Am I Really Real?

Breathing. Starring into the void. Looking right at me– through me. Perhaps you really don’t see me. Screaming. Crying. Trying to make you see me. But you don’t. Everything on your face is just blank. Your eyes only move to blink. Your lips will keep caged in all the words your mind would want to let out. Your smile, that wide, sincere smile you had mere moments before, had vanished completely and without leaving a trace. Your cheeks have been drained of all their color. What is on your mind? What do you want to say, but are afraid to? Did I scare you? Do my feelings scare you?

Go on already! Scream at me! Shout! Yell! Tell me to go to Hell! And I will. Tell me to get the fuck out of your life! And I will. Tell me to disappear! And I will. But please, for the love of God, don’t pretend I already did disappear! Because I’m still here, whether or not you want to notice me. I’m still screaming. I’m still crying. I’m still trying to make you see me.

The silence is torturing. I can hear the sound of our breaths, of our heartbeats. And every heartbeat I hear, every breath I hear, they are nothing but needles shoved into my veins one by one by one by one… meaning to drain me, meaning to break me. But you don’t want to destroy me. At least I have read that in your eyes. You want to be soft with me. You want to take me easy. Yet, you haven’t spoken a word to me in what feels like centuries. You simply stare into the void. And breathe. And exist.

My insecure footsteps begin to move my ghostly body closer to you. Until we’re almost face to face. You’re not moving, you seem to be paralysed in that spot. Standing and looking at me- through me. I can hear your heartbeat louder and clearer now. The mere sound of it is damaging to my eardrum.

‘That’s what happens when you only crave toxicity.‘
I say. To myself. Or maybe to you. Or maybe to the both of us.

You finally decide that I exist and look at me- but not into my eyes. My soul still frightens you. You don’t want to take a peak into it. You look at my hands, that are trembling with emotion. I look at them, too. They are clasping each other, in an effort to hide the trembling. But you see it. And I don’t know what you’re thinking, but your hands reach out and grab mine.

Through my tears and my confusion, I still manage to smile at you. I want to hug you, kiss you, feel you, tell you that you deserve more than you ever had and I’m the one who can be what you deserve. I’m the one who can truly make you feel loved and safe and maybe even happy. I’m not perfect, and I definitely wouldn’t make a perfect girlfriend. But I would never, not in a lifetime, not in a thousand years, treat you the way you have been treated before. I’d never be toxic for you. I might be toxic for my own fucking self, alright. But not for you. Because I do care for you, which I can’t really say I do for myself. And I wouldn’t be capable of hurting someone I care for.

I raise my eyes, searching for yours. You stare at the ground. You feel my eyes burning through your body, like lit cigarettes through paper. And I feel a sudden urge to wrap my arms tightly around you and never let you go.

I want you to look into my eyes. Aren’t you brave enough to do it? Say something. Do something. Don’t pretend nothing ever happened. Don’t make me question again if I’m dreaming…

Am I really real, though? Am I really here?

I’m afraid to let your hands get off mine and take a look at my fingers, so I begin to mentally count them.

1.   2.    3.    4.   5.  6.  7.  8.  9… and?

Oh, 9. Well, this explains a lot. A wide smile takes over my face. This means that now I am 100% in control of what goes on around me. And it also means that I’m 100% in control of your projection in my mind.
A faint voice in my head keeps telling me that I should wake up. It’s going to hurt more if I keep on playing this sick game. But do I listen? Seriously though, who ever listens and pays attention to those cautious voices? Even though I am totally aware of the fact that I’m only deepening the wound and besides, add some salt to it, I still don’t care.

You smile back at me— and this time, you look into my eyes.

Playfully, I punch you in the arm.
‘C’mon, now, say something! Don’t leave me hanging like that!’

‘I could say whatever the hell you want, but are you sure you want to do this again? You see how much it hurts, yet you keep on going with these vivid dreams and…’

‘I don’t think you’re here to give me advice, thank you very much.’, I say politely.

You roll your eyes. It amuses me, I don’t think I ever saw you do that in real life and it’s more of a signature gesture of myself.

