All The Colors In One | FILLIE

twenty six - iridescent

song - If You Love Me, Come Clean by Flatsound

~"I can always pick up books
in the search of what I need
but that doesn't help me any
if you're impossible to read
so if you love me, come clean"~

All of her life, she felt like she was falling. It was never clear where she was falling to- whether it was into the unknown, or into a dark sinking hole, and it was not even clear whether or not she would make it to the bottom. There was a magnet within her, pulling her down into the depths of the unknown faster every day, like it pulled all of the weight from her stomach and let it sit on her ankles. It sometimes seemed that she would never make it to the end of the dark hole, that perhaps she would be stuck in this limbo - falling but never landing anywhere. Maybe she had become used to her safety net over the months, the protective shield that steadied her, made her less scared of the unknown depths below her. If anything, at least she knew that she wasn't the only one falling down that hole, that she wasn't alone. 

But sitting in that chair, there was no safety net with her. 

"How are you adjusting to having your vision back?" the kind lady asked her, leaning forward with a comforting smile. 

Millie looked down at her hands, "Okay, I guess...it's just a lot. Sometimes I feel like I'm still dreaming and that one day, my vision will just disappear again. Maybe I don't want to get too attached but...it feels good to have more control. I'm trying to get used to it."

"Does it make you feel happier?" she wondered.

"Why do you ask that?"

The lady smiled sympathetically. "Because you don't seem happy."

Millie's eyes fell back down to her fingers, taking note of the slightly chipped nail varnish on her fingernails, doing anything to avoid the conversation. She had been trying her best to keep busy, to spend more time with her family and more time studying so that she wouldn't stop to think about everything. If she thought about it too much, she started to think about every last detail within her life and how it made her feel, how it was filled with so much color and light now that it created goosebumps. Then she would become angry at the feeling inside of her heart, the emptiness that had been laying there for a long time - perhaps her entire life. She started to focus on the sad truth, that her vision had not fixed everything. That she somehow still felt so dark inside despite the light in her world.  She wasn't expecting to have everything that she wanted and to still feel like something was missing. 

She took a deep breath. "I-I guess...I just though that it would fix everything. But I still feel like there is something...wrong, something missing."

The counselor nodded. "That is understandable."

"Is it?" Millie tilted her head. "Because I don't understand it."

"Have you ever thought that maybe what you are feeling...could be more than just your vision? That maybe losing your sight wasn't what made you feel so different, so...unhappy with the world that you live in? Maybe we need to start with your life before you lost your vision...start with you and what is causing those feelings."

Millie was silent.

"Do any memories stick out to you...before your condition?"

Her voice had a strange edge to it. "I had just started sixth grade. I...I never had many friends but there was this girl that pushed me off my bike. My parents got really upset when I told them and saw the bruise...and tried to get me to point the girl out."