Asunder

Chapter 9 - Nothing Together

Being alone is satisfying in a way I can't completely comprehend.

Well, not completely alone. I like to be alone among others. To feel how unremarkable I am to them. It's a comfort and a numbing. It's the power of invisibility.

I woke up too early this morning to stay and do nothing at home. There's only so many hours in a day I can take of staying there. That's one of the reasons school was so useful.

Though the work load was tiring, it knocked me out at night. Almost every day of the week, sleep was easy. The regular classes also provided me with ways to be alone, around people. Around friend groups and cliques who wouldn't have cared if I disappeared. It's the feeling I'm getting right now, lying down on a perfectly green ground, staring up at the perfectly blue sky.

In the winter, the park looks like it's from a fairytale, naked trees freezing over and shining in the sunlight. In the summer, greenery is resplendent, vibrant and young. Taking advantage of the open air, children, their parents and teenagers come to this park everyday. Often enough that I have a guarantee of it never being empty in the mornings. A few years ago, by miracle or other, while I was taking a long walk with Maya, we walked past it. Though she didn't even spare it a glance, I noticed it.

The kids always scream and laugh, but are never unbearable. The playing area is sufficiently far from the field of grass where I lie to reassure me that no balls will hit me in the face. No roads can be seen around, since it's isolated from even the suburb. Though it takes a good hour to walk here, it's worth it every time. For a bit of peace.

Maya and I never came back, but I remembered the park. I remembered it after she left, and I came back a few days after. I didn't know where else to go. I didn't know how to ease the hole she left, what could give me space to breathe, distance from the house and much-needed solace. And it turns out, this was it. This is still it.

The sun's harshness is blocked by a tree at the edge of my peripheral vision, so it doesn't blind me to stare at the sky. As I lie, limbs unfolded and open, I let myself inhale, exhale; let myself feel nothing. Like I'm floating in water so cold I begin to numb.

I have just closed my eyes when a feminine voice rings:

"Greene!"

I sit up fast as lightening, eyes flying open and heart palpitating at the start the voice gave me. It sounded so close, so loud—

I find Emma Simmons standing at my feet, arms crossed.

The first thing I notice is her face. She doesn't look angry, though based off of our last encounter, that would be completely justified. Rather, she looks frail, a little tired. I can tell by the way her shoulders curve towards me, by the way she leans on her left leg.

"What are you doing here?" I say, looking at her straight in her round, blue eyes, lined and winged with black. She only holds my gaze. Chokes it.
"It's summer. I don't have to be doing anything."

That answer doesn't seem worthy of any response, to me.

Standing tall in her perfectly ripped skinny jeans and shoulder-less crop top, she stares down at me like I'm in her way. She's never looked at me any differently. But today, I'm less willing to tolerate it.

I don't particularly enjoy her games. The way she looks at me to assert her 'dominance', mostly to herself. So after she amuses herself by staring at me a bit longer, I speak.

"Look, if you have nothing to say to me could you... leave?"

She scoffs, lifting a slender arm up to run it through her hair. Immediately after the fact, she pulls her hand away sharply to put it behind her back. Like she forgot she needed to hide something.