‘Honey, I told you! How many times do I have to repeat myself? It hurts more than it would normally, if you add all these types of scenarios!‘, I hear a smooth, high pitched voice coming from behind me. I quickly turn around and see this blonde girl, one of my friends, standing there, arms crossed, looking at me in her specific judgemental way.

‘Who the hell even brought you here?‘

‘That’s one of the problems you get when you’re so undecided, I guess. Projections of rational people showing up in your dreams, to make up for the actually smart 50% of your brain’ she says, shrugging.

Trying to ignore her, I turn back at you and take a deep breath in.
‘Nevermind that.’

‘You know damn well you can’t ignore your feelings, bro.’
This voice comes from behind you, this time. I peak in that direction and see a tall, long-haired figure. My best friend.

“Seriously? Bringing in the whole circus now?”, I think to myself.

‘Look, it was all pretty and sweet when you confessed, but you have to stop ruining your life with things like this’, the newcomer says while, out of the blue, taking out a gun and pointing it at you. This is insane! Where the fuck did that 100% control (I was supposed to have) go to?

‘If… if you do that…’, I hear my own distant voice.

‘Uuuhhh! Stop being such a drama queen, bitch! You tried to shoot your shot, but it can’t possibly work, so let us save you… from yourself‘, the first girl says, already getting annoyed by the show.

‘Yeah, unnecessary words. He’s nothing more than a projection of your subconscious mind, so you can say goodbye now. At least for today.’

I hear a loud bang. And you suddenly disappear. So do the girls. I’m left alone in the blankness of my mind space, with no more energy to create any other human projection. So I decide to let my mind roam free and take me somewhere else.

I often said that and I will say it again: people should stop trusting their own minds. The damn fuckers will always create a chance to destroy us.

I find myself in the lowest spot I’ve ever been. Literal rock bottom. I watch my collapsed body among alcohol bottles, shattered pieces of glass and spilled pills. I’m in my living room. In front of the couch, on the glass table, there is the second or maybe third suicide note I wrote that week.

I don’t want to see this again. I don’t want to go back there. I don’t want to go through it all again. I need to go somewhere else. I need a happy place…

And there I go. Another failure. I know this scene word by word. Why am I here? In a classroom, in an idiotic situation… but a situation that hurt more than anything at that time.

I don’t know how I manage to see myself so clearly from the outside, but I hate having to do it right now.

I close my eyes, as I already know what’s going to happen. Playfully, or maybe not so, I see myself wrapping a purple ribbon around my neck and pretend it’s a noose.

I. Want. To. Run. Away. I. Can’t. Stand. Watching. This. Hearing. This.

‘You’d do everyone a great favour if you died’, I hear your amused voice.

And then I hear myself laugh.
‘See? The confirmation I needed!’, I say to my best friend.

Why the fuck does my mind even bother to play such tricks on me? I mean… isn’t it enough that I’ve been through this ONCE? Why do I have to replay it?

Will it keep getting worse? Let’s try something else and if it doesn’t…

***

Suddenly, I wake up. As my eyes adjust to the darkness, your words still ring in my ear. And so does my laughter, my shocked response. The laughter that transformed into a long session of crying, that night. And into a lot of possible scenarios played in my mind, fuelled by the fact that I was so certain you were right.

But I’ve gotten over it, it’s fine now. What I still can’t explain to myself is why did my mind do that. Was it to show me what a fool I’ve been to fall (again) in love with you, even though I should have realised how much you hate me? Was it to show me that maybe you could never care for me the way I do for you?

In this equation, there are too many variables, it seems. Apart from you being the obvious, main one. Might also be myself, the way I perceive you and the way I always choose to shove away your negative traits, in an effort to understand you better and to create a positive image of you.

I am literally laughing out loud now, that I have tried to use this dream as a solution, but failed so badly and even after 10 written pages about it, I still have more questions than answers. Which leads me to my initial thought, and that is the fact that you are the only one who can give me the answers I’m looking for.

Advertisement