What Happens in My Room

The room is cold, broken, and holds bad memories, but it is mine. The walls and I have much in common. We are bright and distracting, crammed with vivid colours and pictures, but we are unfinished and may never be. A black closet holds my darkest past…a knife, a match, a coloured string. There are shelves crammed with stuff even I don’t understand, and though it may be spotless, if you look closely at the precariously stacked books, candle, incense, and clothing, the room well reflects the disorganized one who claims it. A drawer near the floor holds my life; years of insight into my mind is gathered there. This is the part I need the very most. For excitement and anger and all the feelings I’ve ever had are carelessly tossed into this drawer. I guard it as though it actually contains my soul. And, I suppose, it does. My room is mine, and I share it with those I welcome into it’s darkness. Sitting cross-legged on my bed, I must be careful not to think too much. I write and distract myself, and I am at peace. But someday I know it will all be gone.

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A young girl sits in a white nightgown amongst the ruins of an old dwelling. Around her is decay and the charred remains of what may have once been someone’s home. Piles of ashes lay quiet and undisturbed around her, staining her dress black. The place she sat was barely recognizable as a room, for two of the walls were reduced to rubble and the ceiling stretched on forever into the night sky. A mist hung low on her, but she did not shiver. Feeling as though she were in a dream, her mind had been wandering and she had been considering anything and everything in the world. What was the purpose, why was she stuck here, what are these mad thoughts she cannot chase from her mind? Images haunt her wherever she turns. But here, in this place, she could let her mind rest. Her eyes scan the debris, and without realizing she had been searching, she found what she had been looking for. Beneath the decay of the fire, a piece of charred paper was sticking up; the only object in the rubble not completely black. She gently took the paper from the ashes. A strong night breeze caught the note, for she mustn’t read the words that were written. But she reached for it, crumpling the dying burned paper. She felt as though her life was sliding away from her as she considered the words from long ago, from piles of secret thoughts all devoured in the flames...“Someday I will die. Who will read my thoughts? Will anyone ever care enough?”

She barely felt it as she dug the knife into her heart, spirals of red staining down her chest.