I returned home, my body ached but my mind raced. The shower was a moment of temporary escape—water washing away the exhaustion, the numbness, but not the heaviness I carried inside. I slipped into new clothes, something comfortable, but nothing could make me feel at ease. I sat at my desk, my thoughts tumbling like a relentless storm, and worked until the world outside faded. From 1 PM to 2 AM, time had no meaning. The satisfaction of solving problems, the small triumphs of understanding what once seemed incomprehensible—those fleeting moments became the only escape I had, and still, I hated it.
Every time I sank into the kind of sleep that consumed you completely, my mind slipped into the same unsettling rhythm—dreams that felt more real than my waking life. This time, I found myself on a beach in the Maldives, the sun barely rising, painting the sky with soft shades of light blue. A distant song played, I Follow Rivers by Lykke Li, its haunting melody echoing through the space like a pull I couldn't resist.
And then, there was the figure beside me. A presence—mysterious, quiet, speaking in riddles.
"The anonymous," he said, though his face remained a blur.
"Who are you?" I asked, though deep down, I knew the answer was just another piece of a puzzle I'd never quite put together.
"It doesn't matter," he replied, his voice calm, as though he'd said this a thousand times before. "You'll figure it out soon enough."
I didn't understand. Why was I here in this surreal place? This moment of peace amidst the chaos in my mind. "Why are you here?" I asked. "This place, this dream—it feels like heaven, yet... why am I stuck here with you?"
"You need a way out," he said simply. "A place where you won't have to worry anymore."
I swallowed hard, the weight of his words sinking in. Pain—the kind I hadn't been able to escape for months—had been my constant companion. But now, there was something different, a strange calm creeping into my chest. Maybe it was real, maybe it wasn't, but for once, the storm inside me seemed to quiet, just a little.
"You think it's gone," he said, almost knowingly, "But it's like a cancer, isn't it? It waits for the right moment to mutate, to come back stronger."
I nodded, unable to argue. I had spent months denying the depth of my pain, pretending I wasn't consumed by it. But his words—they pierced through, cutting deeper than I expected.
He fell silent for a moment, before speaking again, "You need to open yourself up to others. No matter how real or fake they are. The ones who matter, you'll know them. And the ones who don't—they'll try to bring you down."
A pause. My heart clenched as I struggled to understand the meaning of his words. My life had been a cycle of betrayal and hurt, wrapped in silence and loneliness.
"I know you want to know who I am," he said softly, breaking through my spiraling thoughts. "But you never will. Not fully. That's the beauty of it. And yet, you'll keep looking. Keep wondering."
Before I could respond, the dream shattered. My alarm blared, dragging me back into the waking world. Monday. The cruel reality of it hit me like a ton of bricks.
I followed my routine—dull, mechanical—but it all felt so foreign. Even as I stepped out, I was greeted by the roar of Sara's Porsche, the hum of the engine as she asked me to join her. I didn't have the strength to refuse, so I climbed into her car, not saying much. The music played—Ben Platt's River—and for a moment, I let the melody wash over me. It was perfect. The quiet hum of the car, the sun shining down, the trees whizzing by—it was a rare moment of peace amidst all the noise.
But peace was fleeting. When we arrived at school, I could feel the weight of the eyes on me. The whispers, the comments. "What's he doing with her?" they muttered. Garbage compared to a jock, they thought. It didn't matter what they thought. Not anymore. But even so, a small part of me couldn't help but feel the sting. I wasn't meant to be part of their world, and I knew it.
The day dragged on. Classes, meaningless conversations, and the incessant gossip. Everyone talks about relationships as if they hold the answers to life itself. As if love was something you could easily possess, and own. Billy and Malice even had the nerve to ask me about my love life, a life I'd long since abandoned. I wanted to scream at them to mind their own business, but I stayed quiet, responding with as little as I could.
Sara and I didn't speak again after that. I returned home to my parents—who were as distant as ever. They sat at the table, arguing about something trivial. I couldn't even focus on the details. It was always the same. The arguments. The absence of warmth between them.
I excused myself, retreating to my room to drown out their voices. They never seemed to notice how their fighting affected me, how it chipped away at something inside of me. I asked my mom once why love was so absent in their relationship. She told me it wasn't necessary to show love—it was about feeling it, she said.
I didn't understand it. I don't think I ever would. All I knew was the emptiness that followed them into every room. The silence that swallowed any attempt at real connection.
Dinner was chicken, something simple. But even as I ate, a part of me knew it wouldn't fill the emptiness inside.
After finishing my homework—if you could even call it that—I retreated into the quiet of my room. I put on my headphones and let the music drown everything else out. It was a way of surviving, I suppose. A way to ignore the reality that was closing in around me.
As the night passed, I couldn't shake the feeling of being lost. Alone in a world that didn't make sense. I wasn't sure of anything anymore, but one thing was clear—I couldn't keep going like this. I couldn't keep running from my thoughts, and my own emotions.
I stepped outside again, leaving my bike behind and walking into the rain. The cold water soaked me through, but I didn't care. It was the only way I could feel something real. The wind, the rain, the chill—it was the only truth I had left.
Maybe, just maybe, I wasn't meant for the life everyone else seemed to be building. Maybe I was meant to stand alone, to forge my path. The thought was both comforting and terrifying. But it was mine to hold.
And in that moment, as the rain poured down, I decided: I would no longer let life pass me by. I would become the man I was meant to be—no matter how lonely or broken that path might be.