He was the absolute mirror of perfection. His arms stretched long enough to wrap around the world with his warm embrace. And his smile widened enough to show off every pearly white tooth. Best of all, his words touched my soul. Every sentence brought out a part of me no one had ever seen before.
I loved him and he loved me. I was no longer the second or third option. I was the one and only. We lived each day to make each other happy. Nothing else mattered. Any challenge headed our direction would be conquered.
His smile started fading and his arms started to straighten as my mind began to turn back on. I squirm under my sheets with a grin from ear to ear. Reality soon sets in, and my smile fades just as his did. "It's just a dream," I thought.
She is lovely, they are lovely. My mind likes to play tricks on me, and not just in my dreams. I love too easily; I feel too much. So much my mind starts to picture everything that never happened. A break from reality clears my mind for enough time to push through.
I pop open my prescription bottle and imagine I'm on the beach. Sand weaves around my toes as I try to stay balanced. The wind carries the scent of salt from the shore to my nose sending endorphins through my body. I pick up my paint brush and continue painting the palm trees when the blue sky turns back into a white wall. I shake it off and look around my bedroom. I glance over at my cluttered desk and find my to-do list:
- ◻️ eat breakfast
- ☑️ finish geometry
- ☑️ start speech outline
- ◻️ read pages 114-156 of Spanish
- ◻️ clean room...
I stop reading and close my eyes. I try to wonder off to the calming beach, but my to-do list takes up the full capacity of my overwhelmed brain. I couldn't even allow myself to read half of the list.
I pull out my phone as another form of distraction, only to find my entire group of friends taking pictures at Applebee's together. I start to lie down for a short rest when my mom walks towards my room. I can tell by the volume of her feet that she isn't happy. I attempt to drown out the strain in her voice, but I hear each word loud and clear. "Why can't you get anything done? I'm serious... I don't know what to do with you! What do I do with you?," she exclaims as an attempt to be helpful. The second she leaves I break down into tears. Only a few tears run slowly down my cheeks while my thoughts run a marathon. The laps around my brain start to hurt so bad that I hit my head with my fists; hoping for the negative thoughts to fly out my other ear.
Everything comes back to me one by one, but the image of his goofy smile pisses me off the most. I grab a match; it seems to be my only sense of control I have left over my life. My fingers shake as I tilt it towards my forearm. Tears stream down my face like competitive swimmers. "You never said it but I know you loved me," I thought. The more I thought the louder the words filled my head. They got so loud they began seeping out my mouth. "It was all on my head!," I exclaimed with relief. I had figured it all out. "It was all in my head... all in my head. How could it be so? You loved me so fiercely that I burned; now you'll be left with only the ashes of my existence." I was scared of being seen as selfish. I swear didn't want it all to end; but it was all in my head... all in my head!
