Oddly, you want all of these things. With me. Not someone like me, but me, in all my clumsiness and imminent foolishness. And frankly, I wonder if you are right in the head. To find peace in what I am to you, to seek and add meaning to what we are to each other, and to find a meaning to what this thing between us is. And I wonder, as I always do, if I am right in the head. For watching you fall and trip and profess your heartfelt feelings, not refusing your overtures but instead encouraging every one of them and reciprocating just like you want. And I am unsure. Am I true in all I feel, or is what I feel a response to what you feel?

Except I miss you when you’re away and I miss you even more when you’re here but I’m not sure if you’re with me. I miss the way my heart does this little kick at your smile because you don’t smile at me, you don’t even talk to me as often anymore. And it hurts. A lot. You take the chances you get to be a menace, being all prickly, pushing off my arms when they wrap around you, pushing yourself away when I get the slightest bit close to you. And it’s stupid cos I feel really stupid about it. About how it makes my arms ache with emptiness. About how my chest hurts a little more than normal at the rejection. About how much it stings when I reach for you and you aren’t there. Or worse, you turn away from me.

It’s rational, not wanting to be out and all affectionate with me. But, do you ever consider how annoying it gets? When you replace affection with bullying? Swap out your hugs for unnecessary flicks on my forehead and the absurdest comments about nothing in particular? I wonder if you do not understand how irritating it gets when what and who you associate with being your calm and safe space turns to the one thing you despise the most. The noise in your head. The buzzing of a million flies that do not seem to want to go away. The hovering cloud of despair that takes away your sunshine and heaps more lightning on the boulders already on your shoulders.

And on nights like these that I struggle between picking accepting being the attention-starved person that I am and reaching out a hand to grasp yours in sleep and turning away, I hate myself a little bit for being attached to you. For getting even more attached to you by the day. For thinking I’m the daft one for wanting the tiny reassurance the feel of your skin on mine gives to me. Picking at my nails, I wonder why the tremors in my hand refuse to stop; why I can’t seem to prevent myself from being, once again, that idiot who needs to feel what it means to be me in the touch of another.

It’s weird to watch you get lost in your head and everything around you and be unable to help in any way. Except every time I reach out, I am rebuffed. Told, “It’s nothing.” “I don’t want to talk about it.” “I’m fine.” Over and over and… over. Knocks the breath out of me because what can I do if I do not know what it is I ought to do? If I am not needed in the ways I was needed before? If I do not matter the way I think I do? Except I’m probably being selfish. Or delusional. In my hopes that it’s all in my head. That you still love me, that you’re obsessed even. That you feed off being close the way I do. That you understand why it hurts the way it does every time you act as if I have got the plague, evading the reach of my grabby paws but not hesitating to be grabby and paw at me and then flit away as if you had touched a hot coal.

And, on mornings like these, when my chest burns a little bit hotter, I hope maybe you know how much I have bottled up inside me, and maybe you’d reach out instead to hold my hand in yours and get these tremors to stop.

Signed:

A🖤💜

I fear the day you turn your back on me because I stutter instead of coming clean about what I want to say to you. I fear you would leave when I am stuck flipping pages instead of writing to you. I am scared you would delete the voice messages I send because you cannot hear anything in the empty messages. I fear you wouldn’t understand what the empty messages mean. I refuse to think you wouldn’t hold the empty page to the light to see what my lemon-soaked ink has spelled out for you.

If the words can’t be written, can you crawl into my ear? Become the worm that reads the secrets of my heart, spread them open before your eyes, and tell me, in truth, if you understand, truly, how I feel and why these feelings prevent me from writing to you. Would you take a stethoscope to my chest and decode my message from the beat of my heart? Would you sit still and let the rhythm of my heartbeats be the words you seek to hear me speak? Would you hold my wrist, trace my pulse, and rewrite the letters on paper for me?

I do not trust myself to speak these words to you, but I trust you enough to hold my heart in your hands and listen to what it is I have been stuck trying to tell you. I believe you feel as I feel and wouldn’t find it surprising that these words weigh so heavy on my heart and conscience. You would be able to relate to why I spend hours staring at your reflection instead of directly at you whenever the words want to push their way out of my mouth. You wouldn’t judge my hesitance at letting you know why I refuse to let them fall at any moment in time.

My hands keep shaking at this moment because I am trying to offer up my heart to you, but I fear I cannot handle it as well as you would. The thrum of my heart is in the tremble of my hands as I try to show you the blood soaking the tips of my fingers, spreading into a pool underneath my feet, my ruined face staring back up at me from the crimson bath I wish to drag you in. Won’t you like to put me out of my misery? Hold your hands out to accept the bloody offering I have before you and tell me the words I do not know how to speak anymore.

Speak to me, from the depths of your heart, the words I have failed to speak to you. And maybe, just then, I would tell you what they are. Or not.

Signed:

A🖤💜

Today, I do not even know where I am or who I am or what I am. I feel nothing; I see nothing; I hear nothing; and I know nothing. It’s as if I have been cocooned in a shell, hidden away from myself, my memories, my thoughts, my mind, my life, and my entirety. It should hurt, the way this place is cramped. It should smell, the way this place is filled to the brim with things I can’t describe. It should be stifling, the way it feels like the walls are closing in around me. But I feel nothing. It feels like nothing. It smells like nothing. And that? That is disconcerting. How does something smell like nothing? How does it not have a distinct smell for me to at least put a name to where I am or what I have been shoved inside?

Am I dead? Am I dying? Am I caught in a dream? Do I have to close my eyes and wake up again?

I fear I am being weighed down by my sleep paralysis demon, and when I go to shove it off, I find I have no arms. No arms? No legs. Nothing south of the border either. I fear I am formless. But a conscience? How do I have a conscience when I am formless? Where? How? What in the name of all that is existing under these broken pieces of greenery is going on here?

I should feel fear. This is where fear usually sets in, my anxiety bursting at the seams, my breath coming in short bursts, my heartrate contesting for first place with conga beats. But nothing. I recognise what I should feel, but I do not know how to feel it. Neither do I have a way to express it. What is going on here? Anger ripples across the surface of my non-being, and it shakes my core. Yet, I have no way to explain that I feel this anger. This fear. This pain at once again, losing myself, my sense of self, my bearings, all because I have lost it all. My form, my essence, my person, me.

*********

Gasping for breath, I come awake again, hands tied above my head, my heart pumping frantically, everything in blues and yellows and greens and pinks. I do not understand what is going on again, and I look around in search of clues. Fear, hate, disgust, anger, pain, a hint of pleasure – everything comes washing over me, clueing me into what emotions are at play here. What exactly is happening eludes me, however, as I can feel my eyes ensconced behind a thick blindfold. The pain in my shoulders is bad enough to explain that I have been hanging here for two hours, at most.I hurt, but the most pressing thing is my need to pee. I crave the sweet release that comes with peeing as it seems I have been holding this in for over four hours and the unnecessary torture seems to have prolonged the wait, testing the limits of my bladder beyond normal. I hate being hung like this and I am pissed off at whomever these amateur kidnappers are to choose to leave me hanging in this state for a long time.

