Kait did the honors of dropping Sanele home after mom left him with us.
If there's a time I ever felt beat down, it was tonight. Nothing can ever fathom the feeling of your mother not being able to accept you or be able to even tell you that she really loves you. I mean, I may be a lot of things, but undeserving of a mothers love is not one of them. A mom's love is supposed to soothe your soul, provide you solace in times of need, to water you. And right now, all I feel is dry.
Her love feels dry.
I enter Kendall's room as silently as possible, trying not to wake her up. Once the door shuts, I slip out of my shoes and switch on the light. To my surprise, Kendall is awake, sitting on the edge of the bed, patting for me to join her. I stand firmly in place, my eyes welling up with tears already.
"I-" I try to speak, but I can't, my throat closing up as the tears begin to run down my cheeks.
Kendall rushes over to me, her arms around me in an instant. I don't hesitate to hug her back, my knees threatening to give in below me as she embraces me. We fall to our knees together, with me not letting her go, not even for a second.
"I love you," she whispers into my ear as I sob. "I love you so much, Yasmina. You are loved." She lets me go, her hands on my cheeks as she wipes my tears. "You have a very beautiful heart, Yasmina, don't let it turn ugly because of the world around you."
I sniffle. "You don't know what it's like, Kendall. It's so fucking hard."
Kennie smiles sadly. "I may not know what it's like because I'm not in your shoes right now, but what I do know is that I'm going to be with you on your journey. Our shoes may not be the same, and our journey might not be exatcly the same, but your journey doesn't have to be so lonely. I'm here."
I smile at her. "You should be a poet."
Kennie shrugs. "I don't think any type of poetry I spew out can match the work of art right in front of me." I laugh as she kisses my cheek. "You're the embodiment of all my hopes and desires, and everytime you smile at me, a piece of my heart exploded into tiny little pieces thinking about how lucky I am to be spending life with you."
I shake my head at her. "You don't have to worship me."
"I'm not, I'm just reminding you of how beautiful you are to me, and how beautiful you are to the world, inside and out," she explains. "Yasmina, you're smart, empowering, firm, and strong."
"But I cry," I mumble.
"And that's okay; pretty girls cry too," Kendall quips. "You're not just your good qualities, Yasmina. Your good, your bad, and the in between, that's who you are. You're strong, independent, caring, enthusiastic, and preppy. However, you can also be mean, selfish, sad, and annoying. You can feel like you're not enough, and some days, you can feel like you're on the top of the world with nothing stopping you. All those qualities, your imperfections, your mistakes, achievements, losses, gains, and everything you experience are who you are. You are you even on the days you don't feel good, and you are you regardless of your sexual orientation, interests, who you were, and who you want to become. You're a human, Yasmina, and I want you to see yourself as that; not perfect, not imperfect, but human. You're still a human, Yasmina."
I stand up with her, and nod my head. She's right; I need to stop being so afraid of being myself. I need to allow myself to feel and live my truth. I'm human, I'm not perfect.
I am human. I am not perfect.
I walk up to the mirror and look at myself. I wipe the stray tear from my face and just stare at the mirror. I place one hand on it and admire my slightly cracked skin. It's not perfect, it's slightly dry. There's no need for me to be perfect.
"There is no need for me to be perfect," I whisper to myself. "I'm human."
Kennie appears behind me, wrapping her arms around my waist. "You're still human, it's time to start treating yourself like one, Yasmina, you deserve to treat yourself well, regardless of what anyone thinks of you." She hums.
And as she stands behind me, in support of me, I think I can finally say that I'm ready to start doing that myself.
YOU ARE READING
We're Still Human
Teen Fiction****Sequel to Ordinary Human Beings **** Yasmina Nothando Thompson seems to have it all figured out. At Riveria Boarding School, she's the captain of the basketball team, a respected prefect, and she's finally found her place with a supportive group...
