dragonfly || d.m. [✔]

insomniac,

TW: Indicates suicide indirectly, VERY indirectly.

White holds all the colors, yet it is called colorless. Love holds all the emotions, yet it is hated by some.

—

a r i a  s t u n n i n g s

As I lay in bed that night, I was well-aware of the feeling of claustrophobia that clouded my senses. 

The thing was that, I had never slept — so to say — because of my sleeping disorder: insomnia. Never had I ever spent a night in bed and not wandering down the corridors of my school or home. If you can call it a home, that is.

I had developed insomnia years ago, when I was a mere child of ten. I wouldn't have, but things happen. Shit happens. It was all because of my nightmares about a telephone conversation which changed my life:

"Hello?" I spoke into the phone.

My brother, Leo's, voice sounded on the other side. "Sis?" he asked.

We hadn't heard from the Leo in quite some time. "Yes," I whisper, pulling the hood of my black hoodie closer, as if it would protect me from some unknown emotion.

"Sis, I don't have much time. Is mum home?" he asked, unknowingly hurting me because I thought that he didn't want to talk to me.

"No, but I can take the message," I say.

Just then I hear my mother enter the room. "Is it Leo?" she whispers to the air surrounding us.

I hand her the phone. Seems like I won't be able to talk to my brother. She grabs it like she's drowning and the phone is the only piece of wood around her. For her to hang on to.

"Leo? . . . No . . . You told me . . . I don't believe you . . " she spots me. "Go to your room, child," she tells me.

I leave, wondering what Leo is telling her.

When I enter the room again, half an hour later, she's there, but she's on the ground, whimpering like a hurt animal. 

"Be strong, child. Be strong," is the only thing she manages to tell me as she gets up on spotting me. "Don't be like me, weak and lost."

She turns and leaves through the door, leaving me whispering a quiet, "Mum," to the wind behind her. 

The only person who returns is Aunt Couldings. 

I tell her what I heard of the telephone conversation and she seems to understand a whole lot more than me. 

"I guess it's just you and me now," she says. 

"Mum?" I remember asking.

"She isn't here, is she?" my aunt tells me. 

"No," I say quietly. The quietness of a child desperate to be in her mother's arms again.

But all I ever got was my aunt. 

I didn't really understand the conversation on the telephone till I was twelve and a young teenager who harboured extreme hatred against her parents — a father who left her at birth and a mother who couldn't stand the harsh reality the world pushed towards her. My mother never came back, needless to say. I didn't know what exactly happened, but I could make a very educated deduction.

She ran away, leaving behind a child of eight. But never mind, because what is gone is gone.

Gone.

I stare at the stars, wishing I could open the window to get a breath of fresh air. Suddenly, a wave of courage and desperation come over me and I find myself throwing open the window and balancing myself on the windowsill. I can see the silvery moon in the night sky, the misty taste of moonshine upon my lips. The pinprick stars look artificial, but only because there are so many of them. 

I pull the hood of my jacket closer to my face as I look into the kindly face of the silver moon. The moon is the closest thing to a mother that I've ever had -- omnipresent and always smiling. And even when I can't see her, I know she's there, somewhere, even if she's on the other side of the world.

"What're you- STUNNINGS-" a male voice pierces the quiet night air, scaring the daylights (although it's night) out of me and almost making me lose my balance. 

"Yeah?" I muttered, pulling the hood still closer.

"Get down from there," he said.

"Why?"

"You're too close to the ledge."

"I prefer it like this," I reply.

"Look, I can't have you dying on the very first day — within a few hours, in fact — so please get down," he tells me, the impatience quite undisguised but there was a hint of worry too. 

"Whatever," I say, slipping off the ledge. . . 

And landing straight on him, my back to his toned chest. I rush off him, pulling my hood on because it had fallen off. "Why were you standing behind me?"

He, however, didn't seem to be focusing. Instead he said, "You have silver hair."

"Er- Yes? But it's also brown?"

"Keep your hood off," he tells me. "You'll look prettier."

"I don't remember ever asking for your opinion," I say, shoving past the boy.

He stares at me as I climb into bed, his blonde-white hair emitting a light glow in the moonlight, making him look angelic as his silver rings glinted in the silvery light.

He continues staring at me, leaning against the windowsill. "Do you even remember?"

"Remember what?"

"Never mind, forget I said that," he says, but I sense a slight crack to his voice.