What, by Zechariah’s saggy balls, do they want with me? No, what did they want with the person I have booted out of their body? I really need this to be over so I can rest. Whether in the body that was originally mine or someone else’s. I need the rest. I hate how much emotions I have expended today and I need silence. Not the silence that comes from being numb and constricted in an empty place. I need the silence in my head, the silence occasionally punctured by the little puffs of air that flow into me through the ventilator attached to my host body. I need to go back. Find out why I keep skipping bodies. Why I keep ending up in the weirdest of places. Why I seem to have lost my rest.

But, till then, might as well see this through. And most likely not give them what they might be looking for.

Signed:

A🖤💜

For one, I have little words to explain exactly what and how I feel because I do not exactly understand what is going on with me. Do I try to distract myself in any way that I can? Yes and maybe. However, I am not sure my distraction efforts are as effective as I think they are supposed to be. And right now, the feel of my fingers pressing on 26 keys and more tickles a nice feeling in my head, welcoming me home. It is a feeling semblance to running my hands through water, weaving in and out of the flow, letting it slowly caress the back of my hands. Pressing on these keys feels like rewriting the rhythm of my heart, tuning my heartbeat in a way I have never heard before, the chords of Vivaldi’s Summer mixing with Lil Nas’ “Sun Goes Down.”

I wanna run away like Alice did. Bury myself in the world of soft keys depressing under my fingers. Malleable under my touch, bending to my every will, spilling out secrets I didn’t think my heart held. This is my heart’s safe space, a home I don’t remember abandoning, but missing as much as I require the next breath of air every time the panic pulls my head deeper into the water than I would allow usually. This is my heart’s song, flowing through the boards of this keyboard, spilling out of me in words and sentences and ink that refuses to leave my throat. I gurgle out a vomit of words, handing over myself into your hands, eyes and hearts, feel my pain at letting go the way I feel it. My writing is an escape into Alice’s wonderland and I do not know if you see the words swimming freely, the punctuation marks chasing after every sentence like the bills are due.

The bills ARE due and I have to continue, letting it spill with no proper direction in mind. Maybe, in this way, I can get rid of my hurt, blow away the ashes of my cremated journal, fill up your screens with more ink than you would think possible, fill you up with more of me than you ever thought you could receive.

My chest hurts; a pain so familiar, I miss it when it doesn’t hurt. This is my new form, and I am trying to accept that my evolution has just started. It cannot end here, I just have to follow it wherever it leads me.

Signed:

A🖤💜

Does it make me selfish to wish I was all up in your space at the moment? Getting in the way of whatever project you’ve chosen for the night, pestering you with questions I know nobody would love to find answers to, but their ridiculousness makes you laugh and flick my forehead out of concern for what rattles around inside the shell I call a skull. Is it fair if I wish you weren’t wherever you are currently? Do I get to wish for you over and over again? Am I allowed to? Would you come running if I called out to you? Would you listen out for my voice if I cry out for you?

See, I want you back here wimme.

Even if it’s in shared silence or in the noise that fills up the pauses we leave because we’re too caught up in each other to bother with anything else. I carry you with me everywhere I go. Your voice has slowly but surely replaced one of the voices I avoid listening to, the smell of you hits me out of nowhere, and I am stuck chasing a ghost. The absence of your touch irritates me beyond measure, so I end up wrapped in your clothes to make up for it. Would you understand the level of this obsession if I explained it to you? Would it convince you that living in my skin would be the best way to have you to myself now and forever? Would you accept my offer to burrow into your skin and stay there now and forever?

I miss you, you gremlin. Come back to me. Come be with me. Come stay wimme. Come convince me I really am not as alone as I think I am. Come push away the weird silence that is spreading inside me. Might not be healthy, but I need you once again like I do every time. To help repress the annoying blankness and sadness and darkness that fills me up like bad smoke. I fear once again that I am even closer to being harmful to myself than before. And you? You make it easier to breathe; you make it easier to convince myself that, “Hey, you really shouldn’t be thinking about killing yourself, yunno?”

I miss you, you loveable brat. Why in the name of Zechariah’s saggy jowls are you a million freakin’ miles away? What in the name of what makes you comfortable with being away from me for so long?

(It has only been a day and a half. They’ll be around today. I am just pissy.)

Signed,

A🖤💜

God, the smell of jollof shouldn’t be the first thing to send me into a frenzy this early in the year. If it had just been jollof, I wouldn’t be going this mad. But, no, their scent had subtle cinnamon undertones. How are cinnamon and jollof a good combination? Do they bake? Do they cook? Are they a caterer or a baker or both? How did they get to smell like chicken broth, fried plantain, jollof rice and cinnamon???? What is the colour of their eyes? What is the colour of their underwear?

Wait, what? God, how did that pop into my head? How am I supposed to finish revising for the test that is in less than two hours when all I can think of is an omega who I may not see for the rest of my stay in this ghastly school? “You may see them again,” that annoying voice in my head whispers. I may. I may not. I need to read. I should be reading, not thinking about how to get them in my arms so I can pinpoint the source of their actual pheromones. Not imagining laying them out on the table in front of me and dousing them in my scent so their scent doesn’t get out and wreak havoc on others. Not thinking about how I would find a way to get to them and affect them the way they have affected me.

Now, I wouldn’t be so psychotic as to think they could be my scent match; there is absolutely nothing about jollof or fried plantain that is in the make of my pheromones. But, the cinnamon? God, the cinnamon.

I really really need to focus now. Who even smells like jollof rice?

Signed,

A🖤💜

I bought a blade for the purpose of dramatic actualisation and when I realised I couldn’t do it, I shoved the unprotected blade in my bag pocket where my pods sit. It took less than a minute of mindless searching for the blade to wedge itself in my finger, making its home within the supple flesh made available to it, the former occupants escorted on an almost unending wave of fresh red.

It was nice. A needed feeling, transporting me to places unseen, unknown, unrecognised. Places sorely missed. You wouldn’t know of the white space in your head when joy and dopamine mixes, would ya? Where it feels like nothing, including yourself, can hurt you? Where everything is so silent and calm and you have no thoughts and you may be made a mess of and you wouldn’t hate it? Do you know where that is?

However, after the high comes a weird crash. It hurts, it’s loud and bright again and it stinks.

