I keep having a variation on the same nightmare I had since I was a child.
Tonight it was about me visiting my mother’s cousin, except he lived in a house out in the country. For some reason he lived there with my sister and his own children. He put me in the worst room - something about it felt off. And then I felt all these vacant stares because none of them were who they said they were. And then the paralyzing fear hits me in my gut. None of them are who they seem to be. And I run as fast as I can outside. It’s broad daylight. I try to call a cab and I get through, but when I try to get out of the country estate I find it’s a maze with the same graffiti “LARCHMONT” scrawled on every wall like a slur or a gang sign. I can’t get out I can’t get out I can’t get out who are they who are they get me out of here where am i oh god
and then I wake up with my heart bursting from my chest
one, you’re like a dream come true
two, just wanna be with you
three, girl it’s plain to see, you’re the only one for me
he played this song as he held me in his arms and stroked my hair and face
how could a girl not melt
I wonder what it would be like to be loved, not used, by a significant other.
I wonder what it would be like to have my father back in my life.
I wonder if I can ever forgive my sister.
I wonder if I’ve distanced myself from my own mother.
I wonder if I’ll always be this alone.
I wonder if I’ll be able to manage the depression I’m hiding once I start working.
I wonder what it would feel like to not be fat, or better yet, be thin.
I wonder what it would feel like to be happy with myself, to live without this incredible sense of guilt, to know what it is to be confident, to find security in someone who I love and trust.
I can’t calm my mind down. So many thoughts and memories are ready to steal the sleep away from me as soon as I close my eyes. First I feel him on top of me in that moment when he took what was his. Then I hear his voice like it came through the phone two days ago, husky and deep. Then I see the flecks of gold in his dark brown eyes. Then I smell the scent of him, just him, the sweat and the skin. Then I taste him. And I just can’t seem to sleep because my senses are crying out for what’s not theirs. What can never be theirs. Who I love and have loved for six years. And the irrational voice in my head screams, you stupid, fat, ugly bitch, you never deserved him anyway, while the rational voice in my head resists, but it’s losing, and all I know anymore is “crazy” and “huge” and “ignorant” and “worthless.” Nothing my grades or salary or friends will tell me can really persuade me otherwise. Mind you, I’m constantly playing a game of distracting myself. Drinking, studying, web-browsing, whatever it takes to lose myself. But when I close my eyes, the entire system rebels against the will of my heart. My heart, my sad and broken heart, which was ironically the strongest part of me, loves him so much that it is willing to let him go even if my body and mind self-destruct.
Date the boy who makes significantly less money than me, who I like, but who has a kid by his ex?
Or be alone, nursing an old and diseased past relationship, dwelling in the past and being nothing in the present, but holding out for a better future?
