Perfectly Imperfect Writing

A Place For My Terrible Writing

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Hey!

Hey! This is a blog for writers to come together to create something truly unique, myself (Shannon @spoopyprincess98) and Ryan (@rdbaird) will be writing various things, poems, stories etc. Enjoy! ^_^ 

p.s send us your writing and we will promo yours too on our page if we like it, seeing as we want this to be a community created by writers, for writers <3 

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Howdy Followers!

Hey everyone , Shannon here! I know Ryan and I haven’t been around! Very huge apologies! I found out I was pregnant with our rainbow baby a while back, so I’ve not really had time or motivation to write! I am starting to feel a little more normal now in my pregnancy so expect a fair few bits of writing from myself this winter and possibly through my maternity leave next year haha! Thanks so much for your patience, as a special thanks, I am working on a little something for you all which should be available in the next few days ;) 

Love always, 

Shannon (@spoopyprincess98) <3 xoxo

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A Broken Soldier by Shannon

Broken. 

Not worthy. 

Tainted. 

All because of you, 

the sickening smell of your aftershave still burns my nostrils,

you lay ontop of me, 

using me however you saw fit, 

you eventually left me alone to wallow in my shame, 

and yet the weight of you never left me, 

The weight of your body always prevelant in my chest, 

weighing me down, day after day, 

every breath I take is a struggle, 

you took the best parts of me, 

no childlike naivety remained here, 

innocence unwelcome in a place like this, 

and yet I fight, 

I survive, 

Plagued by the nightmares you created in my head, 

sick girl, crazy girl, attention seeker, 

all names I bore because of you, 

and whilst every day I am consumed by the uncleanliness that stains my soul, 

You will not stain me, 

you will not walk among my loved ones, 

you will not strangle me into silence, 

you will not take me, 

for I am more than your toy, 

I am the soldier, 

constantly battling my mind,

battling the urge to give in to what you wrote into my story for me, 

refusing to walk the path you forged,

I will not be your good little girl, 

but your reckoning instead. 

A hurricane, blowing through everything you created inside of me, 

forging my own path, 

my own story. 

A story worth writing, 

worth reading, 

worth living for. 

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12 Steps at a Time by Ryan

I promise, I am trying my best

But as you can probably guess...

I faltered.

I am chemically altered.

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Hey!

Hey! This is a blog for writers to come together to create something truly unique, myself (Shannon @shannonthemusichoe) and Ryan (@rdbaird) will be writing various things, poems, stories etc. Enjoy! ^_^ 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

My Tumblr is now @spoopyprincess98 guys! 

Thanks 

Shannon xxxx

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Beautiful Sadness by Shannon

I remember the day I met you, 20 weeks

20 weeks too soon. 

You were perfection, 

your gorgeous little head protected by your woolen hat, 

tiny fingers wrapped around mine, 

My nose, my mouth, only they were now yours and not mine, 

My world fell the day you did, 

I have never experienced such beauty and sadness 

like the kind you brought into the world, 

And then they took you, 

My entire world fell apart and imploded, 

Lungs empty, 

clawing desperately, 

trying to surface, 

trying to survive you long enough to mourn you, 

Trying to scream, so that someone, 

anyone can hear, 

Only to be strangled by my own thoughts, 

Trying so hard to escape the weight of this feeling, 

Trying to get close to healing, 

But all I can do is think about how I’m here, 

And you’re there, 

Wandering,

Lost, 

Crushed under the weight of this feeling, 

Drowning, 

Waiting for the reaper to grab my hand and take me to you, 

So that I don’t have to be without you anymore, 

Here with your daddy just trying to survive you. 

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Hope by Shannon

It was a day like any other when I found out I had gotten the best gift ever bestowed upon me in my entire life. It’s funny how one moment can change your entire life forever. I woke up that day and had absolutely no idea just how my life would change. You see, I had never given my future much thought, not till I saw you for the first time, not till I learned of your existence. I saw those little red lines and it gave my life meaning, in a way no one else could ever understand. Something I had waited years to see, something I wanted my whole life. And I finally had it. No one will ever be able to fully comprehend what you mean to me, it’s something I don’t think I will ever find words to explain fully. Because there aren’t enough words in any dictionary to explain how much I love you. The things I would do for you. 

I am your warrior, I will fight for you till I no longer stand, because as long as you are happy, as long as you feel safe and loved, my life has meaning, my face shall smile with yours, even on your darkest days, I will fight for you, I will love you, till I am no longer here to do so. You are burned into my heart and soul for eternity. And nothing will ever change how much I love you, no one will ever rip us apart, for you have my heart and always will.  You are my biggest blessing, my perfect princess and I cannot wait to meet you. 

I know now that no matter what life throws at me, I can deal with it, because I have you, my entire world sleeping comfortably in my tummy waiting till the day we meet. I am awestruck by you and how much I love you, it is something I never thought humanly possible, I didn’t know I had the capacity to love something in the way that I love you, you will forever be my biggest achievement. 

