His Eyes

Looking into his eyes took her breath away.  

There was something there, behind their stunning color.  

There was depth.  

There was beauty.  

There was a kindred soul.

Or maybe she way seeing herself reflected back.  

Maybe it was her, without the cracks and the bruises and the flaws.  

Reflected in his eyes, she was whole. 

There was motion too.

It was gentle, like clouds drifting away.

Or like a light, summer breeze.

In his eyes, her storm was gone.

There was no rain.

No lightning.

Everything was peaceful.

She decided in that moment that if she ever fell apart again, 

she'd just look in his eyes to put herself back together.

Opposing Faces

I've been two people in my life, fluctuating between two faces, two identities.

When I was young, I was who I am now.  Anxious.  Quiet.  Introverted.  Scared.  Shy.

At 13, I found a different side of me.  Loud.  Popular.  Happy.  Outgoing.  Sarcastic.  Witty.

And then, when I was 15, things fell apart and that little scared girl came back.  And I've been her ever since.  I've fallen deeper and deeper into her fear.  Her anxiety.  Her self-doubt.  Her silence.
It felt a lot like drowning without any water around.

Recently, I was pulled from the invisible waves.  It was a joint effort, I did some of the leg work, but he did a lot of it too.  And since then, that 13 year old girl who had the world in her pocket and the universe on her side has been calling a lot.  Right now, it feels like a battle between the two.  As much as I want hope to win, I've lived in anxiety long enough to give it a solid foothold.  But hope is strong.  And so am I.  I know she's in there, that girl who could rule the world.  I just have to figure out how to give her back her throne.

Growing Into Myself

I've finally realized a few things about myself, and I thought that in the case that your drowning in uncertainty, maybe sharing them would help you.

I finally realized that I'm never going to be the kind of girl who can wear heels, and leather pants, and red lipstick.  I'm never going to be a bombshell heart-breaker.  I'm never going to be "cool" or "intense".
I'm always going to be the kind of girl that trips over her own feet.  The kind that considers "brushed" hair as a "style".  The kind who likes to rock polka-dots and sneakers with a dress.  I'll always be more comfortable in jeans than in short shorts or a dress.
My favorite colors are always going to be bubblegum pink and cotton candy blue and I'll probably always use candy to describe color.  I'll always be able to name more crayola colors than U.S. Presidents. I'll always prefer staying in with a book to going out.
I'll always be overly excited about tiny things.  I'll always be awkward in public and spazzy at home.  And I'll always use outdated words like "nifty" and "hooligan" and "snazzy".  I'll always be a hopeless romantic and I'll always have a hard time letting go of the past.

I say all that to say this; until a few months ago, I was surrounded by people who made me think that these silly things that make me who I am, weren't enough.  That I was wrong.  That I wasn't enough to matter.

But I'm here to tell you, that I do matter.  And those people who told me I didn't, they're long gone.  It hurt so much to let them go, like I was losing part of myself.  But now enough time has passed that I'm starting to see the light, and I'm starting to see myself.
I was so lonely that I settled for toxicity in all of my relationships.  Now that all those toxins are gone, I'm breathing clean for the first time in almost ten seven years.  And I like myself again.  There are a lot of things I'll never be.  But I like who I am.  And you should too.  Because no one should be able to change you.  The right people help you grow into yourself and when you find them, you'll know.

Broken Fairytales

There was nothing beautiful about our fairytale.
By the time I found the ending, all the pages were bloodstained and shredded.
Torn apart by the fighting it took to get to the end.
Instead of a glass slipper, I lost my innocence running from you. And you never bothered to try an return it to me.
Instead of a sleeping spell, it was my heart that was broken. And you didn't wake me up, you left me there to die.
Instead of a poison apple, you handed me a mouthful of empty promises and choked on their lies.
You were a prince when I found you, but you turned into a beast. As if my love were some curse that made you that way.
And nothing hurt more than turning to the last page and finding myself alone, without a happy ending.
All alone after the fight I made to matter to your story for so long.

Around not About

She always talked around him.

She liked subjects that brought up his career, his ideas.

She prayed for others to mention his name.

She liked to talk about their similarities and how unexpected they were.

