Silent Pantomime

Chapter 49 | Dilettante

Chapter 49🌌: for hannah, from me
[ this chapter is dedicated to my world's favourite person, it still slightly follows the storyline, but is much different and I attempted to do a dark/light academia style theme. also it is set after annika told hazel about what happened at the dog incident, which will be revealed in the next chapter where things will go "back on track"🤍 ]

After I found out the truth of what I did to the little girl, I felt somewhat relieved but also dismayed at how I could have done something so awful, and then simply let it slip through my fingers. Annika had given me some space, which I was glad for, as I didn't want to snap at her in anger over something I did, which would have ruined the half-peace between us.

Feeling so hopeless with myself, I wanted nothing more than to run off into a completely different world. Of course I had grown sick of having to pretend to be something I wasn't, but maybe changing my name to Alice and falling into a Wonderland was a much more real version of me.

There was a strange urge surrounding me, filling me with a giddiness to get consumed in the sweet heavy scents of an apple orchard, and dance under the dripping grapefruit colour of the sky, while watching the honey glazed leaves flow into the wind. For the first time in a long time, I didn't want to wait for the stars at night, I just wanted to enjoy the day, no souls attached. What I wanted for once in my life was to get trapped in a fantasy, and have two wings added to me that would have made me an angel instead of a fire fairy.

That feeling that wouldn't go away simply just did, I wasn't sure where it had gone, but there wasn't even a wisp of it in my heart. There was no draining eternal alarm ringing in me to stress about not receiving my letter for the day, or having a punishment, and even the overall longing for attention seemed like it had disappeared. I knew it would come back, but if I had dipped my life into another life, maybe it would have stayed away for longer.

I had always had myself convinced that every act I did was to keep myself civil with the stars, because I wanted to keep myself bright enough for them to look at me without wanting to look away. There were billions of lives up there, and I wanted nothing more than to have them carry on my life for me. But my blissful ignorance had truly been the ocean I was swimming in while the world was on fire, as everything I touched became an ember, and I hadn't ever noticed.

I wondered if when I was sat next to people was the moment when they would have missed me the most out of my entire existence, because every part of me would have been there, except my mind. Nobody had ever asked me where it went, or if they did, I had never realised. It was ironic really, my soul had always been sick with the illness of thought, and the only problems my thoughts ever had was whether or not there were as many of them about me in other people. Yet, after being told the truth, the urge to get my past to let everything go no longer seemed like an issue. The stars would probably have been even more important to me than ever the next day I woke up, as my mind was a living contradiction, but in that moment I was okay with hiding in the dark spaces between the stars.

Deep down, I think I was wanting to let everything go out of fear, because I was scared of the fate I had very much brought on myself. But I wanted to feel overwhelmed in a different kind of rush outside of my own enclosed circle. Instead of skating on thin ice in a shrinking figure eight, I decided to find a key out of my confided life. It was easy really, I stole one of my mum's unread books.

A fantasy is much closer to you than you may think, forgive me if I may romanticise the past and glamorise the future, but their lives on pieces of paper can make you want to leave a letter in your own life reading With Love, Always before diving into theirs.

Taking my new life in my hands, I walked outside into the hues of pink, before commitment grabbed me and pulled me in.

It was called Dilettante which means one who cultivates an area of interest, without any real commitment or knowledge.