I love you so, my little Hope,

Mummy xxx 

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Soul Bearer by Shannon

I had never been a girl that needed much, I was known for being easily amused, not high maintenance. I was a girl who would cry just off of you running her a bath, one small act of kindness meant the world. So no part of my heart was prepared for you and the good you put into this world just from being in it. I had never met someone so kind, so loving and affectionate, someone that would give me the world at the drop of a hat. It would always be hard to fathom just how truly happy and truly at peace I felt with you, as part of your world. When we met I was not only one with the darkness... It consumed me, taking over every part of me. I hung with guys who I knew would treat me like shit, put myself in stupid situations just to feel alive. But I never felt truly alive, not till I met you. You are ingrained on my soul, your name surely carved into my heart till the day it stops beating. And I would never be able to predict this one day, the one day you took my life and changed it forever, the one day you would make me happier than I ever thought possible, give me things I thought would never come across my path in one hundred years. 

You are my heart and soul and everything in between, you took a sad girl in a dark world, and you filled her days with such joyous light that it would make anyone who stumbled upon it utterly jealous. Our relationship was something to behold, something that no one else had ever experienced, so intense, so raw and primal that it was the rarest form of love there was. Pure, unfiltered love, the kind of love talked about in books, in movies. Perfection. That’s what you are to me. And now you are a silent soul bearer, drifting through the night like a genie in a lamp granting wishes, bringing happiness to all. As I stared at those two red lines my heart soared, everything I had ever wanted was actually happening, and it was all down to you. You my blue eyed boy, are the greatest and most fascinating creature to cross my path, I am entranced with you, every movement, every word and facial expression mesmerizing. I am addicted to you and you could give me no better gift than you have already. You truly are the gift that keeps on giving, every love song on the radio, you are my heart and soul and I will forever be under your spell, soul bonded with you till the ends of time. 

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A Wonder of the Modern World

In any other situation, in any other time in my life before this point, I would have systematically set fire to all that we were, like it was my job.

The love I had for her would never stop, never rest or break. Every day it grew, consuming me entirely, as she showed me more and more of herself. I would never survive her, of this I was absolutely certain. I would listen to the sound of her sleeping, snoring slightly and my world was endless. 

She was my paramour. My muse. My reason to wake up. With all that I had and all that I was, I vowed to spend my life showing her all of the wonderful things that she could not see about herself, all of the things that I loved about her. She could not see herself as I did, in the ways that made my heart beat so rapidly I worried it might break free of my chest. 

We both had fears - with good reason but this was nothing like anything that had come before. And I do not mean just for us. What we had was brand new. We were trailblazers. Our love was something to behold. Never before had someone been so intensely adored as her. She would not accept that she saved me but she did and I knew it. 

If only I had the power to let her see inside of me, to show her all of the repaired damage that she was responsible for on the construction site that was my sanity, maybe then she would understand it. Nothing was ever going to scare me off, make me question or doubt us. Nothing could ever diminish the fire and passion she ignited in me. I had known from the moment our lips met for the first time that she was going to be my greatest obsession. 

Every conversation was an opportunity to love her more as she let me see more of show she was. 

I was acutely aware of the fact that I did not always do or say the right things at the right times. I was constantly fucking things up. I pushed too hard.

In the end, it really means nothing to have pure intentions if you actions still cause harm and this is how it was, some times, in my head. My mind was always waiting to trick me, trip me up. It worked, on occasion. 

This was always on my mind. I was an over-thinker. One thought, in particular, did plague me in my quiet moments of solitude, in the ringing silence of the dead of night: what if I had finally lost my mind? What if, this time, I had really gone fucking insane and woke up alone again one day? What happened if this was all just the greatest dream of all? It would not be a huge stretch - the hallucinations had always felt real, had sent me spiraling, even on the rare occasion I was sober. 

How could I tell if any of this was real? Did I care? If this was all in my head and the madness had truly set in then my madness had saved me. 

Madness was my bliss. 

- Ryan 

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It was in that moment, that I realized I would do anything to protect you, I would be there to hold you up when your pain paralyzed you, I would be the one to heal your heart, to protect you from the devastation life brought, I decided that I would be the one to show you what life was, what it meant to feel truly loved, truly alive. And I will fight for your sanity, for your happiness, till my dying breath.

Shannon

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Robotic Hearts by Shannon

Being with him was like being hit by a car, like standing in front of a truck waiting for it to totally decimate you on it’s way to a drop off. In the beginning it was exciting, almost beautiful, but in the end. It destroyed every part of me. Me and him had met in school, I was 14 years old, him 16. We hit it off instantly, I spent my school days going to lunch with him and some friends, I spent lunches laughing so much I would cough as if my body were rejecting this new activity. When I met him I was struggling with everything, I stole my parents vodka just to avoid feeling, to numb my pain, to help me sleep through the nights. Night time was my enemy, I spent my nights unable to sleep for the fear of the monsters awaiting me in my unconscious, they threatened to consume me and all that I was would cease to exist should I surrender, should I close my eyes for one moment. I spent my nights crying, fearful of closing my eyes because it was only when I closed my eyes that I truly saw anything. I saw my demise, that monster threatening to rip out my heart and eat it in front of me, threatening to rip out my lungs and leave me gasping, begging for mercy, for some release.

