someone i never was

- sobs into pillow -

 B I A N A V A C K E R

____________________________

I am a specimen. Idolized for my beauty, admired for my resilience — yet forever berated. And still inevitably forced into uselessness.

/

The public does apparently love me, though we've never held a true conversation. Speeches said to an empty studio have never struck me as heartfelt — and perhaps it's for that reason I've never felt any sort of connection with my audience. Their obsession with my work, with me, is pitiful. They're not the people I wish to reach. And their fascination and dissection of my character is a poor excuse to delude themselves of the fact that they lack the certain quality of companionship. Or any human contact beyond their basement walls.

Not that I can claim any superiority. I've never had any guests on the show and that's simply because I lack the friends to do so.

/

Biana, dear, you're never going to be normal.

/

Father is a studious diplomat who will forever be honored for his time serving the Council so dutifully. There's not a single blemish upon his record, his reputation — or, as he puts it, his legacy. I truly do hate that word.

/

It'd terrified me, the first riot. The distant, muffled sounds of death and pain and hurt had, for once, been much too close to my own ears. A brick had then been hurled through my window— shattering the glass and my privileged illusion of safety.

Mother had found me, eventually, screaming and choking on my own snot. Taken me to the safe room. Ignored how I wailed at the cold, red stickiness covering her nightgown. I'd distantly wondered why she wasn't screaming, too. Her injuries must've surely... oh.

I was six and stained with the blood of strangers.

The blood covered my hands, somehow working its way into my hair, my nostrils, my eyes, my being—

His voice has soothed the suffering masses in a lull. The words of his monologues had inspired an ignorance among the rightfully furious protestors of our society, somehow replacing the very true hunger in their stomachs with a sweet, synthetic warmth.

Father convinced the dying that their hope would sustain them. He lied. And maybe he was only following orders. But he'd smiled knowing that they would die.

/

I loved my mother very dearly.

/

I've never known true darkness, though the sun hardly ever graces my features. The flashing of paparazzi leaves my pupils forever dilated, my eyes forever watering in retaliation to the lights. Constant spotlight – a term I've begun to associate with the family legacy.

My ancestors were very admirable people, don't get me wrong. Their resilience through war gave us the glittering society we know today. The forever mounting cracks in our jeweled world aren't their fault, exactly, but more a product of continued disregard. Disregard that we can no longer blame on a lack of knowledge — quite the opposite, actually. Our current world leaders simply cannot comprehend the absolute excess of politics that they face. And so they don't.

/

How terrifying it must've been for the protesters, the refugees. To have been promised salvation and only been met with cold and hunger. I couldn't have stopped it, I know. They were all doomed to die, even if I'd somehow managed to explain how exactly screwed they were.