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If I could erase a decade, I would. If I could erase a lifetime, I would. I wouldn’t even blink an eye. Among the people in the world who unknowingly or knowingly bring misfortune to others, I am the worst. I am someone whose existence killed the one most important to me. I have a habit of asking people, what they would do if they could turn back time. What time would they choose? What would they change? During my time in the real world, I gathered many answers. When I look back, I know it’s pointless. If a person could turn back time, there would be no value in the choices we make now. However, if I could change just one thing - I would bring her back. Just her, nothing else.
The last piece of punishment Zeus laid on mankind, was giving them Hope. When you have hope, you can’t give up. When that hope is taken away, everything else loses meaning. One way or the other, you can’t win. Her existence alone damaged my soul irreparably. Her words and the tone of her voice seeped into my cracks from the first glance at her hungry hippo-socks in a cold night like the one that killed the little match girl. Had I been born a girl, my circumstances might’ve been different. However, I feel like I would’ve followed her anyway. To the ends of the Earth, up the Milky Way into a Galaxy far, far away.
The Lacie I knew was taller than a mountain. A real, active volcano that managed to warm me from the depths of my sordid existence to the farmost I ever thought. She sensed my emotional illness and curiously reached out to me, like a goddess that has no need to fear a mere human. Next to her, I was that. Nothing more, nothing less. Whether I loved or resented her for it amounts only to my egoism - and simply has no meaning. However, I have never belonged next to another human. There are many psychological studies to refer to when describing the disconnection I experience when I interact. I’ve had a very clever man explain very explicitly why my emotional map seems to be missing, but his hypothesis hasn’t helped me in any way. It is not supposed to.
From day on end, I live in an apartment composed of a toilet, kitchen, bedroom, and a living room. There are no windows and the door outside is sealed from both sides. In my bedroom I have a small closet, which is also being observed. I walk from one room to another, and the whole time there is a person who gets paid for keeping track on what I do. From the smallest of habits to second-sharp clock on how long I sleep. I am a living Truman show - except my life isn’t broadcasted to general public. If it were, it would bring this small country some wealth through media taxes - as it would be the most watched reality-series in a long time, and would feature the death of the main character. It is only human to be interested in the gore and the curious - also the beauty.
In my teens I was beautiful enough to interest a goddess. She said looking at me, is like looking at blood seep through pure white dressings and drip onto pristine snow, into which I leave no footprints. She asked me once why I avoided playing sports like Basketball or Football, and all I could say was that I need something between the people I’m supposed to protect and the people I’m supposed to harm, because it is hard for me to differentiate them if they all occupy the same space. Next to Lacie the world was clear. When she told me I had the potential to be a god among humans, I couldn’t see how. It’s different now. What is God but a flame and a bodiless voice in the desert? I am but caged in this body and the objective reality my existence creates. She died. Because she could die, she wasn’t the one who dreamed me. There was shock. There was guilt. The dissonance spread, until the hand holding her diary hardly felt my own, the weight of her daughters rested on someone else’s knees, and the heart beating louder near her brother was simply static resonance.
Oswald will never come to understand how my plan to turn this world into dust is for the better. He is simple, straightforward and kind. Then again, if he were as cold and dissonant as I am, I wouldn’t have thought I loved him as long as I did. He is no more or less than a part of this dream I see - the firewall, preventing reality seeping through. The instinct which prevents a person from subconsciously killing themselves while hypnotised. It is unsavory now, and I have decided to wake up.
Yes. I am merely sleeping. I’m seeing an endless dream, where everything I care about turns to dust. If I destroy everything - every single thing - I am sure to wake up. I’m sure to see her again - the real goddess, who won’t die, who I will serve for the rest of my life. If I exist out there. According to studies even flowers sleep. Perhaps I am one, or a butterfly resting on one. Either way, no matter how long my worthless life is allowed to last, I will once again make her laugh.
Twice a year I meet with a smart man, younger than I am, and I talk to him in riddles via camera and screen. I have nothing to expect and nothing to fear, yet I only seldom feel the need to answer questions straightforwardly. I still do at times, when a fleeting knowledge of a debt towards his father catches up with me. At times, when I consent to the medication doctor Barma prescribes to me, my body feels heavy and I crave for things like sunlight. I think about individual people and I swallow my guilt head-on like a glass of bitter poison. In this favourable loneliness, I have come to terms with this body and the limits it has. I have come acquainted with how it trembles in cold sweat after a nightful of a dream I don’t remember. My eyes water and breathing becomes unconventionally difficult. I have come to know the most pleasurable feeling of them all - Relief, after such an attack ends.
I dislike medication none the less. I would like to blame my mother, who had me eat her prescription meds from the very first moment I showed dissatisfaction towards her parenting. Alas, I merely blame her for making me unable to write music. The only thing I ever envied, was the way she loved the songs Oswald wrote for her to sing. I can play many instruments, yet it’s impossible for me to bring to life a melody of my own. Even I, only sing the songs he wrote.
Today I clean an already spotless kitchen and try my hand at baking. It has been five years since the day I walked into this place and I thought I ought to celebrate. Something changed in this monotone life yesterday evening. I have a strong feeling, that the wind will start to blow and my existence in this facility will come to an end. Then, finally, I can return to her side.