When I met him I slept 1 hour a week, I wore hoodies everywhere so that my shame would not be visible, so that no one would see the damage that these monsters caused me. I felt everything and nothing all at once, I was constantly fearful to blink for a moment in fear of seeing the things that tormented me, that forever changed me. But I could also look at my own mother, the woman that had given birth to me. And feel absolutely nothing. I could put it on, love right? That’s what I was meant to show? Admiration? But when it came down to it, I was numb to the world, to everything crossing my path. I no longer hated the world, because I didn’t care, I was a robot going through the motions, it was the Wizard of Oz and I was the heartless tin man. Except he had heart the entire time, and mine was empty, missing, a dark abyss where my heart once was as I went through the motions of every day life. Then me and him met, and I thought he would fix me, I thought being with him would repair everything, that he could be my savior. That he could make me happy. It wasn’t till two years later I realized how selfish that was, to expect him to fix so much damage, damage he hadn’t even caused, couldn’t even know about. But I had not yet realized one important thing. Before I could ever be happy with him, I had to learn to be happy myself.

I jumped from person to person throughout high school life, longing to just feel something, anything. Looking for attention, love that had been lacking in my life, whether down to my own distant father or the fucked up disassociation that often diseased my every pore.  I was the joker in a world filled with innocent civilians, threatening to blow up at any moment, to detonate and destroy all in my path. I was a ticking time bomb waiting for the smallest trigger, the smallest reason to explode and murder all those closest to me. I recall cutting for the first time before meeting him. My mother and I had an argument, I had been foolish, putting myself in dangerous situations with people much older than me time and time again. My mother had assumed it was because I was naive, I didn’t see the danger. But she was wrong, not only did I note the danger awaiting me, I welcomed it, begged for it. Because while shitty. Fear was a feeling, a terrible one, but at least I would feel something other than the emptiness overcoming my every cell, engulfing my soul like the flames that threatened to make me explode.

She threw my piggy bank on the floor that I had been holding, fiddling with in an attempt to not look up at her, my mother was so swept up in her rage, the fear that turned into rage as she thought of all the bad things that could have happened to me, that she didn’t notice the darkness in my eyes. If only she knew the bad things that had actually happened, that had kept me up at night. I knelt down studying the broken fragments of that pink ceramic pig that had been a part of my life since I was 2 years old when my grandparents purchased it, I should have been sad staring at the broken fragments of my past. But nothing mattered anymore, I felt nothing and that was how I liked it most of the time. No one could hurt you if you felt nothing. You weren’t weak. This argument had been particularly haunting to me, the woman who carried me for nine months had screamed, cried, begged me to stop. And I felt nothing. I blankly stared at her. For the first time in months, I needed to feel something, anything, even if it hurt. The first cut was the most blissful, as the crimson river dripped from my arm I felt the rush of pressure releasing it’s grip on me, I felt lighter, almost high on the instant release I experienced, every emotion I hadn’t felt for years, every thought, every ounce of me spilled out in those little drips on my laminated floor. And for the first time in 4 years, I cried. This was to be the start of a dangerous addiction.

I had to wear cardigans, hoodies, anything with long sleeves to hide my new addiction, so that people wouldn’t see how truly damaged I was. Meeting him helped me, while still numb I had perfected my false laugh, my masked smile that hid so much. But there were rare occasions with him that my laughter was real, that my smile was genuine and not that of the mask I had grown oh so accustomed to wearing each day. We started to hang out on the weekends, we would go little treks through the country near our homes, hang out at shopping centers being stupid, him singing even though no talent was visible, the smile he wore so often while being utterly ridiculous was infectious, something I grew to admire and also loathe, something I wished I could have for myself, but something I loved on him. We spent every weekend together being stupid, every lunch time the same way at school. After a while we were going out, but my heart was not prepared for how short lived that would be. After 1 month of giving the smallest bit of myself to him, of allowing myself to indulge in his laughter. My uncle was dying, I had subconsciously kept note of the fact he was getting worse but tried to pretend he wasn’t. Tried to fool myself into thinking miracles were real, a few more months of treatment and he would be back to karaoke, back to dancing and making us all laugh and smile like he once had before the tumor diseased his brain making it hard for him to remember any punchline, any song lyric.

