of her imagination, imaginative bodies, ghosts, only strengthened her parents' argument. The walls of the room were closing in on her, as they always seem to do, habitually.
GUST.
"USELESS! YOU'RE USELESS. I already told you what to do; I explicitly told you what you needed to do before the fact, told you how to prepare, and how to prevent this. But, what did you do instead? You overlooked it, pushed my advice to the side. I KNEW YOU COULDN'T DO IT. A USELESS WASTE OF SPACE!"
MIST.
Misunderstandings: she didn't mean to be defiant, she just wanted to prove herself. She wanted to show she could be independent, follow her own path, and still succeed; however, she met failure again, like always. Her parents' words, they were like artificial intelligence, learning, improving, knowing the exact words to hurt her.
SHOWER.
Escape—she wanted to leave, run. She no longer had a place within her family and the home they embodied, but even before she had an opportunity to express those feelings, her parents were already kicking her out. And she found herself running; it was in no particular direction, just away. Yet the distance, the growing separation from her and her family, wasn't relieving.
LIGHTNING.
"A USELESS WASTE OF SPACE!" Their words continuously and constantly rang in her mind even as she escaped, distancing herself further and further. Their expectations were chasing her and catching up as she felt her body grow weak. She could no longer run away; her legs failed to carry the weight of her body and the extra baggage of her emotions and thoughts.
THUNDER.
Falling. This was her downfall. She fell onto her knees, her palms pressed against the concrete ground. Her tears were blending with the raindrops falling onto her, hitting her skin, piercing her inner feelings she held onto so tightly before everything let loose today. She became vulnerable, finally, but it wasn't well received—she could have predicted that, though.
TWILIGHT.
Reset; she wanted to reset, restart her life. But, she didn't know if that would be enough. Would a second try at life, only one more attempt, be enough to correct her mistakes, wrongdoings, and deficiencies? Would she become the perfect child she knew her parents wanted to be in her second life? She knew the answer was no. She acknowledged her ill-fated life.
DUSK.
Fearful, she stared at the darkened sky. She didn't know where this moment laid within her life's timeline. What moment was she experiencing? It wasn't a coming-of-age moment, nor a mid-life crisis; it was just her life. And, currently, she stood alone in the darkness, unsure of her mysterious life's future. What would be her next step?
—
a/n: i think i purposefully wrote this story in kind of in a secretive, vague way, where there is a lot of hidden meaning. the purpose of that would be so this story could become a metaphor, in some ways, adaptable to others' lives, as readers build their own meaning for this story. after all, though we live different lives, we are never, truly, alone. we are more similar than you think.
