sadness is sweet 🌺
flashback time! @mgsonam remember that friends who cry together, stick together.
Sixteen wasn’t always so sweet, Dahui had come to terms with it. High schoolers were childish and voluntarily stepping out of the hierarchy landed you a prime spot on the map of insignificancy. She’d never begged for attention, probably never would do in her lifetime, but she couldn’t help but feel lonely. Dahui loved being alone, but being ignored, insignificant, scorned? Feeling helpless? Being overtly influenced by others? Subject to another’s evaluation when it came to determining her worth? No. She didn’t like that at all. When a sub-clique of ‘popular’ kids decided that it was her turn to be antagonised, and took over the art room at lunchtimes for a rocky month, all she could do was float aimlessly, find another haven. Adaptability was her forte. Art was in her heart. But she didn’t like it.
She told her mom not to worry when she came home with nettle stings on her forearms, acquired from spending her breaks camping out with nature. She hid out anywhere and everywhere at school, fooled herself into thinking that she liked the unexpected challenge of disappearing for an hour or so every day. The toilets, the changing rooms, the rooftop, anywhere where it was quiet. Tears could be thoughts, why not? People went to the ends of the earth to feel something: she was lucky. Lucky that she could sit on the rooftop with a sketchbook in her hands and feel something overwhelming enough to bring her to tears. Lucky that she could muster up the strength to draw it on paper.
In the middle of convincing herself that she was privileged, she heard faint footsteps.
