Scrambled Thoughts

What do you do when it feels your heart is breaking and everything around you is crumbling down, shattering like a baseball going through a window? The feeling gets to you, consumes you. Every thought is one that you’d rather not think of, or never have before, but this feeling that you have, these thoughts that you think, won’t go away.
You start to disappear, around a corner, out of sight. It’s not like people don’t care about you, because in your damaged heart and your thoughtful brain, you know that they do. Your family, your friends, even boyfriend. They all care, but for some reason, that feeling of dread continues to bother you.
It’s almost as if you are anxious about something, something that you can’t put your finger on. You don’t know quite what it is, but you do know that things aren’t going well. Your mind is constantly alive, buzzing, and hyper. Your eyes droop, then close, but still, you can’t fall asleep. How wonderful it would be to drift off and sleep soundly for once. But, you know that won’t happen. It hasn’t happened for a while, and you aren’t sure why. You do know that it all relates back to that feeling.
Is it annoyance? Is it frustration? Is it hurt? You recognize the feeling as a bad one because you’re always in a funk. You’re going through life as if you were invisible, as if you didn’t care whether people spoke to you or just walked right through you. Or maybe you do care, but you don’t want to care.
Because when you are alone, the tears running down your face, and as you stare into the mirror in your bedroom, hugging your bright red teddy bear because there is no one else to comfort you, you wish that somebody understood how you felt. You want someone to hold you as you cry, hold you as you scream, hold you when you can’t hold yourself. You need somebody to be there for you and not run away, afraid of the tears or afraid of you and your outbursts. You think about the possibility of calling your mom or dad into your room, but your mind skips over the idea because you know how ridiculous that is. You think about your best friends, but you know they won’t help. And lastly, you remember your boyfriend, but then you realize how desperate you sound. So you cry, and you scream, and you look into the mirror just to see your pathetic self with a red and upset face.
As you look deep into the eyes of your reflection, you try to understand this feeling, and you end up shocked. It just occurred to you that maybe, just maybe, that dreadful feeling that you lock inside, that you won’t let out, that you know nobody else would understand, is something very common indeed. It is simply loneliness, and you think of the reasons why you would be lonely, and you come up with a perfect answer that unfortunately provides no solution. Even though you have your supportive family, and your wonderful friends, and your boyfriend who you know you are too clingy to, you crave that one person that you hope to find someday. That person who you can talk to for hours without running out of things to say, who you can spend time with everyday without getting sick of each other, who you can give your heart to—every piece of it without the fear that they may break it.But, that person isn’t there with you now, and the loneliness is difficult to handle. Until you find that person, or that person finds you, you have to act as if everything is alright, that you don’t feel that feeling—not ever... And so you put on a fake smile, brush the tears away from your eyes, and stand up pretending that you never cried in the first place.
-Courtney Adams