I stare down at the girl I once was. No I mean I am literally staring down at myself, lying flat on my back in the middle of the woods. My hair that I spent just hours before trying to make perfect is strewn about my face. Twigs and leaves are entwined in my brown curls…what did I do? I’m staring down at my body….how the hell did this happen?
My face is completely pale, practically light blue; no warmth is left in the cheeks. My blues eyes are staring blankly at the dark sky as if searching for hidden answers. This is a dream…it has to be, but why do I look so stiff, I couldn’t have fallen asleep more than 10 minutes ago. Mascara is smudged down to the top of my cheek bones; I look like a sad clown.
My lips have gloss smeared across them branching down to my chin and at the bottom of my nose. This isn’t a dream it’s a nightmare, all I have to do is wake up. I know right now I’m in my bed covered with my blankets…mammy would have come in by now to check on me like she always does. Pretending to be asleep in order to avoid her questions; I am simply caught in a very vivid, very realistic dream. I have to be dreaming…it’s the only thing that makes sense.
This is not me…this girl, this person she can simply not be me. My cheeks have never been that pale, my eyes never that dull. No this is not me…this is a girl who gave up to easily, a girl who didn’t stand a chance. I was a woman, no I am a woman…I have to be dreaming…I wouldn’t have let this happen…I would have fought back…but I did…and I couldn’t.
That’s when I feel like all of the air that was left in my body is suddenly sucked out with a vacuum. Panic is starting to set in; I know she is around here. Her face is the last one I saw…memories, details, colors they all flood into my non-existent memory. In order to have memories, you have to have thoughts and to have thoughts requires a brain and staring down at myself I know that my brain is no longer ticking. The body before me no longer has thoughts or memories…and it’s all her fault.
This is not how I pictured my night. This wasn’t supposed to happen. I’m not supposed to be here. Well than again I highly doubt anyone pictures their night ending up in a ditch miles from their home with bits of their clothing thrown about them. I knew walking home was a bad idea, for one I’m a scardey cat and for two it was almost one in the morning. I shouldn’t have walked home and I definitely shouldn’t have walked home alone…but I did.
I can hear a car coming down the road. I run out to see if I can stop it before it passes, to slow it down. Standing in the middle of the road I throw my hands up hoping the car will stop, hoping they can see me. Waiting for the screech of tires, for the car to swerve, or the jolt that you get right before you are about to fall in a dream to wake me out of this deep sleep. I closed my eyes and braced myself for the impact that I knew was going to follow.
They just pass right through. Of course they can’t see me I don’t exist anymore. I’m as visible as air; I have no sound, no smell. I’m the orb that shows up in the corner of your pictures, I’m the chill you get late at night.
Reality sets in….I am not dreaming.
How does this happen? Who decides who goes and who stays? I was a good person, am a good person? I’m not sure which tense to even use. Am, I still am a good person, floating object, ghost? Why am I standing here, floating? I don’t even know what I’m doing at the moment…but why can I see myself? Why am I sitting here staring at who I once was? Twenty years, twenty years it took to make that body, that being, what it was. Those years weren’t easy. Who decided to throw away all my hard work?
The sun is starting to come up. I can hear the birds start to chirp, I can see the leaves blowing in the wind. I wonder how long I will have to stay here, staring at what I once was. I couldn’t even tell you how long I have been standing here.
Dead. That’s what I am…dead, corpse, deceased, vacant, bereft of life, extinct, gonezo, perished, pushing up daises…how many more awful words and saying can I come up with to describe the state I am in? I’ll use my mom’s favorite…wasted. When I was little and pets would pass away that’s what she would call it, ‘well now that was a waste…now its space gone wasted’. Well mom, just want to let you know, whenever you are, that I am now wasted. The difference being you probably spent more time with whatever pet that had passed than me.
I thought I would be in ‘heaven’ by now, being cloaked in white and meeting old family members. I was cold when I left; I knew I should have brought a coat. Maybe if I had brought my coat this wouldn’t have happened. I was still a good five miles until I would reach my house. I should have just kept walking. I never should have taken the ride, but I did.
-WFAM
