Hex
Chapter 1
It's hard to describe being alone. Not the alone you feel when sitting somewhere having a cup of coffee by yourself because your friend bailed. Not the type where you see lovers walking , hands linked, and wonder why Tommy in 5th period won't ask you out. It's the type where you feel that if you stay where you are standing, you could honestly be the only person left in the world. My views most every day consist of trees, mountains, running quickly out of sight either left or right, but rarely do I indulge myself with the pleasures actually being around others. For what I am, it's dangerous. A runaway. The outlier on the graph of society. A giant question mark.
It used to happen too often, when I would tire of only having the nature around me as company, that I would find myself in a grocery store parking lot, or park. I'd go almost unconsciously just to soak up the feeling of being around people. Listening to phone conversations, the laughs of children playing, petty arguments between married couples over what was for dinner that night…. It made me feel as if I belonged among them. Somewhere. Eventually though, it would happen. "It" being the stares. As clean as I could get myself in a gas station bathroom, there was always a bright neon sign that seemed to buzz above me like a scarlet letter. "Homeless". "Doesn't belong." It was when I absorbed those looks that the illusion of inclusion evaporated into the air like vapor. Then the stress would start. Then the fear. Then the pain.
If only it were the pain of feeling unwelcome.
Unfortunately, these anxious feelings that would creep on me like a silent predator always seemed to bring about my personal and true "scarlet letter". It starts out as the feeling of my pulse pounding away morse code messages to me through my chest and neck. "Run. Run. Run." Then it goes to my head as an immovable weight of pressure that seems to have the power to push me straight through the earth beneath my feet. Next it works it's way through my arms to my wrists where the pain becomes an almost audible scream emanating from below my palms. The fire that burns from them is unbearable. The heat never fails to leave it's mental and physical wounds. Once it hits my finger tips is when I feel the mounting fear reach its peak and I bolt. My feet sadly never get the hint at the first signal.
Stupid Bella. Stupid.
I know better. But, as if in a trance, I find my way into these situations over and over. I still can't figure out if it's ever worth the feeling of being around others.
Today, the siren call came again and I found myself staring at a high school parking lot. The teens of Forks High School milled about, soaking up the last bit of freedom their mornings offered before being corralled into their classrooms until the final bell of the day. How clueless they were. The "freedom" I experience almost everyday is frightening. Although, to be fair, it's not the only frightening thing about myself that makes life harder. How I wish to be in those student's shoes. To know what I was doing with my day, whom I may see, what I might eat, and knowing where I'd be sleeping that night is a relief I long to know once again. Knowing that I should be in their shoes, that I could be one of them if life didn't kick me while I was already down, always filled me with a multitude of emotions. Anger and sadness tending to be at the forefront.
There I stood though, the masochist in all her glory. My dirty clothes, hobo hair, I'm sure, and the look of longing that was most likely plastered on my face scanning the crowd for the sense of inclusion in this normal morning for a normal teen.
That's when the throbbing started. A knocking had begun in my head that snuck up on me without preamble like all of the previous times. It was begging entrance to a door that it foolishly was unaware that I didn't even know how to open and close at will. Gazing at the lot of teens, trying to gather my last look of civilization before the loneliness of the wilderness would take me again, I locked eyes with gold. And I just couldn't move away from those eyes. Wait, eyes?
Yes…eyes. But.. who could have those? How could a person have those? As I forced my own eyes to move over the rest of this being I took in the rest. Copper hair, pale face, even paler than mine…
And a mouth that was grimacing at me. The frustrating look I was getting from this guy only slightly lessened the hold his eyes had on me. It was the tiny movement of the girl next to him that broke the moment, and only then was I able to turn around and run into the woods neighboring the school. The anxious feelings arose again and this time they reared their head with a vengeance.
Sprinting forward and as far as I could get I plunged myself into the depths of the firs and evergreens. My own body betraying me and attacking me without any warning. I stripped off what I could before my head fell back with a scream and the flames spread from my palms. My finger tips feeling the licks of fire emanating from my hands. The earth surrounding me falling victim to this obscene scene and trick against the fabric of nature. It was all too much. I could feel my vision turning black as I slumped further towards the ground. My arms lying in front of my head , I could see the telling sign of this wickedness. Two bright crosses burning red as the brand that put them there on each wrist.
Gold. Red and gold. These were the last colors I took in before a slight whimper escaped my lips and I succumbed to the black and to the feeling of being utterly and completely alone.