So, I relapsed. Took a year and some of tightly wielded control, imagined calmness and unprovoked happiness and drew a blade through the tightly coiled tension. There’s no joy in the fact that I was able to hold out for that long despite the persistent itch under my skin to get rid of myself. I tried, I persevered, I held out for a bit, thinking maybe I’ll be fine enough not to think about it. But, seasonal depression is a bumble-headed bimbo, a bunion you can’t ignore, try as you might. It hurts, then it doesn’t, it gets numb for a while then starts hurting again on a random morning. Manifesting itself in the noise and smells of humans, sweaty and horny and disgusting and loud and itchy and achy.

I have no lack for joy, but, I crave the pace of pain and terror. I have walked on the hot coals of despair and found myself burned beyond repair, still I seek the salvation that comes in the form of a river of red. And the high that drives me insane for less than a second? You should try it.

Methinks you may not douse me in the flames of your scorn and the stench of your judgement. So, leave me to hurt the one thing I have control over and pick back up the ashes into the ornamental jar held in places I wish not to reach again.

Signed:

A🖤💜

I stand across the street and watch as you walk further away from me, your body the only thing I see in the boisterous crowd that threatens to burst my eardrums and shatter my focus. I watch you go without saying goodbye for the first ever time. We never walked away from each other without saying our goodbyes. What happened to us? What happened to you? What happened to me?

Friday, the seventeenth, at the seventeenth hour…

I hold your hand for the last time you would allow me and bid myself not to cry at the loss of your warmth. I steel myself as the words fall from your mouth, pretending they didn’t hurt the way you were not hoping for them to hurt. Faking the smile I hope you think and believe is real. Pretending you didn’t just shatter my world with words we promised never to say to each other.

Friday, the seventeenth, at the seventeenth hour…

I become a poet once again and write to you with my tears. I dip my quill in the crashing waves of the salty lakes that cascade along the banks of the flesh you once bestowed with your love, kisses, affection and your delicate body. I hold a flame to the perfumed love notes you always left in my breast pocket and watch them mould to the ashes of the burnt logs in our shared fireplace, the smell on your hoodies being replaced by the scent of detergent and the petrol they are doused in, the pillow on your side colder than it has ever been.

Friday, the seventeenth, the seventeenth minute of the seventeenth hour…

I watch your body go up in flames, you finally becoming one with the flames and the earth as you had always wished. The one favour you asked for on the day you asked me to let go of your hands. And like a phoenix, I hope you might rise from the ashes again.

To love, hold, and have me again.

Signed:

A🖤💜

Every man has a purpose to fulfil, no? And not doing it will lead you into a well of emptiness and sadness, despair and depression, your immediate and eternal companions. No rhythm for you there.

My rhythm exists in watching. And waiting, plotting and planning in secret.

I watch people walk on in the streets, mapping the places their feet fall, looking out for the one who stumbles into the cleanly laid trap. They would never know it was there; they would never know they had been marked, but I would know. Cos, I see it. I see them. I set the trap, painstakingly covering it up with layers upon layers of wet concrete. I know they would come back to it, drawn like a moth to a flame, suspecting something wrong but not knowing what exactly is wrong. They would walk around the hole, feet a bit away from the mouth of it, never actually stepping inside, never paying full attention to what lies in front of them.

I wait in the shadows for them, happy they always come back to the pit, cheerfully plotting the next trap to lay and what to put in it for them. I watch you as you step onto it, let my mark seep onto your skin, and then brush it off as if it had never been there. I wait, in the shadows, day after day after DAY, for you to come back. And check for it. Wonder what must have caused the irregularity in the muddy floor, what could have been down the slope you thought was there.

YOU DON’T SHOW UP. I wait. YOU LEAVE ME WAITING. For you. I never wait. Or, maybe it’s a game? You seek to push me out of the shadows I have grown accustomed to and pull me into yours?

So, I seek you out. I find you.

And I’m HERE. WATCHING YOU.

I SEE YOU. I SEE HER. I SEE THEM. I SEE ALL OF THEM.

I hear your breathing when I walk down your hallways at night, excited at the thoughts of things I could do and no one would suspect it was me.

I SEE YOU.

Won’t you come play with me?

Signed:

A🖤💜

You watch the flames even more closely, a little step taken in direction of the heat, subconsciously seeking the warmth you lack on the inside and hoping it leaves you as properly toasted as a marshmallow.

When the flames scream your names, their popping and cracking and humming and thrumming a healthy fascination for the distended fragments of your mind and psyche, you have no other choice than to sit and listen to them, no? You watch and listen, connecting each pop to the hum that starts from deep inside your chest, the crackling matching the growling in your tummy, the humming and thrumming a steady staccato like the rhythm your heart beats at random.

You’re entranced, a little step taken in the direction of the flames, the drums in your mind beating out a tune only you hear and feel.

When the flames stream into your subconscious, their whirls and twirls a dizzying sensation disrupting and re-arranging your focus, you have no other choice than to let them get in deeper, no? You let the voices fill your head, your mind, your ears, your veins, until all that flows as your blood is their voices, loud and happy, gay, raised in song, bursting out sharply out of the recesses of their throats, matching the deep timbre that rattles around in your chest on a daily. You join them in song, raising your sonorous bass to the skies, embracing their tunes, racing to match the beat they sing to.

You’re enraptured, a little step taken further in the direction of the flames, this is beauty unmatched, a choir unbeaten, an orchestra of flames, of sounds, of rhythm, of joy, of pain, of ecstasy.

When the flames let you in, embracing you closer than you ever envisioned, lapping at your hair, your skin, your clothes like a dog eagerly welcoming its owner, you have no other choice than to submit to their loving, no? You let them bathe you in their fiery spit, burning off the bridges you tethered yourself to, erasing your tethers, releasing the tiny bonds you didn’t know were there. You are bathed in their essence, your essence melting on their tongues as they strip you of the last things holding you back from becoming one with the flames.

You’re finally where you want to be, right in the middle of the flames where nothing can touch you anymore.

And, in relief, you let it all go.

There’s finally a little time to die.

Signed:

A💜🖤

I need to understand why my body decided that it’s not going to be a team player this time around and that’s why it has been sending signs of the impending one week of doom. Certain other bodily functions I can control or postpone till whenever I can’t seem to ignore them because they’re pressing on the “PAY ATTENTION TO ME” button that I hide somewhere beneath the unshelved leaves of paper flitting around in my head. But, this trip down the Red River is a confusing phenomenon for me. I know a few people who are happy to be visited by the monthly week of testament of the absence of a coco felon. But, I!! Me!!!! Moi!!! I am absolutely annoyed at the fact that I shall spend the next week suffering for actively choosing not to put myself in harm’s way and surrender to the pull of the coco felons popularly and widely known as “baby fever.”

Curses!!