She liked to talk about herself in relation to him. 

But she never said his name,

or talked about his eyes.

Or about how his smile took up her world.

Or how many times she had imagined them together.

She never talked about him, just the exterior things that happened to associate with him.

Never about how his voice calmed her nerves,

or how he could make her sit still.

People thought he was just another planet in her orbit,

but he was was her whole galaxy.  

The glitter in his eyes made up her stars

and he was her everything.

But she talked around and not about so no one would ever find out just how much of her existed in him.

Whispers of Memory

When the sun comes up over this dusty town, and paints us all in gold, I think of how times have changed.
I see the ghosts of memories on every corner, just behind reality.
Visions of us when we were young and nothing mattered but having fun.
I can hear our laughter on the whisper of the wind and it sends a chill of disappointed sadness down my spine.
I wish I could just forget us.
Forget cards under the table and dancing in the street at 2 am.
Forget the smiles and the special places.
Forget the fights and all the accusations.
Sometimes, when the sun comes up, I realize I haven't been thinking about us.
I hope that maybe I'm free from the chains of the past.
But as the sun slips away, all the pain comes back.
And every night, I miss the way things used to be.
When it was us against the world and not all of you against me.

Camp NaNo Project Chapter 1 Excerpt

Blinking slowly, the world comes into focus.  All around, the smell of dirt perforates the air.  A raw pain flares in my wrists and panic clutches at my chest.  I try to move, but the ice cold chains hold fast, their clanking deafening in the quiet space.

      What happened?

      Legs shaking, I try to stand, but my bones turn to liquid and I hit the ground hard.  Sucking in a shaking breath I sweep my eyes around the room.  Nausea crushes my abdomen.  The room is no bigger than a broom closet and my claustrophobia tightens like a vice around my lungs.  Panicking, my breaths come in quick succession. 

Help.  Someone.

Caden.  The name slips through my mind, as my vision darkens, like sand through numb fingers.

Under the Umbrella

The air was humid and stale and empty under the canopy of red he held up to protect him from the rain.  All around him were personal tents of various shapes and sizes and colors.  It was a zoo of pattern.  A few steps ahead, he saw an empty space and wondered how it could fail to be populated with a nylon roof.  His eyes fell to the spot again as he trudged on.  Now though, there were sopping, blonde curls and shivering, hoodie covered shoulders.  Without a second thought, he scooped the stranger under the umbrella with him and tucked her to his side.

"You'll catch a cold running around like that!  I'm Jake."  He beamed down at her with bright grey eyes and a crooked smile.
"Oh!  My umbrella broke.  Thanks."  She stuttered, his sudden closeness unnerving her.

Earlier, before the wind had ripped her shelter apart, she had thought about how safe it was beneath the canopy.  Safely sheltered away from danger with sound muffled and the wold narrowed down, she liked the solidarity of her umbrella.  Her arm brushed his.  Suddenly, even though there was less room, and both of them were getting a rained on a little more, the lightning seemed to have found it's way beneath the umbrella, crackling between them with every matched step.

"I'm Tess."  She said.

The sound of her small, bright voice felt like a crack of electricity straight through his chest.  He shot her another crooked smile and managed to inch a little closer to her inside their shelter.  Soon, the only storm either of them felt was the intensity of silence, full of potential, underneath the umbrella.

A Dance on Olympus

A rainbow of colored skirts swirl around me.  Effortless.  Gliding.  Elegant.  Genteel.
I stand, un-moving.  Ignored.  Unfeeling.
They are a whirl of jewel tones and glitter and laughter and ease.
I am in black and unadorned and grimacing.
The light here sparkles in an unnatural way, glistening off every shinning surface as though Apollo himself were in the room.
I am not used to such opulence, such wealth, such audacity.
Daughters of Aphrodite twirl with sultry smiles and beauty so fine it seems poisonous.
But the Sons of Eros are unafraid; equally as resplendent and a deadly kind of suave.
This is no place for a child of Hermes, the child of a messenger.
A godly servant to the greater gods.
I am all thought and help and creativity and words.
While these beings bathe in refinement and breathe glamour and sleep on pillows of nobility.
I slip through the Olympian ballroom, afraid I've overstayed my welcome, wondering why I thought I could glide among the angels here.

