An Attempt at Sunshine (Winter Soldier) (Marvel)

[35.00] [December 3, 2015]

We sit around the table eating pizza. I'm half sure mine is filled with maggots. Wanda and Sam and Natasha have recently come back from a particularly risky mission and I assume we are celebrating.

Wanda rests her head on Natasha's shoulder, Peter and Clint laugh about something Tony said. My ghost-boy pretends to look interested in a conversation between Bruce and Thor.

I stand up and leave, letting my untouched food sit at the table. No one notices. I slip down the hall and settle my door in its place behind me.

I sit on the bed and reach under the mattress, feeling for the leather. I pull the mask out from the sheets and let it sit in my hands for a moment, just staring at it. I have been thinking. Everyone always says that Recovery is possible. They tell me all sorts of things.

I have an Idea of my own. I do not think people ever really become Normal. Become Real again. They get better at hiding it. What people describe as Recovery is not Normal. It is not hiding. When shame and guilt pass, people stop hiding how they feel, what they see. They invite others to see the snow.

But the others cannot see the snow. They stare at a wide open space filled with nothing. They cannot see the ice surrounding every thought and every action. They cannot see the ghosts. They pretend.

At least the nice ones do. The others call you crazy. They fill you with poisons that crash through your veins like trashcans down a windy street. They push you out and make you notmyproblem. Because you are now a problem.

That is what I think.

There are others, however, who can see the frost and the ice. They lay in the snow with you and you make snowmen and snow angels. You make something not so cold out of what you have.

I still have a lot of snow.