Chapter 9: Label

As I flew back, I pondered what Stonemover had said further. I tossed it over and over again. I dissected each word, tried to remember the precise tone of voice he said it in, and attempted to use those tones to discover new truths about myself.

My results were exactly the same as before; I was too stressed.

Not only was I stressed, but I was also anxious and mildly depressed. Facing these facts felt weird. It was like looking in a mirror while smiling and being greeted with a face filled with murderous rage. That couldn't be me! I couldn't be depressed!

Yet strangely, these truths were liberating.

All this time, I'd been in denial. Major denial. I'd told myself that I was fine, but I wasn't. And almost as worse, I'd lied to myself about when I started being not fine. I told myself that it was Turtle's unblinding of me that triggered it, but that couldn't be it. That wasn't the start of the anxiety; it was only the catalyst for further sadness.

The blinding was the moment where it started.

Before the blinding, heck, before I even got out of the mountain I spent my childhood in, I was fine. I was fine because I had dragons surrounding me. Whenever I felt stressed or anxious, I would go over to them and tell them my thoughts and they would comfort me.

But when I was blind, I couldn't just go over to them. To go over to someone, you have to know where you are going. I couldn't know where I was going because I was blind.

And if I couldn't go over to someone and talk to them, they might not as well exist. After all, if you never see a certain dragon, they will never exist in your mind. It doesn't matter how many sobs their sad story might inspire or how many of their loved ones died or how much empathy they may make you feel, but if they never get the chance to tell you that story, you will never care about them, no matter how good-hearted of a dragon you are.

So I isolated myself. I had to isolate myself. I had no other option. I was blind. Being blind severely limits one's career options, but it also limits their social life. My blindness made dragons have to come to me, not I to them. It was so disheartening, not being able to start a conversation. I so desperately wanted to intrude in a conversation that I had no right to be taking part in like I usually did. Oh, how I wanted to! I took things like this for granted before I was blind.

And no one came to me. I had a reputation for being quiet, for being my own best friend. I was known by everyone around me to immerse myself in the wondrous worlds of my own thoughts. So no one would come to me and pull me out of my thoughts without my permission. They let me talk to them. That's how it was. Most conversations took place when I wanted them to.

Rarely did someone come to start a conversation with me.

That's how it was when I was blind too.

Not talking with anyone will normally drive a dragon insane. I realized on that trip back to the common room that I'd held out longer than most dragons probably would have. I remember a day right at the start of Jade Mountain's existence, where the rest of the gang was busy organizing business. On that day, no one came to talk to me. Not Clay, not Glory, not Tsunami, not even my beloved Sunny. When I heard snoring in the neighboring caves, and I knew that it was night, I began to cry. I was alone, with no one to hear my sobs. I was trapped, with no escape.

Flying back, I congratulated myself on my inner strength. I should have broken then. But I am extraordinary. This has to be the only reason I could have held out for months more of this treatment.

Months of being alone. And I got used to it. And I guess I got so used to being alone that even when I was unblinded, I couldn't accept being anything but alone.

That's why I didn't sleep in the caves that first night, was it? It wasn't because I wanted to read. It was because I wanted to be alone. I wanted nothing more in the world than to talk with someone, and yet I wanted to do this while being alone at the same time.

But that was ridiculous, I told myself! As I told myself this, I felt a surge of pride, for I realized I'd hit the root of my problems. I'd been trapped in my own self-made paradox. I had to talk with the dragons I loved, but I also had to be alone at the same time. That's impossible, though. And that impossibility was the reason my existence sucked so much.

I resolved to never think about that impossibility again. I needed to get used to being social again.

But I was scared of being social again. No matter how hard I tried to make myself not scared, my heart stayed cowering behind my skin. I tried to force it out, but it would not budge.

So if I was not to break ties with this impossibility using my heart, then I had to do it using my will. And I had an abundance of willpower. Willpower and inner strength are directly tied. The more inner strength I have, the more willpower I have. I have enough inner strength to survive months of what was near-total isolation. I think I have a decent amount of willpower.

