The Maze

The walls closed.
"Once you enter you can never get out," The sign told me.
It didn't speak, it only stared me in the face with it's shabbily painted letters with the finish peeling away. How did I wind up in such a situation like this? I didn't do anything wrong. I didn't hurt anyone, I only tried to make them happy. Yet, I find myself lost in a maze that changes and alters its form just to make me angry.
Why? Because I was running, I suppose. That's what people said, I travelled the world and hopped city to city because I was trying to escape something that was following me. Maybe I was, I don't really know. All I knew was every day I stayed in the same place something felt like it was daunting me. I needed to get away from the people I knew and find a new life. Do something for myself, for once. This repeated every other month, or so. If that was running, then hell I might as well have been running my whole life.
Feeling hopeless, I began to drag my feet. What was the use in walking around this god forsaken maze if there was no way to get out? Yet still, my feet refused to stop their motion. I was hurt, my feet were scraped and sore. That wasn't all about me, that was hurting, though. I knew my depression like a song I couldn't forget.
It was self induced, ironically. I wasn't depressed when this all began, and maybe that was where the trouble started. My head compelled me toward the pain, drove me to it. I wasn't depressed, but I wanted to be. Which in turn, forced me into being this sad and lonely creature that was entirely unlovable. People would tell me otherwise, but I know the truth. I was a terrible person in the past, and there's no way around that. I kicked the small rocks in front of me.
That was, until I became lovable to some strange degree. There was a boy I met, and at first I thought I roped him into this web of confusion and horrible thoughts, but that was when they began to disperse. The years of forced pain started to slide away in streams, leaving my sides and creating puddles at my feet. Of course, pain like that doesn't leave, it just stays around your ankles. But this boy, this wonderful boy, kept it there. The feelings and thoughts couldn't consume me as long as we were standing in them together. He kept their level down.
It was when he stepped out that they began to rise. They would simmer down when he returned, but there came a time when he stopped coming back. The fears and sadness has been swarming around me, drowning me ever since he left. It wasn't just about him, although at first it was. He was involved in my sadness, but ultimately the sadness was always there, he just stopped trying to make it go away.
Before, he would kiss my wounds and hold me through anything that happened. Once that type of blockage disapated, every thought of self-hatred, and every longing to die just rose to where it was before. This time, it's solidified around me, turning to an icy bitterness. I sank to the ground, resolving to give my feet some rest.
Part of me wondered sometimes, if I ever really loved him. Of course, this causes an argument in my thoughts, because I'll never know for sure. There were things I loved, and things I wasn't crazy about. Seemingly, the ending itself made me quite biased as to how I was supposed to feel, and how I was expected to see him. I see the good things about him, the things that made me love being his. Yet, there are those unwavering factors that make me unsure if it was just the happiness he handed to me that drew me to him.
No, I resolved. I loved everything about him. It's just the choices he made in the end that I didn't love. We laughed at the same things, enjoyed the same songs. I would have done anything, should he have let me, and it left me floundering. When you put so much into something and come out short, you forget what it's like to put effort into yourself, which was why I felt so betrayed. He didn't betray me, exactly. He just didn't act in the smartest way possible.
Definitely not. Judging by the thoughts he handed to me after breaking things off and starting over with someone else, I could think of a few ways this could have been executed much better. How could I have looked at myself without thinking I wasn't pretty enough, or I didn't give as much as I should have, or I could have done things better, or been kinder? How could I have possibly looked myself in the eye and thought nothing short of being dead? It was bad enough he didn't want to be with me, but add on top of that the lies he threw at me to cover up that he wanted to be with another girl, someone whom he said he hated so many moons ago. Which meant, what was I? Nothing better than a hated thing, it seemed.
Looking at me now, I still see the same thoughts. They're still as sharp. I rake my eyes over my hair, my face, my body. I think to myself, "He gave you up for a reason, you were never worth keeping," My mind will take a quick pause to scrutinize every detail. "God, there's nothing redeeming about you, is there? You're just disgusting. I hope you die." And this goes on every day, ever moment, a relentless commentary that haunts me.
It affects me some times more than it does others, but it always affects me. People constantly try to remind me, it wasn't about me, it was about him. They tell me he was confused, and he just loved someone else. That makes me laugh. Is that supposed to make me feel better about myself? It doesn't. A slap in the face would hurt much less. I would much rather you hurt me physically than mess around in my psyche. There's so much damage done in there, it's entirely nonredeemable.
But what was I expecting, to be honest? I was in love with someone who I was terrified whether or not they'd ever love me back. How badly did I want to be everything he wanted, but I wasn't. It's not because I wasn't good enough, it's because he wanted something that I didn't know how to become.
My emotions were rising, both my anger and hopelessness. There was a sound from around the corner, a sound of rustling leaves and breaking branches. I stumbled my way to the source of the noise, not surprised to see another wall of hedge materializing in front of me. The more I thought about myself, the more they appeared. Maybe the key to leaving was to not think.
Sliding to the ground again, I tried to keep my mind as blank as possible. Never before had I realized how much I thought, how much clutter I truly kept in this tiny brain of mine. They say you never know what you have until you don't have it any longer, I didn't think the saying went for the types of thoughts you kept in your head. I suppose sayings like that really don't have a rule of what it did affect, things just happen how they do. There's no pattern to it, sometimes.
