ʟɪɢʜᴛ ꜱᴘᴇᴇᴅ | 𝙚𝙧𝙚𝙣 𝙟𝙖𝙚𝙜𝙚𝙧

27. 𝘽𝙀 𝙌𝙐𝙄𝙀𝙏 𝘼𝙉𝘿 𝘿𝙍𝙄𝙑𝙀

027, 𝘽𝙀 𝙌𝙐𝙄𝙀𝙏 𝘼𝙉𝘿 𝘿𝙍𝙄𝙑𝙀

.⋆𐙚 🍒

ANXIETY IS A GHOST THAT NEVER KNOCKS.

It slips through the cracks. Settles in the hollow of your chest. Curls its fingers around your lungs and squeezes until you forget how to breathe. It sings lullabies made of what-ifs. Waits until the words tangle in your throat and your hands begin to shake.

It appears when you least expect it—
Mid-step.
Mid-breath.
Mid-thought.

It warps the edges of the world. Sharpens everything. Shrinks it all down to the size of your own heartbeat. Too fast. Too quiet.

I've lived with it for as long as I can remember.

The kind of anxiety that rewrites the ending before the story even begins. The kind that wears the face of caution and whispers in your own voice. Be careful, it says. Be perfect. Don't give anyone a reason to need you.

Because needing you means depending on you. And depending on you means disappointment.

Disappointment is all I've ever been.

I've never been the one people turn to. Never the one they wait for. Never the one whose name gets tied to outcomes, to trust, to hope.

Until this moment.

Until tonight—
When everything feels too loud and too quiet all at once.
When the city hums beneath my feet like it knows something I don't.
When every second feels like a countdown to something I can't undo.
When they're all looking at me like I matter.
Like I've can do this.

And I don't know how to tell them I can't. That I'm terrified. That I'm ripping at the seams and trying to hold it together with nothing but adrenaline and shallow breaths.

My vision is starting to blur. My knees feel weak. I can't tell if it's the lack of sleep or something deeper. Something I've been running from my whole life.

What if I mess up? What if I lose? What if I crash and hurt myself—or worse, hurt someone else?

What if I prove my mother right?

That I was never enough. Never ready. Never meant for moments like this.

My breath curls in front of me, pale and ghostly, disappearing into the night air before it even forms. It's late, past midnight, but the city feels awake in a way I've never seen before. 

There are more people here than I ever could've imagined. More than at the meetup a few weeks ago. More than at that first race I'd accidentally joined.

This feels bigger. Louder. Heavier.

Faces blur beneath the flicker of headlights and smoke. The low thrum of voices bleeds into music—basslines rattling through car doors, the growl of modified engines rising beneath it. High-pitched laughter cuts through the noise, sharp and frantic, the kind that only exists when you're drunk and freezing and pretending not to care.

Somewhere, someone sparks a lighter. Somewhere else, tires scream against the pavement. Cheers erupt—loud, unfiltered, hungry.

The air is thick with it—Fuel. Burnt rubber. Sweat. Weed. Alcohol. The metallic sting of adrenaline.

It clings to my clothes. Fills my lungs. Hums beneath my skin uncomfortably.

And all of it—every sound, every smell, every flicker of movement—feels like a warning.