My uncle had been my favorite member of my father’s family, I even preferred him to my own father, the life burning inside him was something that always fascinated me, the good radiated from him, his heart so often visible in everything he did, my uncle doted on us, he did everything for us, if you wanted something he would buy it, if you were hurting he would make you laugh, do a little dance, tease you in the way he so often did, sing. Whatever it may be, he would use it to make you sit bursting at the seams till you could no longer hold it back or resist, till you erupted into a fit of laughter. I despised how he knew exactly where to tickle me so that I would crumble, but when he got sick I would’ve given anything for him to annoy me that same way one last time. To call me my nickname that I had so often hated, the nickname those little plastic mind boggling pills had erased from his mind. In those months before he left me he was a shell of the lively firework I had adored, he no longer sang with me to songs we loved, no longer remembered his best jokes. But still found ways to make my heart come alive with total adoration. He was the absolute perfect embodiment of everything a man should be, strong but vulnerable with a heart of pure gold. He gave everything for his family, poured himself into our family, into ensuring we all had everything we needed, ensuring we were always laughing, always happy.

And now the light that he brought into my life was fading with each passing day, I secretly knew this but refused to admit it, to let myself believe someone so bright could be struck down at 30 years old. Being with Malcolm had made it easier to push this down further, till my weekly phone call with my uncle, that was when it came rushing back, those fears, the knowledge his time was almost up. I tried telling myself that his pain would soon be over which was good, but the minute his pain was finished would be when mine multiplied by thousands. As if he passed his pain to me without knowing, without meaning it. My uncle fought for four years to stay with us, to keep being the family crutch, the glue that held us all together was dissolving and none of us knew how to handle it.

It was 2 days before my 15th birthday, my father had told me that my uncle was getting worse the night before, it was on that day I turned to my best friend with a grim prediction. My uncle would leave us on my birthday. I walked into school that day barely holding it together, pieces of the wall I had built in my mind slowly fragmenting away. I survived that day, only crying once, in the solitude of a toilet cubicle in the schools poorly lit bathroom. Lunch came, the one time of day I had been holding it together for all day, the time I kept telling myself would be fun, filled with laughter to help me forget the agony slowly eating me up, no one knew truly how much agony I was in that week, how often I begged for death to grip my hand and drag me down and leave my uncles hand free of his icy grip. For he deserved this life more than I. He appreciated things more than me. He was the strength my family needed, we relied on it to survive, without him, we were all adrift on floating bits of wood and he were the titanic crashing into that frosty rock of death. I wandered up to the man that had made me laugh oh so often, on this day I needed him, I needed to be held, for someone to tell me it was fine. But instead, when I requested a hug, he declined, told me he didn’t want me anymore. On a normal day, the break up wouldn’t have done anything to me, I wouldn’t have cared.

But on this day it decimated me, I nodded and rushed from him heading to lunch alone on this day. I cried the whole way down my school hill to the shops for lunch. It was that day I begged for it to be over more than ever, that day I longed for death. He never truly knew how much that devastated me, how could he? He didn’t know of my uncle, he didn’t know how much I needed him, not even him. Just anyone. I blamed this in the next few coming years for our demise, for us fragmenting apart. My birthday two days later was not much better, the night before my birthday was filled with fun and laughter, alcohol being the source of my stupid grin as my cheeks grew to adopt a rosy red color I so often got once drunk. I watched movies with my best friend, ate various unhealthy things that should never have been allowed considering my diet. But this was only temporary, a false reality lulling me into a false sense of security and happiness before I was to be totally destroyed. The day of my birthday I awoke beside my best friend, hungover but happy. For that moment I was in a blissful state of peace, happiness recalling the nights laughter. But happiness for me, was only ever temporary, every wave of happiness was followed by an iceberg that had been planning my demise.

Your gran called me last night, I didn’t want to tell you because you were having so much fun. But your uncle passed away in his sleep.

Never before had a single sentence filled me with such devastation and such guilt. For years I had felt nothing, and now I felt everything. My prediction was right. And while I had been drinking and laughing, my uncle drew his last breath, without me. The man that so often held my hand, comforted me and led me. Had died without me there to hold his hand, to tell him how much I adored him. I didn’t cry, but stared at my mother too afraid to talk, I didn’t utter a word but nodded in understanding, till she asked if I wanted to go to his home to say goodbye, without hesitation I told her I needed to. The funeral ruined me even more, it was that day one of the worst experiences ever to befall me, for the rest of that year I longed for death, I couldn’t concentrate on exams because for me they had no point. I wouldn’t make it to 16, there was no point to plan next year or the rest of my life, because this was to be my last year on this Earth.

It was this time that I now realize, had doomed the rest of my relationship with Malcolm, a few years later we were fated to try again, this time making it to 4 years, but I don’t think I truly ever forgave him for this period in my life, I never got over the hurt he caused. When I was 17 we got back together, and it was the craziest thing ever to cross my path. He helped me heal, he made me a better person. I thought I loved him, he had fixed me, or so I thought. 4 years. Of laughing, crying and literally almost dying, he saved my life in more ways than he could fathom, the nightmares stopped. And after 12 years of secrets I spoke about my pain, all the pain except that pain he had caused me at 15. For years I convinced myself he would leave again, he would get bored again. Those four years plagued me with so much worry, worrying I wasn’t enough, worrying he would cheat or change his mind, worrying about money because he refused to work while I worked myself into the ground. And after four years, I was tired, I gave up trying, gave up fighting, and I engulfed myself in the loneliness, in the numbness that had become my only friend. I slept around trying to feel something again, trying to mimic the closeness I had with him, but nothing helped, nothing mattered, I was alone once more. And I didn’t know if I would be able to survive it again.  

