PICTURE PERFECT.

1 | RIPPED WINGS

裂けた翼  

❝mother, if god is so forgiving, 
then why did he rip the wings of the devil and
condemned him to hell?❞

Not even he had escaped the hands of his mother's religious wrath, unable to keep his mouth shut, the woman chased after the teary-eyed boy, his doe eyes staring onto the angered woman, her hands reaching out, sought after his shoulder. Her nails dug into the skin of the boy, and blood ran down his pale soft skin. Scratch marks being left, whilst the dark-haired male attempted to struggle out of the hands of his callous mother. 

"How dare you speak ill of our savior?" She growled, her eyes struck with craze and anger, it terrified the young boy, he slipped out of his own mother's grasp to run through the narrow and damp alley, the smell of cigarettes and garbage entering his nostrils but he could do no further but keep sprinting, away from his mother. The shadow of the woman had eventually disappeared, the terrified boy only kept himself quiet near the side of the dumpster. Tears endlessly running down his pale rosy cheeks.

Sobbing and whimpering past his hands that tried to quiet himself down and his very heartbeat that seemed to pump faster each second. His shoulders trembled, the adrenaline still registered in his mind. Seconds, minutes — hours had passed by, his vision began to turn hazy, but terror was still registered in his mind. He whimpered but fell into the depths of darkness, leaving the dark reality into the better dreamscape.

He woke up to a white ceiling, static ringing in his ears, there was no talking, simply silence. It wasn't soon until he saw his mother through the door, there was no sight of her wrath, but rather with sweetness and the honey smile. Her old wrinkles seemed to soften, and brown doe eyes looking straight at his trembling figure in fear of what the woman would do to him seeing as he had run away. Once the woman had entered, he apologized, tears rolling down his cheeks.

She continued closer, he was quivering and tightly grasped the blanket. She wrapped her arms around the child, surprised, perhaps his mother had changed? Her lips parted near his ears, "You pathetic child. Be glad mother is coming to bless your sins once more. How dare you run away after speaking ill of our god." She murmured into his ear, he froze, gritted his teeth and said nothing.

His mother had been the source of all his insecurities. Her callous terms labeling the child as pathetic, useless and a mistake. However, the child would always wonder if he really was a pathetic useless mistake. 

To this day, despite the woman has long been in her grave, she stayed by his side, every single day, he would hear her endless scolding in her mind. Even as he had gone into the bathroom, fingers down his throat and the food he despised escaping his system, he still heard her god damned voice. 

"You insolent child, you will always be ugly and pathetic. Whatever you do, you will always be like this." He hated every moment of it,  he wished she died along with her body. But her spirit lived on to torture him.

"Fuck off. I don't want you in my mind, I don't want to listen." He growled, his throat sore from the session. He weakly pushed himself to the ground and sobbed. Everywhere he went, it was the same thing. He was an ugly and pathetic child, he still is. He could feel everyone staring at him when he ate, he could feel everyone stare when he tripped. He was sick of it.

He wept so beautifully, the echoes of his whimpering and sobbing echoed throughout the empty bathroom, his hand muffling his cries of pain and eyebrows furrowed. Self-hatred drowned him, it was a sea of darkness, negative things amplified by his own scrutiny and his own critic. He saw himself through the rippling water of the toilet and saw all his flaws.

Saw what his mother had seen: a pathetic, ugly child.

He was not capable of ever being beautiful and pure, not by the standards of society and not by the standards of his beloved mother. He will never be beautiful, he gripped the sides of the toilet and his food continued to roll off his tongue. He just has to keep going, so he could be in heaven with his mother.

He laughed weakly, his throat hoarse, and wiped his tears away. "It's okay, mother, you don't have to take care of me. I promise I'll become beautiful." He whispered to himself, and fell asleep in the bathroom, despite the striking pain of hunger and the burning sensation of his throat, he pushed himself.

Beauty is pain after all. He just had to go through all these things, and he will finally be beautiful. His mother will finally love him and people will finally be kind to him. 

He just has to struggle more. Be in more pain, hurt more. 

You could say he was an angel with ripped wings and a broken heart.

Once more, he had fallen into more than darkness. He began to succumb to his own sea, slowly asphyxiating him. He was drowning and he didn't even realize it. It was a cycle throughout his whole life, even if his mother was not physically there to motivate him to become who she wanted him to be, it was always stuck in his mind. His mother will always be there, whether he liked it or not.

Whether he cared or not.

He needed to be picture perfect.