messages i'll never send

(slowly learning to love herself)

[starsofparadise]

incognito, messages i'll never send – for when you don't feel like yourself.

dedicated to all the boys and girls who lived every day fearing that they’d be living in another shell the next.

contents;

01 toppling.

02 paper cuts

03 hospital lights

04 to her...

05 manslaughter.

06 motion sickness

[starsofparadise]

motion sickness

to my motion sickness, the dizzy feeling in my mind that sends me into a blur. 

the world whirls and twirls around as i sit in the bus, the escape from reality, driving on the highway. 

i start getting sick again – it’s all the reasons why i was singled out as a child, all the reasons why i had to sit in the front row of every vehicle i took as a student in a class group, travelling to a school picnic or a health check. it’s all the reasons i now lean against the car window, staring into space. 

it wobbles, my view blurs. i still remember the countless times my head lolled upon my mother’s shoulder, eyes closed, my small soul fast asleep on the bus that was just one more km/h away from passing the speed limit. that was the only way for me not to start gagging, and for the sick drive to come back as a reflex, for my breakfast to stay in my stomach for as long as it can. 

that, and talking to my friends. but since i lost most of them a while ago, i’m alone on this teetering, tottering monstrosity, which can cost my dignity, and the cleanliness of the clothes belonging to the person on my right. 

it’s a young lady, smelling of flowers and perfume. i wonder if she is specially dressed up today, i wonder whether she’s going to meet her boyfriend for a date or have a girls’ day out with her besties. she fidgets with her phone, yellow manicured nails tapping furiously against the screen, texting someone i guess. at this moment, i wish to be her. not her, with the floral scent, black boots and pink skirt – but her, with friends who actually care. i wish to be her, maybe not her with a boyfriend, but her, who’s not ridden with this disease i swear to god i can’t find a way to get rid of. 

i don’t know who this lady is. but i know i’m going to try not to vomit on her and ruin her day. 

i remember staring out the window always seemed to make me even dizzier, but now it does not. now, it’s calming as the first tiny drop of rain slides down the bus window, as my earphones play slow music in my ears. it’s like a scene in a movie, i forgot which one. 

i place a bet on a random drop – it loses the race against a bigger, fatter drop. and just as that drop hits the windowsill, the first drop of my tears follows along with it, and i let out all my emotions.

the first time i vomited in a moving vehicle, i think i was three. my mom had caught me and the contents of my stomach tipping into that glossy white baker’s-paper bag on the airplane. and again and again, it happened, all the way until i was six. 

when i was six, i took medicine before boarding the plane. it was all good, but i still ended up vomiting – this time all over my mother’s shirt and pants. 

no one belittled me for it, but i always sensed a reluctance to sit next to me on the coach for class trips. and that was the reason. 

surprisingly, sometimes i could control it. i loved dizzy, spinny rides at ocean park, i loved the loopy roller coaster that would make several full turns before speeding forward, full speed ahead. motion sickness never happened to me then. 

and now, my emotions flow out of me – similar to those so many times that i felt the nausea stirring up inside me – like a lawless tide. 

it’s gone. seeping away from me is all the motion sickness, and the guilt it brings. 

for once, i could sit up in the bus all on my own, whip out my phone for a snapshot of the beautiful rainbow, and send it to my best friends. 

they all reply instantly. maybe i was just overthinking. but i swear they weren’t like this one hour ago. haha. 

[starsofparadise]

manslaughter.

to the remnants of old me, whom i buried deep inside my heart for fear people would hate her.

who was the people-pleaser, who was the annoying and stupid and rude girl who never had malicious intent in the first place when she wanted to join a conversation? 

who was the loud, childish and immature girl whose personality could change in a heartbeat, whenever she saw you? 

who was the one you projected all your inner thoughts onto, who was your punching bag whenever times got hard? who was the one you depended on whenever you had to vent, but was the first one you hated when she did something you didn’t particularly admire? 

who was the one who had high achievements, but was still looked down upon for her endless smiles and laughs? 

who was the one who slowly faded into the darkness when she realized she didn’t belong in the spotlights after all, who was the one whose friendships were never true in the first place? who was the one who had no one she could trust, until she found someone else? 

who was the ‘fake’ one in your point of view, who was the one who craved attention, the one who cried over stupid things, the one who was always overthinking, the one who screamed and yelled into the pillow for lack of a better word. who was the one with her head always stuck in a book and earphones planted in her ears, because the real world was too cruel for her? 

she was, but she is no more. 

she used to be me, but does that matter? because in the end, i killed her for you.