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Only Fools Rush In by Ryan

Two weeks before it all started, I was having a conversation with a friend about relationships: I had been single my entire life, my bed was empty more often than not, by far. I said to them, I’m not ready for anything serious, I’m not in the right place to be with someone. This was all true. I was (and still am) and riot. Chaos ruled my mind and I couldn’t even think about inflicting myself upon another person. Who would want that? Who could want me?

The week my dad turned 50, I was off work to celebrate with him and my family. When I returned, I was told about a new start to the team who had been there the week I was not. I was told by Rosina that I would liker her, that she was my kind of girl. You see, Rosie, my best friend, was always looking out for potential matches for me because I was hopeless at it. I was never on the look out for anything like that even though it was all I had ever really wanted. Two days later, she walked in. Fuck, I thought. I am in trouble here, I told Rosie. 

She was all of 5″3, with pink hair and a pair of leather trousers. She was magnificent. I was hers before she said a word and then when she did speak, I was lost forever. Everything I had ever known was meaningless. I was instantly charmed and when she spoke to Rosie about her life, I listened and felt what she said. I felt her in my fucking soul. I wanted to save her, as though I could. I wanted to simply hold her and tell her everything would be alright, that things would get better. She had been wronged, stepped on and pushed aside by too many people and far too recently for my liking. When I heard what happened, I was livid, absolutely furious that someone lacked the sense to treat this marvelous woman better. All I did was listen. Rosina tried her best to play match maker that day but I was having one of my bad days and was almost finished with my shift. I stole glances at the back of her head when she turned away to speak and it was as though the pink in her hair was magic because it was all I thought about that night. 

The next day rolled around and I was still thinking about this woman with the pink hair. She was on my mind all day and Rosie knew I was feeling a bit more than I was letting on and, bless her, she tried again to play Cupid but I was too shy and she was too perfect to waste her time on the likes of me. That night, I found her online but wasn’t quite sure what I was doing. Like the teenage girl I am, I quizzed my best friend and she told me that she thought it went both ways, that she had been talking to her about me. This made me smile. This made me both relax and panic at the same time. Rosie arranged for me to take over her training responsibilities and joked about those leather trousers I loved so much on her and I spent the night before giddy and shaking with nerves. I was petrified that I had already blown it with the silence and this stuck with me. I smoked myself into oblivion, hoping to rid myself of this worry but it didn’t work. I just passed out on my couch. 

Saturday. Today was the the day. I felt good, nervous, like I was about to go on a first date, which is insane since I had said all of two words to her by this point. 

It was funny to think that my plans for that weekend had been to sit with Graham and go through to motions of putting our bets on the football and watching them lose. The big game was the day after, on the Sunday and we we both buzzing with excitement but in response to the pandemic, all football was cancelled. This paved the way for the greatest day I could have imagined. 

She blew round the corner like a tornado tearing through a trailer park, leaving everyone in her wake. She had already decimated me and now I was drawn in to the swirling carnage, only to out find that I was flying. She said one thing and I said another and the next thing I knew, I was hearing my heartbeat in my ears, could feel my entire body pulsating furiously. She could have been reading from the phone book and I would have been captivated. I wanted to protect her. I wanted to make sure that her beautiful smile felt safe enough to reveal itself to me. 

I pushed my knee in to hers and she pushed back and we glanced sideways at each other and smiled. Oh fuck, I whispered as we stood to go for a smoke. I asked myself, am I really about to jump of this fucking cliff? Yes. Yes I was. I would Thelma & Louise my life away for her. 

We wrapped up our day working with her finishing early and we walked slowly to the train station - we were going separate ways but couldn’t part from each other’s company. I offered her my jacket in the rain and she refused - I didn’t mind getting soaked if it meant she didn’t have to. We stood for a while, talking, laughing, flirting. She felt like home to me. In my head, I saw us together and in that moment, I wanted nothing more than to pull her close to me and find out if she was everything I thought she could be to me.

I didn’t kiss her. I didn’t even hug her goodbye when we eventually had to get back to our respective realities but I felt better. I felt good. I was at peace for the first time that I could truly remember. I had a stern word with myself on the train home (the 4th one since my finishing time) about how I should have taken a risk, took a leap of faith but I was paralyzed by my insecurities. 

To my absolute delight, we were talking again before I got home. She found me this time and did something about it. We spent the entire evening talking, going back and forth and it was perfect, it was insane how much we shared, how much we immediately understood each other, like we were speaking a language only we knew. 