Hi. My name is Aubrey, and at times I could be a crass fellow and the other times, I am the sweet little demoness and distraction-addled Law student that somebody’s second son is absolutely and helplessly in love with. And I hate the fact that I might spend the next week battling stupid cramps alongside unending bouts of dizziness and untameable mood swings.

This week was a clusterfuck of sorts and I mean it in the unending silence, distorting and distracting bouts of anger and anxiety way. I always expect my week to go the same way as the former ones did. Work from Monday to Friday, 8am to 8pm (this is quite unexplainable), laundry on either Saturday or Sunday, sleep for a few hours between each day, and at most five books finished within the week, minimal stress within the week, even less food eaten, more water drunk, longer walks taken, more stairs climbed, more games played, less movies watched, more things hated and liked .

But, NOOO!!!!

I did go to the office all days this week by 08:00am, and got back to the house around 08:00pm, today included.

But!!!! BUT!!!!

While I didn’t do much this week cos my boss (who is also my uncle) wasn’t around, I was drained at the end of each day. My anger levels were combating with my anxiety levels for the most space in my brain, my body felt like it was literally collapsing on itself from the insides, and my head started hurting worse than it had in the past two months and God knows I started wishing for the stupid migraines that almost ruined my eyesight over the weird headaches that rendered me dizzy for a few moments then disappeared. I was forgetting things even more than usual, I was clumsier sleepier, hungrier, and then randomly, I had no appetite for anything. Not even water!!!! I did not drink more than three cups of water in two days. And I sat through five episodes of a series. 😭😭😭😭😭😭

The HORROR!!!!

Feeling weird at all these unnecessary and unexplainable signs, I decided to take a detour into the dark sides of my phone and check the one app that haunts me even on my darkest days!! The hated and beloved cycle-tracking app. Mind you, I don’t use any in particular. This one was attached to one of the apps on my phone, so, win? I dunno why I decided that yesterday was the day I was gonna check it. I dunno why I decided to let myself suffer the pain of clicking on the cycle-tracker. Because nobody sent me!!! NOBODY SENT ME!!! I did this to myself.

And there it was for my probing eyes to see this weekend marked in pink for this feared occurrence.🥲

DISCLAIMER!!!

I don’t hate having my periods, I hate the unending pain that comes with it. For five days!! No rest. I could go to sleep to avoid my life being snatched away through my lower belly to waking up with my life being snatched away through my lower back. How does that even relate??? How does it happen???

Now, I’m really curious…

WHY CAN’T I NATURALLY INDUCE OR NATURALLY DELAY MY PERIODS!?????

Unsigned!!!!!!

Hope, the slightest tilting of the universe as if in cognisance of your lacklustre efforts and devoted trials, causing your heart rate to triple in intensity and functionality, sending crossed signals through messed up wires and endlessly tangled cords of inevitable fate.

It shakes up your core, uprooting the oak you long have shoved into the soils of your spirit, breathing into you the breath of life anew. You feel different, air flows into your lungs cleaner and fresher than before, stars shine behind your closed eyelids, the empty night sky looking like a canvas for a fresh painting. You’re ecstatic, happy, full of heart and emotion, ready to take on the world by storm, a little piece of the puzzle being slotted in place.

But, you feel empty. The blazing star trail leaves an intense hunger in its wake, the stardust being mere droppings of birdseed disappearing into the cracks of a land ruined by erosion, the ache in your loins growing ever more painful, the air in your chest robbing you of essence the very second you exhale. The universe is tilted in your favor, but, you’re tired of staring between the same pair of ass cheeks over and over again.

Hope is exciting, but, when days shift and seasons overlap and nothing changes, you lose your glow. You’re hating the tiny flame that burned, wishing it never did glow with the promise of soaring and crackling. You despise the butterflies in your belly, churning wish upon wish into your wish jar, wishing they never did get a chance to flutter those colourful wings that pulled the rose glasses over your eyes.

You stand at the threshold of your house, eyes turned to the bleak sky, your heart slowly shattering into shards. You know it not yet, but the shattering to come hurts worse than the cracks being chipped off. You know it not yet, but, the hope in your chest and your heart and your loins is pain and fire, consuming you from within, sucking at your core, draining you of all your essence, of all you are and all you have.

You didn’t know, did you? The consequence of what you did? You have no idea what burns inside you, do you? You think it mere joy, happiness, a foreshadowing of good things to come.

Well, I’m happy at the fact that you’re not. You lost your joy, you’re losing your spark, it hurts to breathe, it hurts worse to speak. You feel it now, don’t you? The cracks in your joints? You hear it now, don’t you? The creak in the well-oiled machine that used to be your body. You know it now, don’t you? The steady approach of death, in search of your soul.

It’s too late, though. I had you where I wanted you. You fell right into it. You lost yourself in the mirage and came back a ghost, a shell, a cave with no depth, body curled into itself.

I’m happy. Cos I know you’re not.

And hope? You lost it.

You still have love, though. I love you, if only you would believe in it, in me, in my love for you, in us, in what we are and what we could be.

But, hope? You’ve lost it.

Signed:

A🖤💜

POV 1:

No one really ever tells you that the awakening of the master of the forest would cause such a loud ringing in your head, sending bolts upon bolts of pleasure and pain all around your body. I had waited for this day from the very moment the dreams started. It was always some sort of blurry scene, a hand reaching out to me from the darkness, a sense of peace settling upon me when I take hold of the hand and am lifted up into the abyss, and a sense of belonging, comfort, and home wrapping me in a warm embrace. It was always a beautiful feeling, something I wanted to keep wrapped to my chest. A little secret I held close to my heart. The source of comfort I reach out to and attempt to grab ahold of when silence and peace seem so far away. It became my own fairytale, my sole fantasy, the love story they tell you about in the books. I would imagine various scenarios that would end up in that hand wrapping mine in theirs, my whole body embraced in their warmth and the peace that follows. It was happy. I was happy. It made me happy.

I thought that the happiness would follow the awakening of the master. Well, it did. Kind of. And it evaporated a bit.

Let me explain. I belong to a family hardly picked in the line of sacrifices, and we do not expect to be chosen anytime the master awakens. We’re only chosen once in every century, and it has been three centuries since the master had last awoken. And every member who had been chosen as a sacrifice never came back to tell us what had happened, nor did they mention anything leading up to their choosing. They only wrote a manual for what to do following a choosing and how to handle any queasy feelings that might follow the master’s awakening.

Then, nothing.

At all.

I had no one to ask about the dreams I had been having for the past two years, and I kept them to myself instead. Let it not be heard that the one thing I find restful solace in is taken from me and dissected before the whole family. Mother might even disregard it as childish fancies and would bring the discussion to an end. The dreams started the day I went up in the attic to clear out space for a guest and found an old book with chicken scratching inside. Whoever it was that had the book must have been their tutor’s favourite due to their illegible writing and disjointed paragraphs. I hid the book under my apron and set to cleaning the attic in haste so I could hurry to my room and decode what lay in the book in peace to satisfy my burning curiosity.

