Power Issue

It just wasn't fair. Sitting there, completely alone whilst surrounded by strange people I didn't care to know. I didn't say hello, I didn't know how to; I couldn't keep it together. You yelled out at me, your new trick; saying my name. I looked at you and didn't even look over what you wore.

I didn't face you. I just crouched down beside you, even speaking directly to you, wishing I were anywhere else. I've been able to do this my entire life, going into autopilot, putting on that grin and walking through it like its good.

I guess, in the end, I can't hold you at blame. You've given me, more or less, what I expected from you. I felt so sad to know it was you did that to me, I didn't understand, and I couldn't ask, you ran away and I went back to acting like you weren't in the room. We continued our normal cadence. 

You have no idea how much that upset me. 

And, the beauty of it all, is that, in the end, you don't care to. 

But the truth is, there is a power in that for me; there really is. Seeing you, seeing through you, understanding, for the first time in a long time, what exactly is going on around and in me, there is a benefit to this. 

I've met you several times. I even find myself seeking you out, in crowds, in jobs, in friends, in relationships. It all began here, all the pictures and the memories of you in a different costume, you who can confirm that all the horrible things I'm so afraid of are real. I've been seeing endless versions of you playing the different roles throughout the 27 years I'm alive. You come to be something not even remotely related to what you are, in reality; just as scared and confused as I worry I am. Listening closely to what you never said, I've pieced it all together. I tell myself, all the things you meant to say. 

I admitted today to D that J was my tormenter in my preteens. That K died when I was 14 and I've never really gotten over the fear of abandonment. (I've even kept the cheap dress I wore to the service, refusing to give it away. My mother helped me pick it out, no idea where it would take me.) No one said a word. I tried to laugh; uncomfortable at the realization that I couldn't erase that moment. 

Does it give me a reason to be as skeptical and as aloof as I try so hard to be? Does it simply explain everything; or genuinely excuse it? 

"We just want what is best for you," she said.

There is a life behind all of this. There is something else, something deeper beyond constantly living in some broken past. I get closer to it everyday, closer to a definition of what it is I really need. I crave a stability I don't understand from other people. I crave a safety, an honesty. I truly want to get away from chasing after you, all versions of you; a race I've run since birth.  

"You have to look at it like, you're bringing this many chips to the table," he said. "You really are."

It occurs to me lately that people admit their emotions. 

I am, in reality, surrounded by copious amounts of love and well wishing. I'm ready to leave you, all of you, behind. Slowly but surely, I'm counting the chips.

J told me he loved me again today. It was the saddest thing. 

I got the Power Issue of Vogue today and nearly cried to see B on the cover. It all makes sense, doesn't it?