[starsofparadise]

to her...

to that girl, who single-handedly ruined my life and then walked away with it – because my life is better without her.

i hate you, i despise you with every single part of my body. i feel the surge of emotions running inside me, equipping each and every cell, programming them with the hatred and rage, preparing them for the inevitable battle. 

i can’t run from this anymore. you’ve always been like this, you’ve always been judgemental and harsh with your criticism. you think it doesn’t hurt, but that’s only because you can’t see the grimace under the grin i try so hard to keep on, the tears of bitterness forming in my eyes. 

it’s as if they’re knives cutting into my chocolate brown orbs, once so pretty, so bright, sparkling with curiosity. but i guess they say the prettiest eyes cry the most tears, and the most beautiful hearts have endured the most pain. 

every time you see me, you squish my cheeks, my arms, my thighs, and tell me i’m fat. you might mean it in a teasing way, but i can’t hear the joke in your tone. the knives cut into me every time you do that. every time you laugh at my bunny teeth, i feel the insecurities creeping in. 

that isn’t even the worst. the worst is the fact that even my mother compares you to me. she looks at your shiny bright achievements, the shimmering golden plagues handed to you at every single prize presentation. in contrast, my silver medal no longer seems as bright as it actually is. its light is dull as i stand next to you, my extra prizes a blank slate compared to yours. 

but she doesn’t know the black, ugly heart under those gold medals, those certificates saying you’re a chess prodigy, saying you’re a piano prodigy, proof of you receiving a full scholarship to the most expensive school to ever exist. these achievements mean nothing to me as i know you, but they show you’re a genius at violin, the always perfect child who’s good at everything. 

maybe i’m not as good as you are, maybe i’m not as smart. maybe i don’t know how to play an instrument, and don’t have dozens of medals in duathlons. maybe i lose every round of chess i play. but at least i have a good heart. at least i try. at least i can debate because i have more proof than you do.

i’m better than you inside, even if people don’t know. you pride yourself for your ‘logicality’ and ‘lack of emotions’, and even you say i’m ‘too nice’. 

apparently, when you first became friends with me, i was kind, practical and understanding. also apparently, i’m not those things anymore. but maybe you were the one to judge me when i was lenient with you, when i tolerated you. 

you spoke out against my best friends. you spoke out against the people i genuinely liked, but little did you know they were all better people than you had ever been, even the ones i told you i ‘hated’. 

you said you got to know someone understanding and kind. and she still is, just not with you. because you hated that side of her so much, you forged her into another person, the personality created just for you. with you, she’s calm, level-headed, and doesn’t let her heart get over her. maybe you think this side is better, or maybe it’s worse. you said she changed since she left primary school. but she only changed with you, and kept her warm heart for everyone else. she shielded the best part of her from you. did that satisfy you?

but it doesn’t matter, because your judgement doesn’t matter to her anymore, and you can’t expect her to be kind, caring and understanding when you’re not the same in return. as for the practicality, maybe cutting ties with you was the most practical thing to do.

[starsofparadise]

hospital lights

to the weirdest, most awkward social standards to never exist, that didn’t shape me to be who i am today.

feeling like you weren’t enough. feeling like no matter how hard you tried, you just would never fit into the shell that your parents forced onto you when they stared at your grade; the personality that your friends expected from you when all of you laughed together; the things that went unspoken.

feeling the eyes of others fixated onto you in public, like you’d done something criminally wrong – watching where you tread. every step is danger, waiting to appear.

it was like the world would’ve been better without you. like you were a mistake. like you didn’t belong. like you were the least favorite child, the dumb student. and this hater, the burning hatred inside of you slowly consumes you, bit by bit, until what’s left is nothing other than this shell, this doppelgänger of yourself. and last, they think you’re okay. and you tell yourself you are, you really try. 

but you aren’t. the cold hard truth? it’s that you are not okay, and the more you try to convince yourself that it’s okay, the more it comes to light that you aren’t. the more they shine the harsh hospital lights into your eyes, the more your flaws are shown to the world. the more they obsessively criticise you, the more they hate, the more you get picked at – you lose confidence in yourself, and that’s a bad thing. 

