“I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare.”
When the long nights scare you, you sleep with hopes you can forget things. Yet, every day, you wake up feeling more tired than ever. You don’t really sleep. You wish you were.
These days even my mind is scaring me.
One late evening, I walked silently around the corridor. The top floor was always quieter this time around. Students mostly preferred to flock downstairs, hanging around at the library or loitering everywhere. No one was around. Most teachers were probably on their way home now.
Just me and the vacant top floor.
I reached the end of the corridor, outside the prefects’ meeting room. There were trees, their leaves dancing in the wind. Few houses. A quiet street. A bird was singing. Everything was in its place, quaint and proper in the golden sun. The soft evening breeze was blowing, its coolness soothed my tired face. Yet, as the silence drowned the voices below, my mind began to spiral elsewhere.
It was high. So high I remembered feeling giddy staring below. As my eyes looked down, the world seemed to spin and sway, my stomach felt uneasy and I felt as if the bottom road was pulling me closer. I pulled out my hand imagining the fall, my fingers trying to touch brittle grey stones.
“Would it hurt that much to take your own life?”
Then the image flashed, a girl who decided to take a leap of faith.
“She stands over the building, with her back to the open air on the edge of the side of the tall building. She closes her eyes and opens her arms like a bird. Then she falls backward and the thrill is surreal.”
For a brief second, I imagine she felt like floating in the air. Then she might begin to fall at great speed. As she neared the ground, time slowed to a crawl. In the seconds that she was free-falling, her entire life flashed through her mind’s eye. “Why are you doing this?”
Yes, Mar. Why are you even imagining this? A 13 year old girl once jumped from the first floor and her ankles cracked. The top floor? We are talking about cracked ribs and legs, spine injury and perhaps brain trauma.
Perhaps by then I wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. Perhaps then everyone can see beyond my smiles. Perhaps then they would stop treating me like dirt. Perhaps then someone might even care.
I remembered laughing awkwardly to myself back then. Health insurance won’t cover my foolishness. The school will get bad publicity. Dad will only be sad.
I took a deep breath and shook my head hard. Then I retreated a few steps away from the balcony as I calmed my furious heart. There was him up ahead, a figure I often gazed in secrecy but I couldn't even lift my head. My mind was still fuzzy.
I know I can’t make everyone happy, not even to my family. But sometimes, it’s just so sick to be so proper and in control at such a hefty price. At the cost of my sanity. This chest pain has been plaguing me for days. The unbearable silence lingers. Tears welled up one morning before they vanished into smiles so naturally. They never come out.
“You are so hard on yourself, Mar” I know. My entire life has been hard. But who isn’t?
I can never walk near the balcony again.