The diary apparently belonged to the last chosen sacrifice before me, who had also experienced these dreams that I currently have. They wrote about how many times they woke up in the middle of the night, tears filling their eyes, their body shivering and teeth chattering as they felt the pain their Master felt before their awakening. They spoke of the jealousy that burnt through them every time they felt their Master undergo any sexual relations with anyone, and how they wished their Master burnt for letting them experience that. The night their Master awoke, they were prepared for it, for they had sensed it a few days before. They had prepared the garment they would wear to welcome their Master at the threshold of his abode; they said their final goodbyes to their family members and friends and people who they had gotten close to before their choosing. They spoke of their excitement, fear, and grievances. They almost mourned a world they wouldn’t be part of anymore, but, in the end, they were fully prepared to meet their fate and be their Master’s sacrifice.

I felt invigorated at their hope and patiently bid my time till my Master’s restlessness woke me up. I journeyed with my Master through their trip down here and listened to the winds weave in and out of their ears. I felt their frustration at what was slipping through their fingers, the countless stumbles they suffered as they found their way to their temple, and the happiness that sang in their body as they were welcomed by the earth. I didn’t wait for their full awakening before I swaddled myself up, my goodbye note already placed in the bowl at the entrance to the family hut, the one thing the gods allowed us to pick as our guardian stone clutched in my hands, my heart about to beat out of my chest as I made my way down to the records keeper’s house.

Except, tell me why MY Master’s awakening would require two sacrifices? TWO! Wouldn’t I be sufficient for them?

POV II:

I hate, with all my heart, humans, their tiny crushable selves, their flimsy lifespan, how easy their hearts break, how easy they hurt, and how disposable they are. The things I hate about them make up most of what I like about them.

Day and night, I sit at my desk and let my thoughts fly, let them dig deep underneath the surface and give life to the hatred that is always simmering in my guts, the dislike that fuels the blood in my body, and the ire that pumps my heart. Many a time, I wonder if my heart ever truly beats because I never feel her thump against my palm the way she does whenever I am descended into the abyss and bloody basement where I keep the worst of the worst. I revel in the screams and tears and smell of their fear, my blood singing, my heart pumping faster, my eyes brighter as I imagine the things I would do to them. The cuts I would make on their bodies, the bones I would break, the teeth I would force out of their mouths, the blood that would coat my floors. I dislike a messy death scene, but many people deserve to be made to suffer slowly and watch their essence drip out of their bodies and coagulate on the floor beneath them as they whine, whimper, and plead for mercy that isn’t forthcoming.

I worked myself into a frenzy almost every night with my blood dreams and their satisfactory effect until the day they suddenly became replaced by dreams of warmth, comfort, happiness, and the worst emotion of all, love. Why? What might I have ingested to ruin my nightly routine? I paid it no mind the first few weeks it started happening, for the dreams were not as common as I thought they would be, and I could still summon my bloodlust from whatever cave it had been driven into. This was my new normal until it got worse.

WHO IN THEIR RIGHT MIND REACHES A HAND DOWN INTO THE ABYSS?

These dreams became more frequent, their intensity scarier than it was at the beginning, and they were driving me madder than anything that had ever driven me mad. I sought help in the medicines I had hidden away from myself when I saw I was beginning to depend on them too much. I sought their aid in bringing back my thirst for bloodshed, my bloodlust, and my excitement at shedding the blood of others, and they refused to work. Instead, they gave me hallucinations of flowers, sunshine, and rainbows. I stopped sleeping. I stopped thinking and started doing things to take my mind off the foreign emotions that were invading my body. I worked myself to the bone, creating new spells and crafting new crystals, avoiding sleep for as long as I could. I buried myself from the waist down in the sand to avoid sleeping; I did everything possible to prevent my eyes from closing and having me dream of things no person should ever be subjected to.

Comfort? Not for a working man? Love? Not for an abandoned child? Happiness? Not for the hitman that I was. I hated what these dreams were turning me into. I hated the spells of happiness I was forced to enjoy against my will. I struggled with sleeplessness and the hatred I began to develop as a result of these disgusting dreams.

Until, against my will, I fell asleep and was thrown smack dab into one of those hateful dreams. I struggled for a while before dragging my unwilling self out of the horrendous dream, a scream bursting out of my mouth. I had worn my favourite night garments to bed, and they got stained by the blood that was seeping from all parts of my body as I stabbed and scratched and tore into my skin in a bid to get the hateful feelings out of me.

For the sake of privacy, I threw a random red shawl over my head and headed to the records keeper’s place for some sort of potion that would put me out of the misery I had found myself in and found myself facing another thing swaddled in a red garment.

Huh? Is some kind of sacrifice going on down here?

Signed:

A

P.S. For those of us who have read The Awakening, this is the part that was supposed to be before it. But, whatever, enjoy. And do not judge my little murderer. They’re such a sweet baby, and they’ll feel sad if you judge them even if you do not say it out loud. Muah.

But it doesn’t come.

What greets your ears instead are the sobs they try to keep in, the hitch in their breath, the hiccups, and the sniffling attached to their tears. Bothered by the unhappy air, you bolt up from your seat and rush to hold them in your arms, calming and shushing them as you lead them to the couch you were reclining on before they came in. You hold them by the hand and let them fold into you as they sob their heart out, clenching the neck of your shirt in their hands, threatening to rip it off with how strong their grip is. You make to get up and get them a cup of hot chocolate to reduce the shaking in their body. But, as you shift them off your laps, their cries start afresh, and they cling onto you even tighter, scared of letting go. You hold them even tighter now, feeding your warmth to them, mind running around in circles trying to figure out what or who might have caused them pain.

The intensity of their tears scares you, a feeling you try not to show as you rub circles on their back, softly whispering in their ears of things they love and things you love about them. You whisper in their ears the stories they love listening to you tell, the stories that bring them peace and lull them to sleep every time you retell them. You talk to them about the beauty that they are and the awe that strikes you whenever you gaze upon their face beside you in the mornings. You tell them about how lucky you are to have them, how lucky you are that they agreed to be yours, and how lucky you are to hold them and share many of their memories with them. You tell them how beautiful they make everything seem just by being near you and being with you. You tell them of how anxious you are when you do not get to touch them or see them or talk to them in a day. You recount all the special memories the two of you have created together and how they each hold special places in your heart. You tell those funny anecdotes and the funny inside jokes you have both crafted over the years. You talk to them about how them being at peace makes you happy. You talk to them about how their happiness fills you up with even more happiness. You talk to them about how much you love their little finger paints, their little crafts, the little things they put around the house, the colours they have brought to your life, and the joy they have walked you through. You eulogise the beauty of their soul and tell them of your wish to forever enclose them in a glass frame and mount them in a room reserved for your eyes only.

