My dark Professor

I

My mind is poisoned and so is my heart. These very things that should make me a complete human being are ruined.

My soul is poisoned too.

Dark and bitter. Everything about me is dark and bitter.

I'm always angry. Angry at the world and everything I gaze upon. I can't help it. I was born with this poison.

But the poison does have an antidote. Unlike the fairytales where the cursed prince's antidote is true love, mine is exactly the opposite of love. The relationship I have with the antidote is far from love. It's a passion, an addiction, a gut-wrenching need. My antidote doesn't immediately cure, it fuels the poison and spreads it until it can no longer be contained.

My antidote is writing.

I write every day. It's the only thing keeping me sane. I wouldn't know how to live without the worlds and people I create. They keep me grounded.

When I was twelve years old, I wrote my very first story. It was a short story about a boy who wanted to travel the world and visit as many bookstores as possible.
I was so excited to have written a story all by myself. I ran to my father to show him my story. It was written in one of the notebooks he gave me for my eleventh birthday. I gave the book to him and asked him to read it.

The next day he called me in and gave it back. But the book was torn, and the front pages blackened with cigarette ashes. He looked me in the eye and said, "You are a Williams. You will one day take over the Williams Company. You are the only heir; it is your birthright."
I smiled at him.
"Dad, I already knew that," I said, laughing.

"No, son, you don't get it. Do you know what it means to be a Williams? It means being strong and powerful. Not soft, not traveling to bookstores, and certainly not writing useless stories. You are twelve now, you'll be an adult in just a few years. What you should be doing is sitting beside me and learning how to rule the world. Not daydreaming about made-up worlds."

I felt my young heart shatter at his words. I didn't cry and scream even though that was all I wanted to do at the time.

I took back my ruined book and walked out.

Because I was a Williams, and I was strong.

Being a teacher is brutal. Sometimes I wonder why I chose this path. I hated listening to kids talk about how they were going to be the next Shakespeare. Naive young minds had no idea the sacrifice it took to get to that level. I humor them though, I listen and encourage them because that is my job, to cultivate and nurture their dreams, even though those dreams are unrealistic sometimes.

Today I listen to them talk about the first time they read the 'it book', the book that made the most impact in their lives and gave them a life-changing moment.

"Mr. Williams, what do you think?"

I look at the girl who asked me the question.

"What do I think?"

"What do you think about The Nightingale?"

I try to smother a laugh but end up coughing instead.

"Well, it's a good but bland book."

She looks up at me in shock.

"You think it's bland?"