serendipity (noun): finding something good without looking for it
You're an enigma.
All my life, everyone I've ever met has always told me I'm an enigma.
You're an enigma, you're an enigma, you're an enigma. What does that even mean? Do they call me an enigma because I'm a mystery? Or do they call me an enigma because they can't understand me?
I don't think I should suffer being dubbed such a foolish word for the faults of others in failing to properly understand human nature.
I believe it's a paradox; I'm a walking paradox. They call me an enigma because I am one, and I am an enigma because they call me one. Cause and effect, effect and cause.
As a matter of fact, I don't think I'm mysterious at all. I'm just not naïve enough to believe that everyone in the world is as happy as they appear to be, and I'm not interested in wasting my time spewing some fake-faced, good natured, exultant lies back into another person's face.
Rather, I'm interested in living.
Hear me out. Humans live about an average of eighty years; the first ten of them spent in a oblivion filled childhood where you don't know any better, and the last twenty spent wobbling pathetically around in their old age. That gives me a total of fifty years in between, and ten of them are spent on the teenage years where you can't do anything you want to do, and you don't want to do anything you can do. Do you see where I'm going here? The average human has forty years to live their lives. Forty years. That's fourteen thousand and six hundred days. Can you compute that? 14,600 days. Every day I waste leading a boring life brings me a day closer to my imminent and dreary death. Can you understand my immense need to live my life right now? Do you understand why I don't believe in wasting my time on simpletons who don't understand the immensity of their own inevitable deaths?
I have this inconceivable need to feel like I'm living my life. If I get the feeling I'm wasting my life away, I up and move, leave my whole life behind to go start anew, just so I can feel like I'm alive. I need to know I'm not just faking being happy; I need to feel it emanating from my bones.
That's why I dropped my increasingly lackluster boyfriend and job and life back in the city, and left it there, where it belongs. Just murmured, "I'm bored" to my boyfriend while we lay in bed the night before and left a note on the table in the morning saying I wasn't really living. Do you think that was cruel of me? Good. Maybe it'll make him come to life.
Don't get me wrong – it was no fault of his. He was a good guy; we met when we were drinking and smoking and felt alive, and for a while I thought maybe he was just like me. I thought he wanted a life that was always pulsing and moving and breathing. But sure enough, he fell into a dull routine, just as all the other guys did before. He was sweet and caring and reliable and all those other things women crave in a man, but he turned out to be so bland, so easy to understand. It's a shame, in a way. I do hope he forgives me eventually. Or even if he doesn't, it won't matter. I'm not in the disgusting habit of looking back, like everyone else is. Besides, I'm sure plenty of other girls would want him.
I'm not like other girls.
Anyway, that's how I ended up on Castanet Island. No second thought, no tearful goodbye or pang of longing. Just got on the nearest ship and bolted the hell out of that dreary city.
"What's your name, dear?" the captain of the ship, who I now know was Pascal, asked me as I got on board, zero baggage with me.
"Molly."
"That's a lovely name," he smiled serenely. "And what brings you to Castanet Island?"
I grinned. "I'm going to live."
Author's Note: Hi there! So this is my go at writing a story that isn't a one shot, but rather a full-blown story. Don't worry, the other chapters won't be as philosophical as this one. If you enjoyed it, feel free to check out a few of my other stories and leave me some reviews!