The Pointe of Love

5 - Estella

The stars in the night sky are always beautiful. The way they glimmer like forbidden sparkles of glitter, the way they leave the atmosphere looking like a sea of light, the way they seem like foreign fantasies waiting for a person to accidentally discover.

The way they captivate me each night, lulling me into watching their mystifying adventures.

But everything, even the stars, hide their insecurities under deceiving masks. Even the stars, however beautiful they are, constantly feel the pang of loneliness. Even the stars, however bright they are, will eventually fade out of the narrative.

Even the stars, however confident-looking they are, sometimes want a break from shining in the night sky; because they deserve a break once in a while too, right?

As I'm in the wonderland of my thoughts, a single gesture tingles at my senses. A slight brush across my face, almost as if it wasn't there. The miniscule tickle of a hand causes my hair to stand up, and the rough calluses rub gently across my jaw, enveloping me with a sense of warmth and belonging.

Until that hand suddenly pulls away, leaving me with a sense of disappointment.

The floor starts groaning in protest as somebody suddenly moves, the footsteps of someone mysterious slowly softening until a creak sounds, followed by the closing of a door.

As the welcoming hands of sleep start to rock me back to a slumber, that hand is all I can think about.

The comfort it seemed to bring with it.

The reassurance of that tiny sweep across my cheek.

The hundreds of thoughts that question: who did that hand belong to?

Every single day, I wake up feeling that I have nobody to talk to. To relate to. To rant to. A sense of unbelonging always manages to wash through me like a rush of realization, drown drown drowning me into the sea of estrangement. You don't belong, the water says. Nobody will ever appreciate you, the water says. All of these tiny waves wash wash wash over me until I'm suddenly drowning under all of my thoughts, wondering what I could have done to avoid this situation.

No matter what I do, I'm always awakened by this saddening truth, the sense that nobody actually wants me in this world. That I'm useless.

But everyday, after the wave of negativity finally breezes over me, a sense of confusion, of possibilities, of hope take over my body. One more day, they tell me. Take each day one at a time.

And somehow, these thoughts overpower that drowning sensation I encountered seconds ago. The horrid claws of that endless ocean don't seem to dig as deep into my skin anymore. All it takes is that pindrop of desire, of wish, of aspiration, to alter one's view towards the universe.

And that tiny small brush of a hand, that tiny gesture of affection, that tiny flicker of hope, caused a small smile to unwillingly form on my face, allowing me to fall back to the comfort of sleep with the knowledge that maybe, just maybe, everything might be okay in the end.

***

"I swear to all things good in life, if you don't give me back my toy right now, I will tell mom."

"Shut up Pen, I know-"

"Shhhhhhhh. Damn, you guys sound like monkeys arguing with each other. Now quit talking because she's still asleep- oh wait, she's waking up!"

The first thing I realize is that I'm not sleeping on my bed. Where am I? The stiff, hard mattress I'm lying on feels as if it is made of cardboard, and I bet that my back will be sore when I stand up. I'm slicked with sweat, and a killer headache is making it hard to think about anything else. My whole body is on the brink of collapsing, and I feel like I just ran a marathon.