Chapter Text
I don’t know what happened to the child before me. My mother never talked about them, but I saw a few pictures, and when I looked closely, I found a few journal entries.
The babe had darker hair when they were born, but it got brighter and was soon blond. Its eyes, though they are closed in most pictures, are bright blue.
The issue is that I don’t know if this child is human, or if it’s me. I don’t know if my mother knows either. The only things that I know are that the word ‘human’ isn’t something that could neatly describe me and that one picture the babe looked sickly and entirely human, the next it was healthy, and ‘held an otherworldly beauty’. My mother’s words, not mine.
I certainly hope that I am my mother’s baby. I hope that her real child wasn’t stolen, and I am ashamed to admit that it’s not even fully because that would mean my mother lost a child. I hope that my mother’s real child wasn’t stolen and replaced with me, because I don’t want to think about the implications that would have about my biological parent(s).
Was I put in the place of a stolen child because my parent(s) wanted the love of a human child? Was it malice? Or did they simply want a servant?
Whatever the reason may have been, I don’t like to think about it. It makes me feel. So much. Too much.
When I feel too much my mother always has something for me to do to help me.
I love her so much. So much that I cry.
When I feel it isn’t just a twist of the gut. It drowns me.
Even good feelings can overwhelm me and pin me to my spot while I choke.
Mother never even had to ask what was wrong, she just seemed to know.
Even when I have to tell her what’s happening or why she understands and always seems to know the best way to help me.
I don’t speak the way she does, but she always understands, and even when she doesn’t she’s willing to learn.
Talking is an awful feeling. It tastes awful and the words don’t work right with my mouth. Much like it’s difficult for people from different areas to pronounce words from others, it is difficult for me to speak at all.
Feelings and speaking often lead me to no longer being tethered, and our neighbors find it disturbing. The people at the store stare at me. Everyone knows that I don’t smile when people are around, but I’ve seen the neighborhood kids in the window, watching me jump and dance and laugh and I hate it.
I hate when they do that.
I feel exposed. In my home. Where I’m meant to be safe. They had no right.
I tried to smile more, but I hate it. It’s like speaking. It feels wrong, and that becomes overwhelming.
I hate smiling, I hate talking, and feeling is always like getting caught in the sea during a terrible storm. But not in the middle. Just offshore. If I fight my feet may graze the sand a few times, I can see the shore, but only ever for a moment before the waves crash over me again, tossing me around. Throwing me in and out too fast for me to know what’s happening. Sound so loud, flashes of light so bright until I no longer know up from down, left, or right.
I communicate with my mother just fine, so why does everyone else insist that I speak to her? Why do they stare when I don’t smile? Why do they yell when I don’t talk the way they do?
My mother always says to not worry about them though.
She told me I can ignore them because they just want to make me ashamed.
Shame is maybe the worst emotion to feel.
It starts as a bloom in my stomach, then it turns nauseating, then the pressure builds inside me and I feel sick and hot, and everything is collapsing in while also going out. It’s like when a star dies and it’s awful.
The first time I felt it I would’ve sworn I was dying.
I’m still not convinced that I didn’t.
My mother has never tried to trick me into talking or laughing, which the other kids always said she should do.
They accuse me of being a fairy, and maybe they’re right, but even if I am… Does my mother know? If not what would she do if she found out? Would she leave me like my other parent(s)?
I hope she wouldn’t.
I hope she doesn’t.
I just want to be her child. I want her to be my mother. I never want to not be able to be with her.
I love my mother, and I am entirely confident that she loves me too. That’s one of the many things she says in both mine and her languages.
She tells me all the time, with words and with what she does.
I can only tell her with actions, but she always understands.
I love my mother and she loves me, so does it really matter if I was the baby she carried for those months?
Even if her baby was taken it will be taken care of. They always are. So I don’t feel the need to feel for the child. Not when it hurts like it does.
I hope that baby is as happy and loved as I am.