Fortitude

39-Faithfulness

Cast your burden on the Lord [release it] and He will sustain and uphold you; He will never allow the righteous to be shaken (slip, fall, fail).

Psalms 55:22 AMP

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Taji

I left the airport and went straight to the one place I hadn't been in nearly 11 years. It's normally impossible to get a full arm tattoo in one sitting, but I just wanted the pain. After going back and forth with the artist, we settled on one big one.

So I sat there for about three hours, my mind completely focused on the painful and tingling feeling of the needle on my arm. For three hours, I didn't have to think about how badly my head was throbbing. I didn't have to think about how my whole family kept doing the one thing I hated the most; keeping things from me. Proving to me how weak I am. I didn't have to think about how bad Tanya actually was. I most especially didn't want to think about how to explain all this to the one other person I learnt to love. I didn't have to think of what next, because I knew that after how cold I was to her, it'd be over.

I later passed by yet another place I hadn't stepped in for nearly 11 years. I placed the liquor bottles one by one on the counter, getting a weird satisfying feeling each time the sensor beeped. I looked at the bar code on my wrist then cleaned my fists as I internally fought the urge to replay the worst day of my life. When I looked up, the cashier was shooting me some judgemental looks but I shot her down with a cold glare.

I then went back to my apartment and placed the bottles in the refrigerator. I checked my phone which had been buzzing all evening. The number of calls and unread messages from my family, my girlfriend and a bunch of other unknown numbers didn't faze me. I tossed it on the couch then went to lock myself in my room. I sat on my bed through the night, as I stared at the three frames suspended above my bed. Tanya was all that was in my mind.

I stayed in my room throughout Christmas eve. My body felt to heavy to be lifted off the bed. Underneath the heavily layered duvet, I was still cold. My frozen insides were enough to kill me of hypothermia. The small percent of logic in my mind kept telling me that I should get up and face my family. Face Tanya. Face my strawberry. But my ice cold heart shut all those thoughts down as soon as they crept up. At some point in the evening I accidentally rolled over awkwardly and ended up squishing the arm with the fresh tattoo. I didn't care how much pain I wanted to feel. That exact one, was unbearable. So I got up to tend to it.

As I went to fetch ice from the kitchen, I heard Lily and Raz talking outside my door. For a split second, I gained some sanity and went to open the door. But it was a split second. The second that followed was filled with derogatory thoughts.

You're just going to show them how weak you are.
Raziya can't love someone like you.

So I carried the ice back to my room, took my phone, texted Lily to leave, then got back into bed. I had no desire for food. It was for meant for people who had something worth living for. I had tried so hard to push the idea of giving up on life entirely. I was honestly ready to let go, completely. I was a freak anyway. Everyone was better off without me. But no matter how downcast I felt, the thought of death scared everything out of me. How would it feel like? Would I even feel it? Would I actually be peaceful afterwards? Would God understand why I did it?

God.

That little logical part of me reminded me that I had chosen to live for the One who had everything in control. But the larger dead part of me didn't understand why everyone kept leaving. I didn't understand what it was that I did that was so despicable enough to earn me all this. I shut my eyes and waited for sleep to catch up with my racing thoughts. I needed to sleep before I ended up doing something irreversible.