Maniacs (Gotham)

Antidote

[No Man's Land - Day 100.2]

There are moments when your world begins losing its speed, slowing down until you can't keep track of time. Every minute feels like an eternity within the confines of your own mind, lost in your own thoughts and insecurities. You become fused with the silence, loving it but also hating how alone you can be.

I miss being a child.

When I was a little girl, I was a ball of spastic happiness, giggling until my belly hurt, even if nothing but barbarity surrounded me. I had always been afraid of my father, but there were moments when I could forget and pull myself out of that agonizing zone. My curiosity was my private space. My mood was fast to change; I experienced pure euphoria over the slightest things. Time never happened to me; it happened to those around me. In the times when I didn't fully understand the gravity of my situation, the antidote to my damaged heart was a simple game of hide-and-seek.

But I genuinely feel sorry for that sweet, starry-eyed little girl because even if she is submerged in bliss, the most important years of her life are tainted with malice and darkness... and she doesn't even see it yet. A story I know all too well. I've walked in her shoes and have walked on the territories she's yet to touch. She'll finally feel time, it'll come in long, excruciating lapses while she lays in bed, unable to differentiate between minutes and hours, days even. Inner demons feasting on her pure heart. Voices who claim to be her own. She'll spend most of her teenage years running from the wolves, and the ones she loves the most are just in disguise.

I wish my first love was still a million years away.

Longing to be charmed and wooed is dreamier than reality - the one you love can disappear from your life just as easily as they walked into it. In my imagination, he never does. There, we live in the clouds, and I'm so in love; my mind is so entranced that I cannot even envision my life with anyone else. I'm never alone.

Where I exist, Jerome charmed me. He handled my heart with care, kissed the jagged edges carelessly... and then left me alone.

Here, moving on is becoming the dead-end I keep encountering. Just as I can breathe effortlessly again, the brick wall is placed in front of me, and I throw myself against it, trying to break it down. It never budges.

I had begun envisioning my life with Jeremiah, imagining the multitude of kisses and mornings, and now he was letting go of the rope. He decided to take everything from me, wringing the love out of me to make himself feel safe. I'm certain when he's done, and this crazy theatric he built around us falls, the only one left will be me. Mangled up, watching the dust settle, left to splint my broken bones. I can already feel my mind begin to slip, so who truly knows if anything of me will be left.

"It's all wrong." I heard her mumble beside me, but I didn't even bother to look at her at the moment. She breathed deep before standing up. "I can't believe this... Actually, I can. That's the most pathetic part of this." She paced in front of me nonstop, seeming tired. It surprised me to see her so bitter. I guess all this up and down in my emotions was tearing her apart. She shot me a hateful glare. "You should have stayed away."

I glanced into her eyes, "I know." I whispered, swallowing back my tears.

"Do you know, Reese?" She turned around defensively, hands balled into fists at her side, and screamed. "How? How did we let this happen again?"

"Don't you think I'm just as pissed as you?" I snapped.

She clenched her jaw, "I see a weak girl trying to crawl away from her reality yet again. Reese, we are not the underdog. Either you get with the program and join him, or it's time to go. I'm getting bored of the emotional bullshit."