So. This is an interesting concept, isn't it? I decided that I needed to be less of a push over and more fierce. Woo. Me, right? Fierce. Who saw that coming? Ah well. There are a lot of things that need to be changed. I am so different than what I was so long ago, I see the world in a shiny light that's almost like the chaotic shimmering of a veil about to be broken. I find myself wondering "where am I going" and I can't find an answer. I step carefully, I do my job without complaint and I work hard. And, for what I do, I give up a piece of my soul every damn time. And I'm beginning to run out of pieces to sell. They told me once, when I started there "You're selling your soul," and I believed them. I sold my soul for the bane of all existence - money. And where I  am now? That's not a miracle. It's a bail out. It was my sister trying to force me to smile, to break me from a misery in which I couldn't control. I was spiraling, you see? Completely free of restraint and kindness into a pit that would have broken every bone in me to climb out of. And I didn't see it then. I worked so hard to be free of my parents, of Ezra, of everything that was holding me down...

And yet it was me the whole time.

"You can't do this. You're JUST you." It was a simple concept, one that I swallowed at every moment and accepted. And now, as I listen to the inner voices that tell me to change, to be stronger, to be more friendly, to not leave myself so open to attacks... I feel like I have a mission. I want to help someone. I want to be, for the first time in my life, someone's hero. I want someone that won't be afraid to stare at me and say "I love you for that person you are inside." As cold and dark as I can be inside there is still a beating place within my soul that tells me that I want to feel alive. It tells me that I want to feel that way I did back then.

I want to feel like I am standing at the edge of a building. I want to feel like the only thing keeping me from falling is that thin line I've drawn from everyone else. Not like this. Here, where I stand, is the center of a crowded room. I stand in the center, eyes downcast - no one ever even notices I'm there. I can scream if I wanted, it wouldn't make a difference. "Oh, you..." simple words. A recognition but not a spark. I know that somewhere there is a feeling for what I could feel, somewhere there is a kindness within me that I cannot fathom. And I guess I'll start here. I will start by making someone happy, by helping them. Perhaps I'd be able to build those lines and connections to where I want to live to see those faces - not just to see what each day would bring; not because I was too afraid of the noose around my neck or the blade against my wrist.

For I am a coward, you see? But I want to live for a reason. I want to be a person that is remembered and someone that is loved - no matter how I look, no matter how I dress. There is a place for me in this chaotic world and I will find it one day. I am 21. I am free. I am so alone that I'm afraid to die because no one would have seen me for who I really was.

As I reflect on the cynical life I live... I ask the darkness and the light both to reach out and give me a place to call home - and people to love me for who and what I am.