So I don't remember exactly when I wrote this. I just found it in my drafts though and I'm pretty sure it was freshman year, which would be 14 or 15 years old.
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Happiness.
It was a quite odd emotion.
Some people smiled. Others laughed. And some people...some people cried.
People were just so overwhelmed. Just filled to the brim with joy. They were overflowing with happiness and didn't know what to do. So they cried. And cried. And cried. They cried their eyes out, or maybe it was just a single tear.
But they were happy. And most people loved doing that to others; making them happy. To get them to let out a genuine smile. Get them to laugh so hard that no noise escapes their lips and tears were leaking out of their eyes from their overwhelming joy. And most got joy out of that experience, out of making people. To some, bringing people joy, brought themselves joy.
And it was magical.
Then there was the other side. The other side of humanity. The side that loathed seeing people happy, especially if they themselves weren't. If they weren't allowed to be happy, then no one else was. They tore people down. Turned them into rubble. A shell of the once happy person they used to be. Kids and adults, they loved to do this to other. It brought them their own sick, twisted joy. They got their happiness from tearing others down whilst others got it from building people back up.
It was horrible, but that is what people called humanity. There's the good and bad. The dark and the light.
For Toby, he tried to stay in the light. He loved making people happy, and he was a happy child himself. Never to be seen with a frown on his face. Always laughing, and if not, a giant, toothy smile adorned his features. He was the good. He was the light.
But then people brought him down.
The unhappy people, the dark ones, they saw this smiling, laughing, happy child, and they had the uncontrollable need to crush him. And that's exactly what they did. They destroyed this child.
Kids at school tormented him as he struggled to read. They teased him and pushed him constantly until he finally broke, and they continued. Continued to push him, even after he was reduced to tears. They smiled and laughed at the young boy, not caring at all about his tears. Only happy that he was no longer smiling.
In addition to the bullies at school, his protectors betrayed him. The people who were supposed to stick with him through everything, absolutely everything, had condemned him to a hell that he had no hope of escaping.
Forever shrouded with sadness. Never a smile on his face. His tinkling laughter never to be heard again. Tears, not of joy, but of misery now leaked down his face.
