Mirrors | Malum

19

Calum

It wasn't fun coming home, feeling like the entire universe had crumpled between my fingers like sand, and had fallen to the ground, underneath my feet, onto the streets where random strangers walk the face of the earth each day. I felt as if I had a huge weight on my chest, like a thousand bricks standing on top of my shoulders and pushing me down further and further until my back was cascaded into a fence, which could easily pull my skin off of my spine. But it wasn't as painful as the emotions I was feeling.

I hated walking inside to the smell of what used to be my favorite food. I couldn't stand the idea of my father and mother sitting next to each other at the dining table with smiles on their faces while Mali walked from the kitchen with a pot in her hands and oven mitts to protect heat from burning her skin. It wasn't something I expected and it definitely wasn't something to celebrate.

"What's the celebration for?" I remember asking my dad, and his eyes lighting up and that little smile of his curving onto his face. I haven't seen him smile in a long time.

"You son."

I wasn't hungry and I didn't want food. All I really wanted to tell them was that this was some mistake from a miscellaneous boy who thought curving into the lines of my life would make a difference but it only made matters worse. However, the way they were all smiling and tearing up, and complimenting me by saying they were incredibly proud that I was "finally showing off what I do best to the world" made me not want to say anything.

Art isn't what I do best.

In fact, I don't do anything best. And I hated, with a passion, standing there with a fake smile plastered on my lips, with my hands dangling beneath my hips, feeling as if I were going to throw up because this isn't what I wanted my reality to be. But it was, because I was too afraid to disappoint my family.

And now I'm stuck.

I was waiting by the train station, coincidentally waiting to see Michael because my sister was on a date with her boyfriend and completed her classes early for the day. He hadn't showed up at the same time he usually does and I was beginning to feel worried. I could feel my underarms and palms sweating, because I was nervous that I had upset him too much and he wouldn't want to see me again.

Maybe it was my fault for telling him that I was trying to get involved in the first place, but I felt obligated to tell him that he couldn't keep the thought inside of his head that I was his and he was mine because I don't belong to him. The only person I belong to is myself and he needs to get that through that thick skull of his. But he can't and he won't because he's addicted to seeing me every single day.

Or was.

I felt my heart rate slowing down and that same wave of sadness washing over me. It was like I could crawl into a hole and bury myself, or dive into an ocean that was easy enough to drown in. I wasn't an angel and I'm not going to be one because I scared the one person who actually cared about me, away. And now I'm left here, to stare at my hands that have touched dirt and stones, and branches of trees that have corrupted my sanity and left me with demons.

I was about to leave, because I had no chance at this point of seeing him. It's a possibility that saying I didn't belong to him ruined the friendship that we were building. We were creating towers and buildings that could lift us higher into the sky together, but I destroyed them because I was too afraid of getting closer to someone who could just leave me.

I didn't want Michael to actually exit out of my life, because he was starting to give those words that consistently slipped out of my mouth, meaning. I'm worthless had turned into I'm worth it, and I'm giving up became I'm not going to stop living, thanks to you. But now those thoughts have returned and I'm fighting the voices inside of my head. And the anxiety that seeps into my veins at night leaves me with tired eyes and mornings of relying on caffeine because I'm too exhausted to focus on the world around me.