A/N: Dedicated to a friend of mine who experienced similar situations to Lisa Mishima. I recommend listening to First Breath After Coma by Explosions in the Sky while reading. Enjoy!
You've always been asking questions ever since you were just a child; ever since your parents separated; ever since you met those two boys…And every time it happens, the cycle just repeats. It grows dull and monotonous; weary of your tedious labour and your meaningless life. Yet you still ask those questions; those answerless questions that plague your mind have forever been there since you began to comprehend the human life and the ability to think.
Why am I here?
You don't know why you're here; why you live and exist in this world of paper-thin walls and ugly truths hidden in the thinly-veiled lies hissed out at you. All you know, without evidence to support your claims or a requirement for proof, is that you are nobody; you always have been nobody. That is your conclusion, found without the need for historical examination or scientific knowledge.
You know it just as well that you came here, into this life, with chances, choices and opportunities but you wasted them all by crying yourself to sleep and clinging onto imaginary friends. That began when you first started school; when your parents began arguing and you were left with a broken arm, a result achieved from when your mother mistook you for your father. She didn't realise it then that you were just a small girl and you looked nothing like your father. To you, your mother was an unpredictable monster who came home in tears and just screamed on the phone for hours on end and you just clung onto a stuffed toy for comfort…You don't recall the teddy bear's name, but it was your best friend for the following three years.
Why did you leave?
You asked your father that question many times on the phone but he never answered it. All he did was say that he loved you and not your mother for various reasons that you could not fully comprehend; you were slow on learning for your age. That's what began your clumsy attitude and all your needless apologies to various people you knew. It all grew quite tiresome each passing day to the point that your mother, your dear yet mentally unstable mother, forbade you from uttering those few syllables of "I'm sorry". Instead, she used them, those phrases of begging forgiveness, and turned it all against you; she still remained a monster in your later years.
Why are you like this?
A growing concern of yours in the past years, spawned when your life took the next turning, the turning was known as the teenage years; an awkward, questioning period of time that provided very little relaxation and comfort.
It was the reason you left home, breaking the dead calm of the last dregs of night as dawn rose, the sun, a runny egg yolk, slid up the sky to introduce morning, hiding away the pains of night.
Do you not care any more?
The students at your new high school paid little attention to you at first, until one black-haired, green-eyed, teeth-like-a-beaver girl shoved you into the lockers. The kids laughed of course, enjoying the display of bullying. It was an excuse to make fun of the new kid; the new, short kid on the block was you.
You refused to call out for help, you couldn't do it anyway for the life of you, no one cared and no one dared and so nothing was disturbed and nobody bothered anyone about these things. It was though the change in a well-crafted, flawless system was frowned upon as it so often is. That is, until the day you stood by the pool on a hot summer's day when you turned sixteen.
Are you afraid?
That question has stuck by you since you turned sixteen; since you saw those two boys. You couldn't give a straight answer back then, just an insignificant nod or in a small voice, tinged with worry, you uttered one word, a single syllable: "Yes."
Grey eyes, obscured by wire framed glasses, peered at you, peeling the layers like a banana. This time, you shook your head. No, you were not afraid.
Do you fear death?
That was the last question you asked Nine, he didn't say much but it was the first time someone had truly answered you. He had said something about accepting the cycle of life; that we, as beings, were nothing except a clump of atoms that could speak and move and do things. "Intelligent atoms" was how he described the human race, as though dogs and cats were unintelligible and the working ant was just a few thousand atoms large.
Nine then went on to say that Death was just some personification that reaped souls and sent them to the great Unknown. In that large expanse, a person walked a tightrope resulting in a fall into either Heaven or Hell and whichever one you dropped into, you would have to accept your fate.
And you learned to embrace it also, just like they did. Heaven or Hell, it made no difference.
You still see their bloody, grotesque bodies lying on the gravel at night when images speak far more than words, continued to pierce the tranquil atmosphere.
Are you okay?
You look upon their makeshift tombstones now; pieces of rotten wood stuck together from rafts with numbers scrawled on them. The sand laps at your feet, like a dog licking your face; it tickles and brushes against you gently. A small tight smile escapes you and forms on your lips, painting your face. But it is forced and dissimilar to the times you smiled with them. It's okay, you tell yourself, not fully trusting and accepting those words. It does not matter any longer, however.
The wind blows gently, scattering the leaves in your direction, coating the tombstones. You know that they are at peace and so are you, despite your incessant questions;
Your endless enquiries will never cease.