You tell them of how hard it is to hold yourself back from biting into their supple skin every morning when their flesh is revealed to you. You tell them of how unworthy you feel of them and how your worth is determined by the amount of attention they pay to you daily. You tell them of how sweet their blood tastes every time they tilt their neck to be fed from. You tell them of their sweet submission and how it sends a thrum all over you and makes you want to bite into their beautiful skin and leave marks and bruises and hickeys that wouldn’t fade before they are once again replaced.

You whisper into their ears how easily their eyes can be your undoing. You tell them of the intensity in their gaze when they set it upon you as if they are itching to unravel you, how easily you lose yourself when looking into their eyes, how much time you wish you could spend looking into their eyes without their glasses obstructing it, and how you so wish you could make a sculpture that so captures the twinkle in their eyes, the exact shade of their eyes, and the reflection of the light in their eyes. You tell them about how much time you spend fantasising about their eyes staring up at you from underneath you and staring down at you from above you. You talk to them about how you wish you could have their eyes boring down into yours every hour of the day.

You trace the shell of their ear and confess how much you enjoy watching their ears flare up in vexation whenever you successfully rage-bait them. You confess to intentionally poking them just to have them scream at you due to frustration. You confess how much you dislike their silence when they get angry and how contrite that makes you feel; how much it hurts for them to turn away from you and how crazed you get when you can’t seem to make them accept your apology.

You breathe into their ears how much you love them and rest your head on their shoulders, happy you got to tell them everything you always wanted to tell them before you die.

Their name is the last thing on your lips as your breath fades away and your body crumbles into ashes.

Signed:

A🖤💜

Song: Ma Meilleure Ennemie

The power they had spent half of their life refusing to embrace coursed through their veins, filling them up in a way they had never been filled up before, granting them the heightened senses they refused to take advantage of, electrifying the littlest node of their body, their hair raising as if in salute, an orgasmic shudder passing through their body as their strength returned, doubling in intensity, and the world dawned anew before them. Brighter colours burst forth behind their closed lids, the smell of the damp and rotten earth became the sweetest smelling oud, the noisiest bird sang the sweetest melody, the raucous caws of the crows became the calmest orchestrated melody they ever did hear, and a fresh hunger burst forth inside them. They were filled, yet hungry. Hungry for the taste of the fruit of the earth, hungry for the promises whispered into their ears by the voice they finally set free, hungry for the feel of sweet and warm blood caressing the inside of their mouth, duelling with their taste buds and slowly finding its way down into their stomach, hungry for the first taste of the sacrifice they would receive due to their awakening, they were hungry. They hungered in a way they had never hungered before. They craved in a way that seemed foreign to them and almost evoked fear in them.

Their hunger kept growing as the seconds ticked by. They had no idea what they were waiting for, but they knew they had to wait. They were kept in stasis by that knowledge and let the clean air of the forest cascade over them, keeping their hunger at bay. The voice they always refused to listen to was loudly hammering and chattering happily in their ear, speaking of how much they had missed having a body and how long it had been since they were free in the one place they belonged. They felt fulfilled, new, a fresh being, hungry still.

**********************************************************************************************************

The records keeper didn’t have to hear the shift in the direction of the wind or the raucous to know that the forest had finally chosen its first master in centuries. He knew, just like every records keeper before him had known, that they had been awakened; their spirit had finally led their host back to where they belonged and mixed their essence with the blood of their host and brought them directly to the heart of the forest where their merging happened. The records keeper knew of the type of hunger that would befall them and went outside to ring the summoning bell. He was a few steps away from the bell when a figure swaddled in the blood-red garment they would lose at the entrance to the forest appeared before him, confirming his suspicions that the awakening of the master sent a message to the would-be sacrifice and they would go of their own accord to the forest. Every person in the town had been prepared for this very moment for as long as possible; children were lulled to bed with the tales of the master’s awakening and the choosing of the master’s sacrifice, and every young adult was taught the honour and pride that came with being the one the master’s bloodline chooses as their first sacrifice. No one knew what happened when the sacrifices entered the forest, but it was enough that they were considered worthy enough to be chosen.

The figure in the garment had their face covered; as per tradition, their identity would be found out by morning, and their family would be made to go through the ceremonial rites as prescribed. The records keeper’s heart was full to bursting at the reinstatement of their town’s position as the custodians of the Master’s sacrifices and was about to mention this to the figure before him when another figure swaddled in a red-tinged garment appeared by his right side.

Two sacrifices? Unheard of.

Signed:

A🖤💜

Hiii. And welcome to Pride Month. It’s gonna be a long month.

In another world, maybe, I’m you and you’re me and we’re very much in love again. You tell me what you feel, what I make you feel, how I make you feel, what I do to you, what you want to do to me, the thoughts and images I put in your head, the thoughts and images you want to put in my head, the feelings you want to evoke in me, the strangeness you feel when I’m not by your side, the emptiness you feel when I ‘abandon’ you, the urgent need to always be in my arms, the unending desire to have me hold you, to hold me in return, to whisper words and wishes that would make Sister Theresa blush, clutch her pearls and request for a deliverance of your soul if she hears them. I tell you, in return, what you mean to me, what I want to mean to you, how much I hold you dear, how you feel like home to me, how I love being in your arms and being yours, how much being yours excites me, how little you have to do to reassure me and how staunch I am in my belief that you are mine as I am yours.

In another world, maybe, you’re a character in my book I can’t stop thinking about. I wrote you; yet, your story is unwilling to end. I am unable to find an appropriate end to you. I am unwilling to destroy you as I would every other character that seems to evoke such feelings in me. I find myself writing and rewriting your story, re-assessing your emotions and feelings, reading your lines as if they were spoken to me in person, doing every little thing I hear your voice read out to me, submitting to every whim of yours because you just won’t leave my head peacefully.

In another world, maybe, our paths never cross throughout our lifetime. We never meet, we never start talking, we never come across each other, we never come in contact with the people that would warrant a connection between us both, we never find ourselves in the same places at the same time, we never know what each other sounds or smells like, we are never aware of the other’s existence. But, like star- crossed lovers, we die on the same day; the thread tying our souls together snapping as it grew thinner due to distance, sending one final thrum of pain to each of us, our hearts forcefully stopping due to the unending pain. We die and find ourselves buried beside each other, our ghostly souls reconnecting, re-igniting the flame burned out by distance, subjecting our reincarnations to a lifetime of pain if they do not find each other.