that’s a bad thing… because the more you deny it, the more they obsessively examine you. you feel like a puppet in an aimless show. you think you only exist for people’s entertainment.

they nitpick your flaws, like they know you more than, well, you know you. if you were a piece of writing, they’d be the obsessive grammarly checker, saying the choice of words are bad, maybe it’s more wordy here, maybe you should just simplify the sentence… 

but grammarly’s stupid. it’s not human. it has no idea what’s going through the author’s mind when they wrote the passage, it doesn’t understand writing and how it’s a work of art. even i don’t understand. no one understands at all. 

but you just do it, you just trust grammarly. even if there was sure confidence in your skills, the more they tell you it isn’t enough, the more you start thinking, well, maybe it really isn’t. and that sucks, because you’re who you are without trying to forcefully change it. 

and slowly, slowly, you conform to social standards, bit by bit, piece by piece; until you gradually lose your true self in the process. and the realization of that hurts. it hurts when the lights fade away, everyone goes back to their own orbits, and you realise that it was never worth it in the first place. it wasn’t worth all that obsession, it wasn’t worth the pain. it wasn’t worth changing yourself just for others’ pleasure. 

it wasn’t worth convincing yourself there was something wrong with you, when there wasn’t, and you were perfectly fine. most of all, it wasn’t worth losing yourself trying to make others like you, and never finding the lost side of you back. 

that hurts the most. because they often say people project their insecurities onto someone else; and if that someone is you, you’ve been changing yourself to someone you aren’t – for someone who will never care.

[starsofparadise]

paper cuts

to the many, many tiny cuts in my life that will never properly fade away. 

you know how sometimes, you aren’t even aware you have a paper cut until you use hand sanitizer? you don’t know the existence of a faint, red cut, worn with time on your hand, until one squeeze of the clear sanitizer onto it. wait for it. 3…2…1. boom.

it’s weird how the searing hot feeling just spreads through your veins and you feel like you can’t breathe. you stifle a scream at the sudden pain. all of a sudden, it hurts so much, but just a second ago you had no idea the cut even existed. 

the process of pain and healing is just like that, and it’s inevitable.

sometimes, you don’t even know there’s a part of you that’s still hurt until something comes along that forces you to be aware of it, forcing you to deal with it, forcing you to just look it in the eye. it wants you to say you’re okay, still. so it can hurt you more, cut you deeper while you try your best to deny it, to not acknowledge its existence. so people won’t change their attitude towards you.

but it's hard to say you’re okay, just because of the tears that are welling up in your eyes even at the mere sight of that tiny, small cut, when you wonder how a cut of that size can hurt you so much. 

but it does, surprisingly. and maybe, you finally admit you aren’t. that’s good, because bearing excruciating pain alone is hard, and pain is not only one paper cut, because everyone gets those at least once in a while in their lives. 

pain is hundreds of thousands of paper cuts, carving into your skin simultaneously at the same time. pain is not knowing what you did to deserve that kind of suffering. 

healing is not treating one paper cut and knowing its existence, either. it’s discovering the perfection of your body among – with, or without – those paper cuts. 

i feel like the cuts are inevitable, but as hard as it is, with time, they fade. they fade until the scars are gone, and all that is left is the lingering reminder of the stinging pain on your fingers every time you touch sanitizer. then, you slowly become wary and careful whenever you do. 

slowly, though, that long process, healing, ends. you feel like the hard work is worth it. you’re no longer extremely mindful of every single step you take for the hand sanitizer that’s about to come, since you understand that it won’t hurt you anymore. you begin to step out of your comfort zone, feeling invincible. 

i wish i could tell you that it’s a happy story, that it ends just like that. but in life, nothing’s perfect. paper cuts, bristles in the bushes, may cut you when you’re the least suspecting, the least expectant that it’ll happen. and that is when the process of healing ends, and where it starts, all over again. 

i’m not saying it’s bad, because this is life. you get cuts, you recover from them, and inevitably, you get cuts again. but you shouldn’t cut yourself, you shouldn’t tell yourself you’re not enough. 

and i guess that’s enough. to be you, to be the person who you are. 

remember, when paper cuts happen, the victim isn’t just your hand, it isn’t just some miniscule happening. the victim is you. and the cuts aren’t just cuts, they’re not just red tiny scratches on your hand. it deserves more. you deserve more. they’re the experiences that forge you. for when everything burns away and you look in the mirror, you’ll no longer see someone who’s worthless and wrong. instead, you’ll see a young person, scarred by life, forged by fire, and a soul no longer trapped in the past. 

you’ll see you. the true you.

