hariasonet

[hariasonet]

four hundred and one.

I'm pacing the hallways with a guilt ridden heart. Waiting for a flash that never comes. One step turns into four thousand and one. The hallway was not enough to contain my doubt. The shadow creeping in slowly like poison oak after a prickle on a skin. 

The corridor was full of me. Or me from the past, you wouldn't recognize her by now. I was smiling, showing my missing teeth. Have I told you about that? What about the one where I got my spelling bee award in third grade? It was the word ‘malevolent’ that got me the gold. Now I can't even recognize the word when it spits on my face and calls me names. Funny how the world works, huh?

Or the one from five years ago, me in my dazzling dress looking pretty in pink. You said things about Peter Aoki who didn't deserve to bring me to Prom. You, with your thousand verses on how I deserve better. Deserve someone like you. But did you? Did I?

Oh! That one from my older sister's musical performance of cabaret. Our friend group was meeting up that day, didn't we? We’re just going out for four months at that point, just a shy manner of speaking and texting, we’re not brave enough to put a name on something so early. That’s what you said at least. Fransesca told me you looked at my sister too long. 

What else, what else. Oh, that’s us with the red cup glass from a party a few months ago. This one was where we confirmed it to our friends group about us, right? You, with your snapback and me trying to put on a smile. Act like us just happened a month back and not something you insist to hide for the past two years. 

This was my parents house, you never step foot here, yet your presence is still haunting like a bad dream. Four thousand and one and I'm in the kitchen. It was airy, with big windows and spices put neatly in the cabinet. My mother was always peculiar about people who walked to her special place. I never like cooking that much, but I have claimed it for myself. I had to. All my siblings have their thing; My older sister Sasha with her musical, my little sister Sylvia with her MIT scholarship. I have to have my own even if it's something inane like cooking. 

I'm already the forgettable middle child, at least Im known from something. At least when I get to college I can make a name of myself. At least I had you. Right?

Four thousand and one and I'm in my dad’s study. There was nothing familiar here. The thick book and maps stay still, collecting dust and problems for tomorrow. Is this what it felt like, stuck in time? The only one who went into the room was Sylvia, only to clean it out and walk away. She was the only one who was not tainted by the anguish. Is it what it feels like standing still while the world keeps spinning around? 

Four thousand and one and I'm in the dining room. The table was spotless, a speckle of dirt nowhere to be seen. THe one place my mother tried her best to improve, so people from outside looking in can see how beautiful our home is. How beautiful and empty, never to be used. A trophy to parade around and to fulfill your ego. Am I no more than your trophy? Or am I something less than that?

Four thousand and one and I'm still pacing, finding something to put my focus onto. But I have nothing, nothing more to see, nothing more to give. Even when you’re not there to consume my attention, I still have to give and give and give. To your overlying ghost of an ego, feed it till it is full of my torment and I am left nothing more than a husk of a person. 

Four thousand and one and still nothing. Nothing from you, or other people I care about. People who told me it's ‘us against the world’. The one i thought cannot leave me bereft and dry. THe one I hold dear when they shed their never ending tears or torment. Yet no one. In this big house there is no one but me and my distressed shadow.

“Why didn't we meet sooner?” I remember you said that one time, when we’re still giddy on life. 

I agree, I recall. Nodded like a marionette doll, with no thoughts in her head. 

Me  at that time had not yet been touched by reality. Still with her rose colored contact lenses and bad dye job. Looking life right in the eye and thinking everyday is a challenge she should overcome. And then there was you. You and your wallbreaking smile. One look and I'm wounded on the leg. One look and I willingly gave you all the key to my destruction.

And that's all you need. 

All those secretive smiles, illicit dates, and reserved hugs. All those caution steps, looking behind my back after every peck. All those wasted years just for you to wreck it the second you take hold on what you want. 

One flash and it all goes out of the window.

“Why didn't we meet sooner?” 

Three years ago I might foolishly agree. But me from now could only stare at nothing and pacing. And pacing and pacing and pacing. Walk around this house like a madman because this is the only thing I can do. 

The other possibility was arson and I cannot light anything on fire without burning myself first. 

So walking around it is. 

“Why didn't we meet sooner?” 

I ask the hollow wall, no longer holding my secret like it used to be. All of me was already wasted. Used by someone else for their own amusement. All the threads I hold dear, snip away in a blink of an eye. 

And you’re holding the scissor, grinning wildly. 

“Why didn't we meet sooner?” 

So you can annihilate me faster, put damage on my naive self even more? Bleed me dry and sold the blood bag for cheap? 

I was kind before I met you.

No, I was kind, I am kind. 

Where were you when I was kind? 

You were never there, weren't you? Not even a little bit. And now I have to be the one who bears the brunt and burns with it.

Four thousand and one and no one’s gonna come. Either to save me or to mock me even more. They all have enough of me, it seemed. Four thousand and one and this house was valuable, even more than me. But still no one’s come in through the door. Even when I am at the edge of destruction. 

Four thousand and one and blazing red. 

Four thousand and one and no more. 

#writing #creative writing #writer stuff #by me #writers on tumblr #based on prompt