In another world, maybe, we’re two books standing side-by-side on a BookTok girlie’s shelf. She finds us the best accompaniment to each other as we’re the start and end of a series, we’re a limited edition, not available to anyone else and where one goes, the other appears. Our first and last sentences bleed into each other, our story is completed, but seems not to have an end, and there are new sentences and chapters in us each day.

In another world, maybe, we’re characters in Mercy’s favourite manga. Our love story is reflected in each panel detailing who and what we were before meeting each other, when we met each other and after we met each other. Each panel is an expression of what we mean to each other in images, our ups and downs as a couple finding their way to each other artfully depicted, our every emotion reflected on her screen, lighting up her face and filling up her thoughts every second, our intense passion causing her to blush and giggle for no reason.

In another world, maybe, we’re two cats curled up by the window, soaking up the sun light streaming in, our heads buried in each other’s fur, tails swinging happily, bellies full and hearts even fuller.

In another world, maybe, we’re Solomon and his lover, passing letters through the cracks in the walls of his palace and setting standards as high as the peak of your breasts for lovers.

In another world, maybe, we’re two trees with our branches interwoven, tired of living miserable human lives and infusing our spirits into two seeds growing side by side, refusing to leave each other’s embrace as we grow, taking of each other’s essence and feeding each other each other’s essence in return, our lifelong embrace creating a shadow for other lovers to be themselves without fear of judgment, the wind sailing through our leaves whispering into their ears our love story and the different lifetimes we’ve lived being with and being apart from each other.

In another world, maybe, we’re petals of a chrysanthemum, our separate sides coming together to make the whole flower.

Signed:

A🖤💜

16/02/2025

It’s my 19th birthday today and 19 years in this miserable town has me wishing for more places to be, more things to do, more chances to take, more opportunities to seize, more doors to kick open, more books to read, more people to meet, more jobs to get done, one person to love. For someone who has never had a reason to celebrate their birthday, I have mixed feelings as to this one. I have felt excitement from the first day of February till this moment and I fear my unending depression would ruin the day for me. I have imagined a million different ways today could go, a million different messages I’ll get or not get, a million emotions I’ll feel or not feel, a million more things I would do or not do. I have overthought all of these and I still am not prepared for what today would bring.

I have sought ways to end my sorry existence before this day for many reasons unknown and for the sake of the plot. There was hatred, pain, disgust, shame, fear, disillusionment, disappointment and disgrace abiding within this empty shell and that felt like enough reason to do that. The plot, however, was unclear and every method to end the story proved abortive. The knives didn’t cut deep enough, the ropes didn’t pull tight enough, the flames didn’t burn hot enough, the scars didn’t sear deep enough. Nothing worked. The plot kept thickening. The shame kept growing, the fear kept doubling, the anger and terror and annoyance and emotions tripled and quadrupled, breeding hate for the person in the mirror.

I found myself disgusted at the person staring back at me from the mirror, their eyes not quite in tandem, their nose a little bit off the right path, their lips a little bigger than their face, beaver teeth that could cut glass if they tried, a body much too skew-whiff and quite unfit for their age.

Now I wonder, why did I hate them so much? Why did I have issues looking into their eyes and accepting them, imperfections and all? Why was I bad to them? Why was I hard on them? What had they done to warrant that hate? Why do I hate them?

But, that’s water under the bridge, isn’t it?

I’m still quite a lot of sad and tired. And bitter. There’s a lot of bitterness that makes it seem I am becoming one of those adults who are sad and tired all the time. But, I’m just 19 fgs. Is sadness supposed to be my default mood? Why do I keep being bitter? Why am I still lost in this hazy labyrinth of confusion and melancholy? My melancholic temperament seems to be deepening and messing with me more often than not nowadays. Why am I aging so fast? What about aging has me all kinds of messed up?

Sadness aside, I fell in love at some point.😹

Funny you would hear that from me considering how many times I have protested against the idea. But, I walked the whole nine miles and fell in love. I jumped on the chance to see myself through another’s eyes and I must admit, the experience was surreal. A whole different person is who they showed me. I saw someone different from the monster I thought was in me. I saw someone happy, someone who was ready to take on anything, someone who believed there might be a little bit of good in everything and everybody. I found someone who believed in unearthing what was beneath the surface and bringing it to light. We sat together and worked through the little pieces of trauma and blockages that was preventing them from being and feeling and seeing and living and I pleaded with them to live this through. For me. At least. If they weren’t ready to go through it, they could let me be a teenager for once. And they did. I did teenager things. I cried teenager tears, laughed teenager laughs, partied the teenager way and lived a little off the edge.

I never seem to stick to the plot.😹😭

But, bear with me?

It’s my birthday. The world should freeze and only move at the end of the day. I need the attention that today bestows upon me before I go back to reading for the exams that seem like they refuse to leave my life alone. I oddly want to be noticed today, I want people I consider close to me to actually remember that it is my birthday today and for them not to forget that I exist and maybe wish me this time around? I want the long messages, the sweet texts, the weird yet endearing things that show you actually remember. I crave the indulgence of being excluded from everything because you know, it’s my birthday?

On the other hand, I don’t want anyone to remember or notice because I unfortunately do not know how to deal with the attention and scrutiny. I have too much anxiety to go through this and it makes my little heart quake so much to know that you still think of me even though I try to hide away from you and from myself. I don’t want to be reminded of the sorry existence I have carved for myself. I don’t want to be reminded of how old I suddenly have become. (In two years, I would be legally bound by whatever contracts I enter.😭😭)

But, whatever happens today… I hope you’ll keep open the space in your arms for me again and let me hide away from everyone as I try to gather myself and the little vulnerable parts of me exposed to the public and mould them back to their former position.

With love,

A🖤💜

I thought at this point, I’d be a happy cookie, smiling at your thoughtful texts, laughing at the inside jokes we never seem to get enough of, looking forward to the next time we get to steal away from everyone and spend time together. I always went to bed thinking and wishing for enough time in your arms, more time every day because of how much being away from you messed with me. I had wished this would be a smooth sailing time for us, me holding onto you for no other reason than to feel your warmth, me reading out jokes you would never consider funny just to creep you out, me being an extra character in your world, providing the needed white noise to block out the outside world till you have had enough, seeking you out, trying to be what/who you need when you do…

But, hey, I let myself get too delusional for a moment there, didn’t I? I was caught up dreaming up a world I don’t deserve to live in, a world not meant for a messed up and twisted degenerate like me. I was wishing for a happiness I don’t think I’ll ever have. Taking scenes from my favourite books and warping them into my reality, living in each daydream as if they were a foreshadowing of what is to come for me. Bending over backwards to delude myself into believing I had everything I ever needed at the moment I had you. Deluding myself into believing I could hold a perfect thing in my hand and not demolish it like the klutz that I am.