Fragile Stupidity

The fragility and stupidity of the heart amazes me.

The way it aches and reaches for the poison that destroyed it.

Ripped apart and in tatters, it still pounds for the hands that tore it up.

For the love who broke it.

For the friends who betrayed it.

For all of the faces that turned their backs.

The problem with me, is that my heart is in my mind and my mind in my heart.

They can't be separated.

I can't ignore one and trust the other.

Reason lies intermingled with feeling.

Hope with probability.

There is no feeling without reason for me.

No thought without emotion.

I am all or nothing.

I am either too little or too much of both.

And my heart is as fragile and stupid as all the others.

Brown Car

The brown car passed, casting a hook into her heart and dragging her behind.
It was impossible not to remember.
Impossible to breathe as the memories crushed her.
Like the weight of the ocean was bearing down on her, forcing her to think, to replay, to remember.
Their faces flashed in her mind as the brown car passed.
It drew her eye in the rear view.
Even though it wasn't them, she couldn't look away.
She couldn't stop the voices in her head, screaming that it was her fault.
The license plate started to shrink, ripping the hook from her flesh, leaving her bleeding and gasping for air.
She reached for the radio dial, like the music would be an invisible tourniquet for her wound.
It wasn't.
It just dulled her senses enough to make the thoughts slow down.
And the brown car, that was nothing more than a car, took a piece of her sanity with it down the road.

City Bats

Where do city bats go when the sun comes up?
Where is their refuge when the night retreats?
Do they fly to the country and find shade in the trees?
Do they take off to the horizon, chasing the darkness?

I wish I had the wings of a city bat.
I wish I could fly after the moon, the safety of the darkness.
I wish I could soar between streetlights and over dim backyards.
I wish I knew where they hit from the daylight.

Away from the burning sun.
Away from clarity.
Into Darkness.
Into dusk.

Where do the city bats go when the sun comes up?
I'd like to go there too.

The Sailor and The Storm

She looked into the horizon and her heart stalled in her chest.  He was back, bringing with him the usual storm.  It had been a while since he had rained down on, nearly drowning her.

That day, she floated unconscious in the sea until a kind sailor came to her aid.  He scooped her up and asked no questions and took her far away.  He made her healthy again, in the shade on a sandy island.  There, they were all the other needed.

She had almost forgotten the boy with the storm.  She had prayed he's never find her.  She didn't want the sailor asking questions.  She just wanted to live happy, and free from the clouds.

As the grey clouds gathered, and the storm came closer, she remembered the joy she felt, dancing in the rain.  But she was smarter now.  And she knew that it was all temporary joy, and she'd have to live with a cold for another month.  So as the storm drew near, she fought her instincts, and stayed inside, watching the clouds from behind clear glass.

He stopped on the shore.  Like her knew what she'd done, the life she had chosen.  In the wind, he howled his disapproval, but he couldn't shake her resolve.  She was warm, safe, and dry, snuggled up in the cabin just within the tree line.

His storm raged on for days, demanding her presence.  But when it was clear that she'd never come back, he started to fade.  Soon the sky turned from black into grey.  And after a day or so, grey faded to blue.  Before she knew it, she had forgotten there was a storm at all, distracted by the sanctuary of her peaceful island home.

Never Swimming

If I am a hurricane,
He's a natural disaster.

If I feel broken,
He must surely feel shattered.

Nothing is safe with us.
Not me.
Not him.
Not anyone else.

There is no equality,
balance.
We're constantly battling to be on top.

Nothing is sweet.
It's all tears and poison.
Addiction to the mess.

We're never swimming,
Always drowning,
Pushing each other under,
for one breath of air.

The Sunshine

There was something otherworldly about her.
Something dark that only added to her strange beauty.

No one understood her ways.
That was okay.
She didn't need to be understood.
She just wanted to be seen.

And see her he did.  That lonely Prince.

He saw her and he knew they were the same.

So he whisked her away to a twisted kind of fairy tale life
 where their darkness played well together
and she could feel the sunshine.