The branches crumbled to dust. Maybe this not thinking thing wasn't so bad. Behind the wall, I saw a new path of jumbled maze I had yet to see. Curious, I let myself become enthralled in the new chance to find my way out. More walls began to peel away.
Trying to keep my mind an empty canvas was quite the task. It was like the game where you tried not to think about it, and the second you did, you lost. No matter what happened, you always ended up losing, too. You try not to think about it, and it doesn't go away. If you forget, the thought will reconnect itself in your consciousness and you'll lose anyway. The trick to something, is not trying to forget, but rather trying to remember. Whenever I want to remember anything, it always seemed too far away from my grasp, but close enough that I know it's there. Sometimes I wonder if my brain does that on purpose.
As I rounded the next corner I came to a concrete wall, standing sturdily between two long columns of vine. The words "I love you" were scrawled messily in black ink across the wall, a stone bench placed beneath them. I didn't know why, but the words themselves made me burst into tears, even though I was unaware of who wrote them, or what was forcing my eyes to leak a salty solution that made them burn. Feeling worn out, I sat on the bench as I cried.
The stone was warm, probably from sitting in the blazing sun for the day. It felt nice beneath my sore skin. Slowly the tears stopped the less I questioned where they were coming from. I know he told me he loved me before, and did we ever say it to each other a lot. He more than likely wasn't even the one to print those pretty letters upon that maze, being that he's probably still in our home town, comfortably locked away in his pretty life.
What was it about the words that hurt me, though, I wondered. Was it the fact that I didn't hear them anymore? That couldn't have been it. Or if it was, I was too blind to recognize it. My heavy thoughts pushed me to think harder, instead of accept the simple answer. If I was going to be here, I might as well do some soul searching.
Could it be that I was afraid that he didn't love me, or doesn't anymore? No, that's much to obvious. Albeit, a terrifying thought, it wasn't a very realistic soft spot. Suddenly, it began to meld together, and form a coherent thought. All of this hatred, this bitterness, left me weary. When it followed you around day in and day out, it takes a toll on how you see things. I could feel my ice formed of sadness melting as I untangled my web of confusion.
Quite possibly, it wasn't from his perspective, that sentiment. For all I know, in a sleepy stupor, I could have written it upon the wall myself as a cry for help. I did love him, I knew very well. How I loved him, that was a different story. Did I want to be his, I couldn't tell, but love has no specific definition. For me, when I could smile at someone I wanted to hate with every inch of my being, and worry about them even though I had no right to be concerned, or when I allowed myself to hurt more than I ever had because I wanted them to be alright, that was when I knew I loved a person. Maybe not be in love with them, but that signified the kind of compassion I was willing to give for someone I cared for. I held that feeling for him, and it hurt me, sometimes.
Time and time again, I think of how I just wish he could be happy. He never really was, being that he was constantly sad. However, if he could just be that level of euphoric with me, that would make everything that much better. But I know better than to be selfish when it comes to him, it just isn't possible. I couldn't possibly allow myself to take all I wanted knowing it would make him sad, and maybe that's why things got to be the way they were.
I wasn't mad at him, I figured. His decisions, maybe, but never once could I have been mad at him. You can't get angry at someone for being confused. Or maybe you could, I mean, I'm upset with myself and that's what I am. Confused. Everybody gets confused, it seems, and they're so mixed up they can't even tell they're confused. That's what had me hopping from continent to continent like I was allergic to staying in one place for more than a month. This wasn't about him, I realized. It was, for once, about me.
Across from the me, a panel of vines collapsed to the dusty ground. Outside it, was the forest I wandered here from. In disbelief, I was almost afraid to stand, afraid that if I made a move too quickly it would prove to just be a hopeful delusion. At the same time, I didn't want to hesitate, just in case the door closed once more.
I felt something crumpled in my hand. A note, I recognized. I unscrambled the arrangement of the paper scrap and decoded the perfect handwriting looped in a beautiful scheme.
"Congratulations," It read. "The secret to escaping the maze corrupt of sorrows and pain, is to forgive."
At first, I wanted to question, "Forgive what?" but in an instant, I knew. Not only did I forgive him, the boy I loved to blame all of my problems on, I forgave myself for being an unreliable twat for the past year and a half. I recognized myself in my own skin for the first time since I was told to leave home, that I was no longer welcome in our cozy apartment once I had another place to stay. I thought that was the root of my problem, but it was simply me. There are ways to handle things, and there are ways to deal. This was not one of them.
Of course, there's no real way to deal with everything, but there are ways you shouldn't. But sometimes, to find yourself, to find who you are, you have to let it all go and get lost. Get so lost you don't even recognize your own name among a sea of strangers. Once you lose who you are, it gives you the chance to find it. You can't find something if it's only half missing.
Wiping the residual tears from my sun-kissed cheeks, I stood to my feet. I walked from the maze, lingering my gaze on it's taunting walls for a moment. After committing all I had learned to memory, I pushed myself away from it, walking back to the tourist sight that I had deviated from. Maybe, now that I was in Russia, I would stay here for a while. Get to know everything it had to offer, and live instead of just existing in place upon place. Or maybe I would return home. Wherever I ended up now, was going to be a place I could call home. And I was happy.