I gathered my will. I converted some of it into courage. Then I entered the common room lighter, calmer, and more at peace with myself.

I went over to everyone, something I did not get to do while I was blind. Over the next few minutes, I started three conversations. That was two more conversations than I'd started over the past year.

"Library. Meet me. Group meeting. Now," I told everyone separately.

"OK…", said Tsunami. "I guess, but why are you acting so weird lately? You're never grammatically incorrect."

"Can I finish this conversation with Marsh?" asked Clay. "It'll be quick." "No it won't," Marsh muttered. Marsh seemed bored of whatever Clay was saying to him, and his face brightened up at my words. "No," I told Clay. "Now. Plus, Marsh doesn't seem to be very interested in whatever you're talking about." Marsh tried to deny this, acting surprised, muttering "Wha? NOOO." "Don't lie," I said to Marsh. "I saw your face. You looked like you finally found out who your father was." I considered telling them, Imagine knowing who your father is, but then I remembered that given the fact that I never got a chance to meet my mother, I was in no position to talk. Marsh gave up and accepted the fact that he would have to displease his brother. "Just go to the meeting," he told Clay. "And never talk to me about bugs again."

"What's wrong?" asked Sunny.

"Nothing," I told her. "I just wanted to tell the gang about us, and about…us being cousins, you know."

"Yeah, I guess we should," Sunny said. "They deserve to know."

"They're our friends. We can't keep secrets from them."

"Star, what are we going to do?"

"What do you mean? I just told you what we're going to do. We're gonna tell the gang that we're cousins?"

"No, I mean about us!"

"About us? What about us?"

"Are we still boyfriend and girlfriend? Or are we just cousins? What are we gonna do?"

"Well, we're still boyfriend and girlfriend, aren't we? I mean, being cousins doesn't change anything."

"Starflight, this changes everything!" She used my full name. Uh oh. She means business.

"OK, Sunny, what does this change? Tell me," I asked her calmly.

"Well, you don't just see family members strutting around and kissing each other! Like, Turtle and Tsunami aren't in any sort of relationship!" Sunny said.

"A: that's an unfair comparison, and B: are you sure we know that's not true?"

"Shut up, Starflight, and stop joking around! This is serious!" she angrily said to me.

I'd thought my joke was funny, so I'd been smiling. Apparently not. I wiped the smile off my face and went into serious mode. I lowered my voice and used the calm, authoritative tone that I was known for.

"Sunny, we're not really cousins. We are, but we're not really. We're from different tribes. We're the last two dragons someone would think were cousins."

"Yeah, but it doesn't change the fact that we are!" said Sunny. "Look up cousins in one of the twelve dictionaries you own and you will see our picture under it."

"But 'cousin' is just a label," I told Sunny. "It doesn't mean anything."

"Yes it does," said Sunny.

"What does it mean, then?" I asked her.

"It means we can't be a couple anymore," she said.

"Yes, we can," I told her.

"Starflight, that's not how it works," she said.

"I don't care how it works. I just want to love you," I said to her. "This is true love. Right?"

"Yes, but I'm just not sure it can work-"

"It'll work. We'll make it work. And just because our dads are brothers doesn't mean that we can't be in love," I said.

Sunny sighed. "You sure this can work?" she nervously asked me.

"I'm 110% sure," I said to her.

"But what will everyone think?" asked Sunny. "What are Clay and Glory and Tsunami going to say?"

"They'll understand," I told her. "They've supported us at every turn. They're our best friends. Of course they'll understand."

"Really?" she asked doubtfully.

"Really," I told her. "Now come on. We should probably go to the library now."

"Library? Why?" asked Sunny, clearly still doubting me.

"To tell the gang. I told them I'd meet them there five minutes ago, and I'm just worried that if left unattended they're going to destroy the place."

Sunny meagerly smiled. "Yeah, we should probably go," she said.

So off we went to the library, to have one of the more important conversations of my life, and by far the most important non-war, non-prophecy, non-Jade Mountain related one. Seems like that's all I've talked about my whole life.