Now, here I am, dropped harshly into reality, each event more jarring than my unprepared mind envisioned. I’m left fielding questions from everyone, “what did you do?” “What did you do wrong?” “Why did you ruin it?” “What mistakes did you make?” “Why?” “What happened?” “What did YOU do?”

I feel the judgment in their stares, the unwanted pity, the unhidden anger and disgust at what I might have done to warrant such, the resigned sighs as if they had already expected me to mess things up way long before everything came to a head. I hear the words they refuse to say to avoid “hurting” my feelings, the words they bite under their tongues as they exercise control not to have me unleash the mad man I keep hidden. I feel unmeasured fear at having to explain how much I hurt to avoid being labelled as an attention-seeker. I refuse to keep discussing how I feel to avoid the, “you’re still hung up on this?” stares and sighs. I hate to tell anyone how I’ve felt everyday since then and how much hurt I keep bottled up in me, waiting for the best time for it to take over everything and explode.

My head rings with the amount of blame apportioned on me and I turn the questions to myself.

What did I do wrong? What did I not do? I know I was not it, but did I not try to be it? Was I too much? Was I too less? What did I do wrong? How did I get it wrong? What errors did I make? What was my main mistake? Was I too self-absorbed? Did I not care enough? Did I care too much? Did I do too much? Was I just not who was meant to be yours?

The voices in my head annoy me, they blame me for everything, looking over everything I tried to do right and failed at. They run every scene, every word, everywhere I could have been better, everything I could have done better. They take all insecurities and throw it at my face, drowning me in the guilt of my errors, drawing me deeper into despair and messing with every bit of progress I try to make. They hate me so much I find myself apologising for everything and anything. I am ridden by so much guilt, I keep seeking ways to absolve myself of this and feel like me again. I hate how lost I am, I want to find my way to the person I was with you but I don’t know who that is anymore.

Some faker , maybe? A happier me, was it? A delusional idiot? An obsessed dundee? I need to know who that person was again. Their positivity, their happiness, their newness, their freshness, their everything.

Who were they? Where have they gone now?

Signed:

A🖤💜

Do you hear the countless voices in your head every hour of the day? Do you feel tormented by hearing their torment? Does their pained howls breed up a fear in you? Do you hate when they speak to you, screeching and screaming and shouting, their voices echoing and blending into each other?

Don’t their voices remind you of nails on a chalkboard, raising goosebumps all over your body? Do you feel the urge to scream when they start over with their whining and moaning and screaming, messing with your mind, driving you more crazy than you already are, messing with the little piece of normalcy you have gathered? Don’t you ache to bury a knife deep in your gut to get rid of the noises in your head and finally go silent? Don’t they make you ache to punch the man in the mirror staring at you? Don’t they make you wish to get rid of the empty shell you are?

Don’t they whisper the words you refuse to accept to you? The memories, the terror, the fear, the images, the mistakes, the screams, do they bring it to the forefront of your mind every minute? Don’t they leave you wondering who is in control of your mind? Who let them in? What let them in? Why are your demons meaner than you? Why do they keep tormenting me? What is this torture?

Please stop, you’re scaring me. I can’t handle this awful energy.

You can’t wake up, this is not a dream.

They keep whispering and screeching, the agitation in their voices cutting and slicing along your nerves, leaving you exposed to excessive tongue whipping and more screams. Their satisfaction in seeing you cower in fear plays over and over in your mind. You see the faces they make when they realise how deep the well of terror they’ve dug in you is.

They keep you paralysed in your dreams, holding you down and making you watch them run and run and run on and on as they dance and laugh in ignorance of what is to befall them. Then the inevitable happens as it does every time. You watch them die again, over and over and over and over again. You hear their shouts, you see how pain scrunched up their faces as they were doused in the bright pool of death. The pool expands, stretching its hands towards you, aiming for a grasp at your throat, intent on drowning you in the proof of your failure.

They refuse to let you go, their hands dragging you into the deepest darkest pit of despair and terror. They take no cognisance of your screams as it makes no sense to them. They delight in it even. They keep pulling and dragging, cackling as you seem to stumble under the weight of the shame, guilt and pain. But, to complement your torture, they let you go as soon as you lose your will to fight.

And you wake up to your sad reality again. Another day to struggle with the loud noises in your mind. Another day to try to survive the hammering headache and pounding by at the back of your mind.

These voices won’t leave me alone.

But, it’s okay, isn’t it? I deserve this. It’s all my fault. I didn’t watch them. I should be punished more. I deserve a worse punishment than I am getting. This is pitiful enough. It’s all my fault. I caused it. I let it all happen. I watched as it happen. I didn’t do anything to help. And… they’re right, you know? I should die. I deserve the same fate as them. I shouldn’t be forgiven.

Signed:

A🖤💜

That I adore you. That I appreciate you and I’m eternally grateful for you. That I’m in every way caught up in whatever web it is you might have sprung. That everything about you endears you to me. That you’re my favourite person. That you’re the best of the best. That I am yours in every way you’ll have me. That you’re the highlight of my day, the brightest star I see on nights the stars come out to play.

But, sometimes I don’t know how to show it…

So, I write words to you. I hold your hands as tight as possible every chance I get. I hold tightly to you as if the waves from my heart would connect to yours and flood you with knowledge of how happy being yours makes me, how much safer I feel with you, how much I wish never to have to let go of you. I dig around in your pockets, holding tightly so you don’t slip away and leave my hands empty. Hold you, kiss you, hug you as if you’re the only thing I need to survive, my lifeline. Give you words spilling from a pen made out of the bleeding rhythms of my heart. I immortalise everything I can’t show and attempt to say it. Every time it feels hard to say it, I only need to have my skin touching yours, holding onto you makes the words easier and out pours the unfiltered and undiluted pieces of me you always want.

But, somewhere at the back of your mind. I hope that you know that I love every single moment with you.🤗

Of al the songs in Fireboy’s #adedamola, ‘back ‘n’ forth’ is my favourite. The chorus of the song resonates with something within me, brings to mind every moment we’ve shared together. Every laugh, every look, every wink, every smile, every touch, every little kiss, every bit of everything and it makes me wish for more. More time with you. More time around you. More time being your pretty little thing. More time with you making fun of my poor comedy career. More time to share every exciting news and whatnot with you. More time every time.😹😹

You tell me I’m like the moon, and I think of you as my star.

You encompass me in the warmth of your light, surround me with your scent, hold me to you like something you’ll never let go of, being with me every step of the way and through everything. Every flaw makes me shine, but being with you makes me shine more. I’m the happiest, the tamest, the wildest, the best of me, the happiest, the smiliest, the naughtiest of me wherever I’m with you.

So take my hands, my darling and be with your lover.

For the moon gets lonely without her favourite star.

Signed,

A🖤💜