Talking to her was like finding an oasis in the middle of the desert. I drank from her and I was saved. 

She made me laugh so much, my face hurt. Everything else was pushed in to the background as I lapped up every word she said, every message she sent. I was an addict who could never get high enough and she was my new favourite drug. 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Blues by Ryan

The alarmed clock tolled for his night’s rest: another hangover, it seemed, would plague this day. Why stop now, though? Naked, he climbed out of his ever-empty bed and went to piss. A sea of crushed cans and used up bottles littered the flat. He would clean later, work first. He found an open can by the open to door the balcony and did not hesitate to throw it back and hope it would help with the hangover. It never did but he needed no excuses any more. 

He was an addict. Hooked on the wrongs things and on a dangerous path, he floated through life, lonely and desperate to feel anything but resignation. It had been a solid decade since the start of this obsession with booze. It took everything inside away for a while and even if it was an hour, it saved him. 

There was no one around him that he cared enough about to want there for the bad days. No one to stop him when the knife came out, no one to call when it went too far, no one to check on him. He had tried so many times to be a part of something bigger than he was and failed and kept failing and before long it was all he knew. Christ, he even failed to end it all. What more could be done?

The pills helped for a while but took away from him, made him less, which wasn’t the worst thing at the beginning. They helped with sleep, too, which replaced the booze most nights. That was the biggest issue: how to fall asleep without being blackout drunk or taking a handful of valium? He used to joke that only Escobar’s coke would rouse him and the dead. He seen a drug and alcohol counselor one morning after waking up in a hospital bed with no glasses or shirt on, after he had taken who knows what from god knows who in the bar last night and whatever it was, it had not mixed well with the day drinking he has been in the middle of when this madness all kicked off. An ambulance was required and physical restraint, too as he lunged and attacked the medical staff trying to save him from an accidental overdose. Accidental, on this occasion. He passed on the offer for help, brushing this off as a bad decision made in the heat of the moment.

On the way to work, he smoked five cigarettes. The journey was 40 minutes from door to door and most of that was spent on the train. He would recoil whenever he saw those nicotine stained fingers and wonder who would want to hold a hand that has been in Death’s?

This was every day for a while. The pills has stopped working and the booze had, too. He felt better and better and worse and then better again. While on the meds (prescribed) he became meaner, colder and people noticed. People would tell him he was being nasty and it never registered, he did not care, could not care and then came the episode.

Lying in bed, only underwear protecting his modesty, he tried to move. He was paralyzed. Terrified, he tried to get up but this only made things worse. The panic set in fully when he tried to lift his arm but to no avail. He was trapped under the weight of the earth and gasped for air, desperate to fill his lungs. It was in this moment that the breakthrough happened. He never wanted this feeling again. Almost an hour of tears and absolute terror had woken him up and the realisation that he wanted something, anything in his life to mean something was overpowering and he knew in that instant that he would stop flirting with Death, would stop the music and pull away from his dance partner’s cold grasp. All he wanted was a glimpse of reality again. The Reaper was beautiful and haunting and looked different each time he saw her but always shrouded in black. A black dress, a black wrap, black shoes and ruby red lipstick. He decided to leave her stranded on the dance floor and face his own reality, for the first time in far too long. He thought about his life and what he wanted but could only ever managed to realise one thing:

He needed to world more than it needed him. 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Alexa, Shuffle Songs by Halsey by Ryan

After a lifetime of celebrating my failures before anyone beat me to the punch, it felt bizarre to wake up every day with a smile on my face and not be held down by the weight of a herd of elephants. Most days, I woke up with my arms around her and never left bed without kissing her. 

Working from certainly had it’s benefits: on the days that I worked and she didn’t, I would sit, five feet away and watch her sleep for a while and chuckle when she snored. She was mesmerizing. I was lost in her. I had given myself over completely and only felt at home with her there at night. I should have been terrified by how deeply I loved her so instantaneously, any sane person would have been alarmed but I suppose sanity had escaped me thus far, why would it suddenly present itself now, in this moment? Despite my fears and insecurities (and the constant reassurances I required from both her and my best friend), I felt safe in confessing my sins to her, in a manner of speaking. I told her all of the worst things I have done and thought and never worried she would leave, not really leave and never come back. 

My favourite times were when we sat together and just talked. We talked about everything and anything. We had no secrets, no hidden shame. We shared our experiences and we related to each other in a plethora of ways. We were one and the same. I was never judged or made to feel ashamed of my mistakes with her and it was the same for her. We were in perfect harmony. 

At first, there were still some nerves but eventually, I heard her singing and I was floored. She was magnificent and wouldn’t hear a word of it, no matter how much I continued to insist (ever single time). Sweet, soft and unique. I could listen to her forever. I basked in every lyric she sang, in every note she hit. What a woman. We would just sit and listen to music all day long and I would hear her sing along and we would occasionally duet and she opened my eyes to a whole new level of music appreciation when we listened to her favourite artists and she would tell me about them and what their music meant to them and to her and I couldn't help but fall in love a little bit more every time she did this. 

