She pushed her eyes close, but sleep would still deceive her. Allegations, and accusations, thrown to her hit her like burning arrows, cutting through her, making her all the more vulnerable, so much so, that she knew sleep would win, another battle. To put in other words, she would loose, yet again.
She wondered who started it off in the first place. And then why did she let out her deepest fears and secrets to them? Alcohol dashed with emotions is a dangerous thing, she’d learnt it long before, but probably forgotten the lesson.
God, let me sleep…Today….
I will deal with this tomorrow.
She’d faced her biggest fears today. Not even once did she let her eyes off the speakers who took their turns to tell her what and how things should be done. Tricky games, they played on and on, and each passing second, her past came haunting up to her, biting its teeth into her soft flesh, making her shed a tear here and there. They knew her no more than what she knew them , yet they had created something in their perceptions that was probably unlike her. She wished someone would stop, somewhere, surely, none of them would breach a level. But no, they did. What started off as a stupid sounding game, turned into a reality checkpoint show. She had failed someone, maybe repeatedly, and she dreaded to hear things about her, that were unfortunately true, yet, superficial. As she pulled herself close, she heard them arguing over her circumstances, present and past, and the irony was that she wasn’t a part of those discussions about her. ‘Did they know my part of the story, or they just pulled all the strings together on their own to make bow and flung burning arrows at her?’ Did she smile? She pulled up all her courage in the world, and though she tried hard to forget the night never did happen, somewhere, some words, stung her like a cobra’s bite, poisoning her entire self, her entire being, questioning her existence, and possibly her deeds.
Humans are a strange race. For I, am aware of what and where I lack, but I never prefer it to come to me by anyone else. Not in a night like this.
Someone said they wished to see me and him happy, forever, (though I doubt the integrity of the word ‘forever’, it more or less implies ‘fictitious’); yet the sincerity of the speaker drifted her mind away from the use of the chosen word. Someone else wished the same, but whether it was the alcohol or something else, that she possibly couldn’t understand fully, he wanted her to quit, quit something that could harm her, “No cigarettes ever, no nicotine in any form”. She wondered what made him say so. She wondered if she needed so many approvals to light a butt. To take a puff, deep, so deep that she would cough for the next half an hour. Well, she knew it was the most polite of their ways to say that, yet somewhere it hurt her. Someone mentioned her being way low than what had been expected, after they’d heard my stories. Stories. Like what? Her eyes searched for a pair that would have said ‘You are perfect, perfect in all ways’. No, this imaginary set of eyes didn’t exist. She smiled. Someone mentioned the hardships that lay in the front, taking care to view the situation from one angle, yet making statements on her. Stating, how hard life must have been to her. How long she’d been smiling, she knew not. Did she need that appreciation certificate?
Beds. I always change sides when sleep deceives me, thinking perhaps on one of the entourages, it will enter my eyes thinking I am someone else. And that side would be preferred the next night. And the next, till sleep gets my game, and then I would explore the bed yet again.
She felt the need to clarify her actions, and justify her steps, right or wrong. Why did she need the approval of others, she couldn’t really make out. Whether it was alcohol or was it her deep rooted hurt, she didn’t know, but when she heard that voice taking her name, in the most informal manner, stating that ‘I’d be forever around’; she blurted. As I said, the word, though fictitious, associates with itself having dreadful impacts, perhaps like this one. She said something he never liked hearing, just the way she didn’t like mentioning it. Something dark, something rave, yet something that was the reason of her being here. She went on, after he was done, and let out her story, the way it was to her. Scary, torturous, and uncertain, lost in the unknown, amongst the known. There was no need. She didn’t need to. Infact, she shouldn’t have let it out.
Justifications are a waste of time, and emotions. They call for unwanted bouts of self appraisal, and self reprimandations. Pity. I hadn’t still learnt her lessons. Perhaps, there were more chapters to be unfolded.
Just after she spat out, she felt naked. She wanted to escape, away, and her wounds drew fresh cuts. The stupid after remarks felt like salt, only making the pain much more unbearable. She wanted herself, with her, in the perfectly imperfect world of her own. She screamed she wanted to go, for she knew they wouldn’t let her, not at this hour of the night. The night was almost dead, and her fears had come to life yet again, mocking her from all possible corners, and the only way they could do it in a callous way was being with her, alone and vulnerable. ‘My fate is such, that my fears will rearrange the chemistry of the universe, so that I could be cut, bled, and stung’. She was home.
Switch side, I said to myself, tears didn’t scare me anymore, what scared me was something inside of me. I begged sleep to envelope me, and like everyone else, it had its conditions. ‘I will, enter your eyes through the sides’, it said, ‘but the centre of the canvas will be painted in the colors of the night’. Devious. I know.
