Separate Ways - Byler

IV - Troubled Times

February had ended and now March was beginning to slip away faster than I could have ever predicted that it would. Spring deadlines were inevitably creeping up on me and yet I stared at nothing but blank sheets of sketching paper that begged to be filled by inspirations I did not have. The floor at the foot of my desk was littered with dozens of scrapped sketches that I'd began before realising they were going nowhere and eventually abandoned. You'd think that my history and memories of endless unimaginable and unbelievable sights would provide an adequate base to begin my work and yet my mind supplied me with absolutely nothing of any value.

In truth, I was mentally exhausted and wanted to never think nor feel ever again. It was as though I'd been thrown headlong into a lion's den, surrounded by the carnivorous beasts of heartache and loss that pounced at me with their gnashing teeth bared, ready to tear off yet another part of me. Though I didn't have much left of myself to give.

I'd thought that finally freeing myself from the blackhole of a controlling, heartless boyfriend would allow me to salvage the parts of who I'd once been in order to put myself back together again. However, I'd been naive yet again and my heart was taking its sweet time in mending. All I wanted was to feel true joy again - any positive emotion would have done, really - yet that didn't seem to be something that would exist in my near future.

Healing was hard work but by no means was I ready to give up. I had endured so many traumas in my life and one lesson they had left me with was that I was resilient. Perhaps I was even indestructible.

Before I'd even recognised what was happening, my hand had begun to sweep across the paper before me. A small but mighty image was brought eventually forth of the inevitable break in a terrible storm that had attempted to destroy everything in its path. Though every person I had created was bruised and damaged and their homes were now nothing but rubble, they remained standing as the winds had been unable to sweep them off their feet. They were alive and they were stronger than what they had been through.

A shadow of a smile played on my face as I slipped the creation into my folder ready to take with me to my class the next day to add to my portfolio. I was far from finishing the assignment but I finally had a starting point and I was filled with a slight and unfamiliar sensation of - dare I say it? - hope.

"Will?" A delicate voice called to me and I heard a faint knocking on my door.

"You can come in." I announced to my mother as she entered into my bedroom, a smile on her face yet I observed how her warm, brown eyes were filled with sorrow.

My mother perched herself on my bed as I slowly span the desk chair I was seated in around to face her, understanding perfectly well why she wanted to talk to me. I met her gaze that was so filled with a mournful affection that guilt bubbled in my stomach at the thought of how I'd allowed myself to become so withdrawn from the people who loved and cared about me the most. In shame, I dropped the steady eye-contact the two of us held in the silence that had engulfed my bedroom and stared at the cluttered, carpeted floor at my feet.

Moments passed and the quiet atmosphere threatened to deafen me and swallow me up whole before my mother finally spoke in a measured voice: "How are you feeling?"

"Okay." I mumbled but I was well aware that I was fooling absolutely nobody.

Careful fingertips slipped under my chin and lifted my head upwards as the woman brought my gaze to meet her loving, dark eyes. "Tell me the truth, Will. Please." She begged and I was unsurprised to find that she, the woman who had known me better than anyone else ever had in my whole entire life, had not been convinced by my half-hearted reply.

No word nor breath escaped from my tightly clenched and well-bitten lips for a moment as I pondered over exactly how to put into words the emotional rollercoaster I had so unwillingly been thrown onto, all the while screaming at the top of my lungs to get off as not a soul heard me. "I've been lost, I guess. Not quite sure where I fit in or where I belong. I don't know how to figure that out."