The Dark Inside

┆1. The collision ━

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Tapping my feet on the white tiled floor rhythmically, I tried to concentrate harder on the newspaper on my lap with a pencil in my hand that I kept poking on my chapped lips with its end. Trying to block out all the noise around me as much as possible, I tried my best to focus on the crosswords in the middle of a busy airport. Not that any of my efforts to concentrate were successful since a family of four behind me started quarreling among themselves about one of them forgetting their phone charger at home.

I bit my lips, squinted my eyes, and concentrated on the words on the paper rather than the chaos around me. I was so close to finding another word.

My phone buzzed inside my jeans pocket for the seventeenth time and I contemplated whether I should smash the phone to stop its ringing or smash and crack open my skull to stop keeping count of how many times it had rang. I didn't fish it out to see who it was. I knew who it was.

I bit my lips harder and closed my eyes. Maybe the pain would block out everything else, maybe not looking at anything would shut out the voice in my mind. 

Noise and unnecessary thoughts. 

But it didn't; it never did.

After a good few seconds that felt like hours, the buzzing stopped thankfully; but the quarreling behind me didn't, though, honestly I would rather listen to a random couple biting each other's heads off than the person on the phone.

I knew what they would say.

And my answer would still be the same.

When the phone started ringing for the eighteenth time, I was strongly tempted to smash it right on the floor in front of me but I didn't. That would create a scene I could live without at that moment.

Instead, I took a deep breath, remembering something about passing more oxygen in my brain so that it could function well, and bit my lips to the point where I felt like I tasted blood on my tongue. I ran my fingers through my dark, slightly messy hair and softly pulled its roots, creating a soothing sensation on the scalp. An elderly couple beside me gave me a weird look, making me roll my eyes and turn around: I could live without another unwanted judgemental look from a complete stranger. 

One might switch off their phone in a situation like this if they didn't want to pick up a certain call or even block that number, but I didn't choose either path. Despite what my peers say about me all the time, I was too much of a coward. I always have been.

When the loud, robotic female voice announced the time and destination of my flight, I quickly shoved the newspaper inside my bag and jumped on my feet to rush to the counter for the check-in and other formalities. Dragging my old but tidy suitcase along with me, I took long strides towards the counter where a long queue of people had already formed. I clicked my tongue in annoyance; I shouldn't have sat so far away from there.

When my phone started ringing for the nineteenth time, I halted in my tracks. I looked blankly ahead of me as the phone went off inside my jeans pocket, a severe headache was starting to form from the amount of stress and anxiety I was feeling just by the sound of the phone ringing. Even after the ringing stopped, I still didn't move from my spot. Giving up, I slowly take out the phone from my pocket and stare at the screen.

'19 missed calls from Mother'

'51 unread messages from Mother'

Suddenly my mouth felt parched, my throat became dry as if I hadn't had anything to drink for the last week.

I needed to drink something.