For as long as Evelyn could remember, her home has never been a safe place. With the constant threat of her mother's erratic behaviour, Evelyn is nothing more than her punching bag.
But one day, she finds an abandoned poem left on a park bench, and...
Evelyn acknowledged the fact that when she was younger, she wasn't the brightest of kids. In fact, she'd go as far to say that she was stupid, idiotic and naïve. The only excuse she would let herself have was that she didn't truly understand what Mother was capable off.
To Evelyn, it was all a bit like a game.
She often found herself pondering things such as 'what could she get away with?' or 'how much could she do without getting caught?'.
All she truly wanted was to be like everyone else, but for the life of her, she couldn't comprehend why, for her, everything had to be different.
One time, she tried to skip school.
All she thought she had to do was not go inside after Mother drove off. But what she didn't know about at the time was social services.
After three days of not going to school, she came home to find Mother, a few police and a couple of other people, who she soon later found out to be social workers, waiting for her in their living room.
Mother played the dutiful role of a fearful, and fretting parent in front of their audience. But as soon as they left, the irony of it struck her, the fact that the social workers hadn't sensed a single thing off about Mother's demeanour, as all hell broke loose.
That was the last time that she did anything of such calibre.
When Evelyn reached the bridge the following Tuesday, relief filled her upon seeing it empty, like it should've been. As she put her bag down, though, she noticed something slotted between the wooden slates of the bench.
Pulling it out, she opened it to realise it was another poem.
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Why, was all she could think.
Why did he keep leaving her poems?
What did he think this would accomplish?
In a dire need for answers, she grabbed a pen from her pocket and scribbled at the bottom of the sheet, Why are you doing this?
She returned the paper where she found it, and tried to forget about it as she sat on the bridge.
• • •
As Evelyn sat outside during lunch hour, flipping over the pages of one of her textbooks, a girl she'd never spoken to before approached her. She waited for a second, clearing her throat, as Evelyn was too engrossed to even notice her presence. She looked up to meet eyes with the girl.
"Uh, some boy called Darren is looking for you," the girl said, tilting her head to the school gates, where distant outline of a boy stood.
"Right, thanks," Evelyn replied, but on the inside she was sighing in exasperation.
Pushing herself out of her chair, she packed up her things and made her way to the iron-wrought fenced that enclosed the whole school.
It was as if they purposely wanted this place to feel like prison.
Upon reaching him she said in complete genuineness, "Are you stalking me?"
His hazel eyes widened slightly in distress. "Of course not! I just wanted to talk. I saw your note."
Evelyn was willing to admit that this whole unplanned rendezvous could be boiled down to her own encouragement— she couldn't have expected to leave such a message without expecting any reply. But now that they were here, she supposed, she may as well get answers out of it.
"Why do you keep leaving me poems? I don't want them."
Poetry had never been Evelyn's forte. In English class, it was always a struggle for her to understand the very words before her eyes. Simple words were no longer simple. Suddenly, it was her job to unscramble the cipher in front of her.
But, that wasn't the only reason why she didn't like poetry.
It made her realise why nobody would see her— to hear the silent words she'd scream out.
She was a jumbled mess, and it took too much effort to understand why.
"Firstly, ouch. And secondly, I was getting to that."
"Sorry..." she said. She didn't know why everything she said to this guy kept coming out at such jagged undertones. She knew better than that. "I just mean, I don't understand what to do with them."
"Well," he replied, shrugging effortlessly. "You read them."
"And after that?"
"That's completely up to you Evelyn— perhaps you could try and see things from the poet's point of view, or maybe you could try and construct your own meaning of existence, or maybe in the end you just do nothing, and go on with life."
Despite giving her a full range of answers to her single question, she didn't feel like she was at any greater advantage with such knowledge.
Queries demanded concrete answers— not pieces of flowery words strung together, or wishy-washy sentiments with no true meaning.
"It's just I don't like poetry very much. If criticism is what you're looking for, stop asking me because I don't even understand what I'm reading half the time."
"I very much doubt that."
She shook her head in disbelief. He needed to stop whatever this was— trying to suss her out.
Much to her relief, the five-minute warning bell began to ring, signalling that lunch period was finally over.
"I should go." She turned to leave.
"Wait, writer's block."
Sighing, she said, "What?"
"I keep giving you the poems because I have writer's block."
"Again, I don't follow."
"I'm trying to work my way through it, but I don't like any of the stuff I'm writing. I just didn't want to hold onto them."
What Evelyn was beginning to realise was that this boy's mind was a mystery; there were so many things that she didn't, nor couldn't even attempt to, fathom about him. Nothing really made sense and every time he spoke, it didn't help to clear the dubiety.
"I really don't get you."
He chuckled lightly, stretching his arms out wide like a beacon for all to see. "There's nothing to get Evelyn. I'm all open to interpretation."