[starsofparadise]

toppling.

to the people, who made me feel like i was worth nothing... and then worth something.

every step we take along the path of growing up is traumatic. it shocks you to the core. it’s disastrous as we take our first three steps forward at the age of one, feet wobbling as we topple into our parents’ arms. 

but it isn’t that easy. it isn’t as easy as a straight concrete path with stones melded into the ground, it isn’t as easy as what you think it’d be. 

because the ones that build up the path of your life, are the ones who could inherently harm you the most. 

life isn’t a straight road. it isn’t the highway, it isn’t even a gray dusty path with asphalt that you can kick and gravel that you can feel underneath your toes. life isn’t a bright, buttery polished road of marble or steel. 

instead, life is a cobblestone path of pebbles, and the ones that you trust and hold on to the most, could send you toppling over your mental cliff… until them. 

i gave them my trust, and they held my hand over the pathway that we walked on together for years. i wished it would never end… but it did, and i didn’t know until the last second. 

i paid no attention to the increasing steepness of my winding cobblestone path. i let it lead me, deeper and deeper down into the darkness of the woods. i still put all true faith in them, trusting that they’d never let me fall. 

but halfway through the ride, one stone gave way, one stone fell, rolling back down the road. and slowly, it became three. then five, then ten. until i couldn’t ignore it anymore. i hoped it’d just be okay. my bold, fearless steps became timid, tiny tiptoes – until even that didn’t work anymore. with one step over the edge, i fell to the ground, and they fled away. 

i watched their dainty feet – clip, clop. clip, clop. they tread into the distance until i could no longer see them from where i sat, hurt, on the floor. they were the ones that hurt me. more items than i could ever count. but it wasn’t that one major fall that caused our friendship to fail. it was the many, hundreds and thousands of cuts they added upon me over the years, it was the invisible scars that hurt the most. 

i put all my trust in them, but all they did was prove that they didn’t deserve my trust. they showed me that the amount of forgiveness i gave them was way more than what they needed from me. because that day, when i sat there staring at their retreating silhouettes with crimson red pouring from my wounds, i understood that they never cared, and would never care, about me at all.

and then i met you. i met you in the dark, at the end of the tunnel. i met you when i was crying alone. you helped me up, and you never let me fall again. the signals were weird and extremely mixed, yet i loved you so much nonetheless. maybe after that one fall, you would be my salvation and my pride. maybe you’d let go of my hand at times, but i had true utter faith in you being there to catch me whenever i’d fall. maybe you’d just look on from a distance with those hearts in your eyes and a faint smile on your face, maybe i’d try to look away from you. 

but deep down inside, i knew – it’d always be you. forever and always. from the start, it has always been you. when i said goodbye to you, i was always hoping it wouldn’t be forever. i walked alone on the brightened road in the day, trusting that you’d be there in the night. and you were… until one day, not anymore.

it was that fateful day that made me realize that i didn’t deserve you, and that you deserved more. maybe you’d finally left to find the solace you deserved. maybe i caused you so much pain, so much hatred, in exchange for the blush creeping onto my cheeks whenever i’m around you. and it was that one night without you that i cried myself to sleep once again, knowing that i could never, ever live without you. 

and then they came toppling back. and then they came, asking for forgiveness. i tried to turn a side-eye, but i know that you’d never approve. so i let them back in. 

the night marked your presence – or rather the lack thereof. i spent the whole night thinking about you, while they gossiped about you. i spent the whole night imagining that you were here with me, when you in fact weren’t, and i was alone in this damn cage of a life, alone with them. 

the dawn came. and i did what was right, since they’d never understand – or a better phrasing, she’d never understand, the other one did. 

and i said hi to you. you turned, and said hi back to me. 

“i can’t live without you.” 

“i also can’t.”