She taught me about life and I taught her how to play Texas Hold ‘Em in return and we sat and played for hours, even days on end. I was a dab hand and she was already in possession of some know how and she picked the rest up in a heart beat and things got interesting. We were well matched and spent our time across the felt from each other and I would lose all sense when I saw her smile that smile of her’s.

People liked to say that they have planned their future but I saw it differently: for me, I was already living my future, we had plans, we were going to be married and have everything we ever wanted, we even had a name picked out for our son. My future happened every day because every night, I climbed in to bed and wrapped my arms around the love of my life and felt her sink in to me and slept with the knowledge that it would never get better than this. 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Tragic Beauty by Shannon

5.00pm, I stare about the busy office, the building practically vibrating with the loud chatter of the mundane. I walked past each desk silently, preparing myself for another week, a week of sitting with people I didn’t know, listening to things I didn’t quite understand and hadn’t mastered yet. I was in training for a new position in my company, while a step up from my previous job, this was no promotion. Moved for being terrible at my job, something that had been plaguing me lately, I was so shitty they had to search for somewhere to get rid of me, someone else to dump me on because of how utterly useless I was. You see, I had never been good at selling things, selling required lying, stretching the truth to make people want things. I had never been a good liar, never one to bullshit anyone into doing what I wanted. So I failed, in a job I had endured 5 weeks of patronizing, nursery-esque training for. I had been forced from the people I had been with for almost an entire year, and flung to the piranha’s, a sea void of friends, void of certain comforts I had come to know as part of my job. Anxiety meant I needed a routine, stability. I needed to be around people I knew, I struggled to thrive in a place where I had no allies, but after the weekend I’d had, I needed them more than ever. These past few months had been almost enough to kill me. 

I had been in love, or so I thought, four years of laughing and crying, of idolizing the man I thought I would marry. Being with him was like a roller coaster, when we were good, we were really good. But then in crept the darkness, the fights that made you contemplate your every decision, constantly wondering if I was good enough, constantly worrying he didn’t really love me. After four years of having no self worth, of feeling unwanted, I had grown tired of being the only one fighting for that white picket fence. Four months I took to contemplate my life, my hardest decision, the only decision ever to make my heart literally ache, knowing I would hurt him is what was the hardest for me, I had decided after month one that I didn’t want him anymore. That we couldn’t work, but took another three, because I couldn’t bare seeing him cry, it had always been my weakness when we fought, seeing him breaking in front of me was something I couldn’t bare. After four months, I broke up with the man I loved over text, I left our home, and I texted him everything I had been trying to tell him for four months. And he broke, coming back to that desolate house made my heart drop, I felt sick, scared that I had made a huge mistake. Scared that I would never know love again, that I had thrown away the only thing close to happiness I would ever witness. 

But now, now I knew it was the right thing to do, I had found some semblance of peace, made stupid decisions someone my age would normally make, did things that I had never been able to do with him. While I was finding myself, I still felt so numb. So empty. I drank every weekend, house filled with strangers, trying to erase everything, trying so desperately to never be alone so that I didn’t cave. Not because I still loved him, but because he was safe, he used to be home. And without him, I wasn’t sure what my future entailed. The only serious relationship I had known failed, I failed at my job, I failed as a daughter, as a sister and as a friend. For those months I was useless, caused more pain than I hindered. The failures didn’t stop there, it seemed recently I couldn’t get anything right. My bed had visitors more often than not, visitors that shouldn’t have been allowed, and wouldn’t, had I been less vulnerable, less weak. Less pathetic. You see, I had spent my entire life thinking emotions made you weaker, and so I tried everything to numb myself to the world. I pushed everyone away because I refused to feel. I refused to allow someone else to hurt me the way he had, the way my father had, the way various people had my entire life. My past trauma had made me almost cynical against my own race, humans.

After my breakup I felt this more intensely than ever before, that was. Until I saw him. The lovely woman who had took my training the week before had mentioned that one of our team, my new team. Was on holiday, and that he would be back this week, I had completely forgotten this fact, till I rounded the corner to my desk, I noticed him instantly, I sat between him and the training mentor who had mentioned him, her and I were to work together again today but I couldn’t take my eyes off of him. I studied everything about him, from his posture to his facial expression, I drank in the smell of his aftershave like I needed it to survive. There was something about him that instantly intrigued me, that demanded my attention. I had never been able to pinpoint what exactly it was about him that started my obsession, but it was that day that I knew my life would never be the same, I knew that he would change everything, but fuck... I never realized how much. For the first time in my life, I was speechless, shy. Noticing that I hadn’t spoken since sitting down I ranted to the mentor I had been sat with about the weekend I had just had, the bullshit that had plagued me. She offered advice and while he didn’t speak I sensed it bothered him, what I didn’t know was if I was bothering him or if he agreed with what his friend next to me was saying. 

