Madness.

11.

Beyonce put this into words better than I ever could. 

The memories of the sandcastles I used to build had washed away. Like they too wanted to be with the waves. Like they knew my fate before I did. Like they too would rather be dead than here on this beach. 

I don't remember when things got this bad or this good. 

I don't remember if it was always like this. 

If it was, I don't remember why I stayed so long.

Why I tried to be a good child or why I tried to be a good person at all. 

I could've been a rebellious-neglected child with misguided face tat's and drinking problem no one cared mention. 

I could've been the child parents would hate to see their children become. 

I could've had an emo phase.

I could've moved across the planet, away from all this and changed my name to Dixan Balls or  Phil McCock or Sharon. But I stayed here, why did I stay here? I don't know.

I'd learnt so much on this beach, learnt things I wish I hadn't. I learnt patience. I practiced perfection. Now I practiced restraint, I was bound by the seal of my word that I wouldn't walk into the waves. No matter how still they got. No matter how peaceful they looked in comparison to my life.

I was home, in the heart of the chaos. No matter how much I didn't want to be here. The child in me was still desperate to win over the affections of her dear old parents. The child in me was trusting and pathetically weak, but she was part of me. A part of me that took control most of the time.

From here I could hear the hustle and bustle from inside.

The laughter, the warmth, the joy that filled my family beach house leaking out onto the beach, staining the sand a deep amber. The yellow-orange light of the fire place polluted each crevice and corner of the house. And I felt out of place. Because I was the tears and the cold and the crippling depression that wasn't welcome with the rest of them. And there would be no cooler lighting to clash with the actually monotone floors and counter tops of the house. 

My parents were trying to trick their guests into believing that this house always looked this homey and comfortable. So they infested the house with warm yellows and autumn colours, they unlocked the glass doors and hung up fairy lights as if they had always been behind the hipster trend. They loved modernism at heart and you could see it in the way they stood, with their eyes hopping from place to place, with their tight lipped smiling parade as they greeted all Melina's guests. Mother could never stand her friends, but for the life of her she wouldn't dare upset her favourite daughter. I was the odd ball. The lopsided mistake. The one that came out feet first. I was made aware of that long ago.

With every fiber of my being, being just a speck less than my younger sister. I wander what I did to deserve all of it. I wonder why I was always less than in comparison to my long fingered thief of a sister. 

The wedding bells were in the air. In my ears. Ringing in my head. In constant repetition. Its sound has become so putrid, so distasteful, resembling nails being dragged across a blackboard. Yes, that sound the one that sends shivers down your spine that never fades away, the one that makes your jaw clench and your eardrums explode. And I can't help that discomfort that creeps into my body every time I set foot into that house. With every moment I spend listening to those bells I contemplate breaking my word like cheap plastic and running into the sea in my backyard. And I wonder why that sound doesn't seem to disturb anyone else in that house. Why don't they all look like they're about to collapse? Why is no one begging for it to stop? I have concluded that I am the only one here still capable of hearing.

It wouldn't be the first time the simpletons in my family were deaf or blind to what happened in this house. Or perhaps they simply did not care. 

In the morning we would go dress shopping. Melina would find a dress to suit her cliche sense of style. Mother would shed tears of joy, giggling and chortling until the champagne finally dealt with her. She would mumble a goodbye as she asked Rupert, her butler, to take her home. It would leave the bride and the woman she asked to be her maid of honor stranded and left to their own devices. The maid of honor would have to choke back tears and pretend she didn't wish it were her in those dresses, or her with that ring or her with Arthur's child brewing in her stomach. And so the maid of honor would indulge in some of that champagne and pity herself when she isn't unconscious by her 6th glass. She will fight the urge to murder sister on the way home, and she will have to hope her drunken self doesn't break the weakening seal of her word.

Melina asked me to be her maid of honor. Mother said yes for me and so I didn't have a choice.

So here I was on the beach, wallowing in my painful sobriety. I wanted a drink to numb the pounding of my skull and something to make me forget my missing heart. Something to make me forget how this house reminds me of the worst night of my life, and I how I was so close to getting relief from all this. I wanted to forget Arthur and Blue and Melina and her baby. I'd forgotten myself long before this anyway. 

I sunk myself in the sand, I stared at the sky like it could give me answers. I laugh. I giggle. I chuckle. I sigh. I think of Blue and what he must be doing right now. I dig my toes into the wet sand beneath me, wondering why the ocean must be such a tease. 

I remember sandcastles and my parents and my devotion to earn their love. And I remember failing. I remember this beach and the first time the waves asked for friendship. I remember razors and I remember cuts and blood and tears and salt water stinging my wrists. And no one else seems to remember. No one seems to remember the disappointment on their faces. They don't remember calling me crazy. They don't remember leaving me behind when they left. They don't remember my tears or my screams. They don't remember letting me starve here. I used to build sandcastles. Alone on this beach I used to dream of somewhere better than this place. But I can't dream anymore, I only see my memories. Memories that only I remember. And my PTSD be pretty like that, leaving me so tired I believe I must still be dreaming. 

I stared up at the stars, wondering if they remembered too. I ask them why no one else does. They tell me no one cares and I don't retaliate. It's a truth, bitter and becoming; colonizing and angry; rampant; controlling. It never leaves my mouth

As I sit here, still and unmoving and unchanging I decide that I want to change my name. I want my name to be something prettier. Something they haven't tainted yet. Something they haven't filled with disappointment and anger. I want to be something beautiful. I want be someone I haven't been. Someone lovable. Someone they'd miss when six feet under. Someone they'd cry over, just for a second.

So perhaps I could be Sharon.

Or I could be Clara

Maybe Taylor

Even Wendy or Gwen or Diane.

I could be Nowel.

Or Hannah.

Or Belle.

I like Belle. I think it's a nice name. It's pretty too. Almost too pretty. It oozes perfection. Serving as my juxtaposition

I could be Belle.

Yes, Belle. Like the princess. Perhaps I can be Belle and Beast. Both captor and victim. Victim and captor. Beauty and her beast. Beast without beauty. Both. I can be both.

I laugh with myself, hopping to my feet, raising my dress and skipping to the edge of the ocean. I let the water wash over my feet, the sand tickles my ankles, makes obstacles of my toes. The moon plays with the salty brine that stings my eyes and my cheeks and stains my dress. I dance around the beach, with the arms of the moon wrapped around me as I am its gravity, its orbit, its universe. The stars watch in awe. Venus can't stop staring. The waves clap, giving me a standing ovation as the tide picks up. My lungs play the music, the mechanical pump between them becomes the beat, the rhythm that tells my feet where to go, how to move. The man in the moon smiles down at me, eyes sparkling with reflected joy as he wipes the rivers from my face. He places his cold lips against my own, gently. Oh so gently. And my mouth. Oh my mouth tastes of the sadness deep within the both of us. And I can't remember if this is what love tastes like.