If he despised how wronged I was as much as I did. Sensing how shy I was my mentor (Rosie) introduced us. His name would be burned into my memory, Ryan. I started talking to Rosie about my interests, music I loved, she noticed my hoodie. My Chemical Romance. 

“Oh Ryan likes them, don’t you Ryan?” 

“Do you?!” 

“Yes”

One word, one word and everything about it was burned into my memory, the tone of his voice, the look on his face as he said it. There was a beautiful sadness about him that I had sensed since I sat down, something that fascinated me in those early days. That one yes was the saddest thing I had heard or seen, his attempt to smile didn’t work on me, because I was an expert. I could see beyond a plastered on smile because I so often wore one. I could see deeper than what was on the surface. While his lips turned into the cutest smile I had seen, his eyes betrayed him as he fixated them on the computer monitor. Refusing to turn to me, now I assume it was because he was scared I would see. That I would know. 

But those oceanic, sad eyes were the most beautiful things I had seen in my lifetime. 21 years I had been alive and never witnessed such tragic beauty. He made concentrating on work so hard that day, I tried my fucking absolute best to concentrate on Rosie, on the glowing monitor in front of her, the phone re-positioned so that I could listen to how she handled calls. But I always found my gaze drifting back to him. I tried my best to be funny, to make him smile and break the ice, to cheer him up. But received nothing back, was I an annoyance in this beautiful creature’s life? Was he shy too? I suddenly grew conscious that I was talking too much. But that was my true illness, anxiety meant I hated awkwardness but so often caused it, I couldn’t sit in silence. I grew restless and had to amend this. So often when faced with silence, I spoke too much, I didn’t know how to stop. When to shut the fuck up and just relax. Even on that first day, I wanted to do nothing but hug him, to be near him. To be a part of his world, I wanted to know what plagued him, I wanted to fix it. I wanted to be the reason he laughed, and not the laugh people like me and him usually performed. I mean a real laugh, the kind that made your face hurt and your stomach ache as if to reject your fun. 

On that day I witnessed the most beautifully sad creature ever to cross my path, and on that day began an obsession, I was entranced, aching for him, to know all of his deepest darkest desires, all of the thoughts that kept him awake at night, in his eyes I saw years of pain, suffering that I too had felt. Sitting beside him I had instantly felt comfortable, a complete stranger. I couldn’t call the doctor myself but I could speak to him. He instantly made me feel at ease, made me smile even when he said nothing, it was on that day I learned, every room is better if he is in it. 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Sweet Semblances of Safety by Ryan

I could finally breath.

It was as though life was the

bully holding my head under

the water, only for far too

long. I filled my nose with the

smell of her shampoo and smiled.

She reached in to the abyss and

dragged me back to the surface,

to a world changed by her sweet 

smelling perfume and her will. I was 

powerless against her. My lungs filled

only to be knocked empty every time 

she walked in to a room. Her time was

precious and so was she and I drank in 

every second I possibly could. She was

my obsession, my addiction and I would

die before I quit her. I was rescued from

the abyss only to be delivered in to oblivion

whenever I dared to look in to her golden

brown eyes. Although I was again lost, 

there was no bully this time, life was 

making amends, it seemed. I was free of the 

darkness, free of the crushing loneliness, free

to  make amends of my own and save the best 

of me for her. 

[perfectlyimperfectwriting]

Blue Eyed Boy by Shannon

It was 4am, you were asleep.

Hair a spiked mess,

wet with sweat from the

hot summers eve. You looked amazing,

this was when I loved watching you most,

when you had not a single care in the world,

Innocent laying next to me, with no clue what

was going on. The thoughts on my mind as I stared

down at you. Bordering on creepy as I drank in all of you,

Memorizing your every feature as you lay snoring quietly,

oblivious to how you were making my heart race just by laying there,

my heart felt tight every time I looked at you, every time you spoke,

my heart tightened because I was at your mercy,

held captive in all that you were, all that you offered to me without trying,

He’s going to leave, he’s going to realize he deserves more.

While you slept so peacefully, my mind tortured me, something I wouldn’t

ever admit to you. I shook those thoughts from my mind as I gazed at you,

wondering how I had ever gotten so lucky.

What I had done right to earn such bliss.

I spent my days shaking my thoughts, totally entranced with everything you did,

everything you said, my perfect blue eyed boy.

If only you knew,

If only you could see,

What those perfect oceanic eyes do to me,

If only you could see what I see,

everything you do to repair every part of me.

Would you be in awe like me?

Totally addicted like a crack whore needing her pipe.

If only we could trade hearts for one second,

trade minds for another.

Maybe you would see why I need you my lover,

no other will do, no one compares.

Because you my blue eyed boy,

are loved more than anyone could bare,

more than any love song could express,

more than anyone could fathom,

you are far superior to the rest.