Memories… some of the best and even the worst, memories that can make a heart fall in love a friendship form or cease. There once was time in my life, that I adored from every spectrum and point of view I could obtain. At least that is how I remember it, that’s what memories do to us. We ravish upon the times we laughed until we cried or the times we cried ourselves to sleep, the times we talked until our throat ran dry and the times we felt we could barely speak, the times our hearts filled with love and souls with well nourished laughter, and the times we wish we just couldn’t remember. Though forgotten memories still exist, they never erase, the pain never ceases. Clearly there is such a thing as to forgive, but to forget? Well, that’s clearly foolish. As far as my memory lets me know, memories used to be my favorite accompanies, filling my lungs with air for respiration; just the very necessity of my happiness, the rope to pull me through a harsh day or a broken smile. Unfortunately those memories are now too, broken. Just a little bit at least, from a time when I believed I was truly blissful and knowing now that it all was fake. In the end I believe to live fulfilled lives, forgiveness is essential but learning that may not be as simple as it seems.


Misery loves company; isn’t that just beautiful? It’s actually almost as if misery lurks in the corners of my vision, traveling with me everywhere I go. It’s not an easy subject matter to deal with or even come to terms upon. However all good things must come to an end. Even the most powerful life changing relationships we develop can wither away in the distance. Almost like when you apply tension to a small string, it snaps, and quicly separates. My name is Rachel I’m perfect at learning my lessons the hard way, even if that makes me heartless.


Personally I view everything different than others, and I never consider myself the average girl. Sometimes I come off as rather hostile, when actually I’m never thinking that way. It’s just who I am, I make jokes, I can actually be hilarious. But it seems like no one listens. That’s a particular pet peeve of mine that I just cannot tolerate that kind of behavior. Especially with friends of mine, one in particular, Joyce. It all began on one joyous, thrilling, heart-thriving day. Who knew it would end with so many tears, so many comments, and the end of new beginnings.Drama didn’t exist much for me throughout middle school, nothing was ever really dramatic. Just a little nonsense and immaturity sprang it in sixth grade dealing with a game of truth or dare, twice in seventh two rumors with and drama starving girls, then again in eighth, with a boy who potentially had a crush on me. Other than those meaningless mishaps, my life was drama clean. As for my friends and I, our young minds cliqued together like a chain. For me, my selection of friends was always unique, and at the time I had met no true aspersions. This meant I was naive and weak.


Listlessly my troubles piled together, disorganized in stacks, crowding my head, dreams, and began a train of thought that I’d never wished to be a passenger of. I could not escape them, they traced my every footstep, watched my path travel every which way. Somehow the endless vicious issues always caught up to me. I felt as if I’d never be released from this road. I remember sitting in keyboarding class, practicing my keys, over and over again. Now, a year later, I don not remember the exact keys the ones I’ve hit a million times, intead I remember the text message my mother sent me.“Don’t stay after school, when you get home I need to talk to you and your sister.” Immediately I pondered everything I’d done wrong in the past week. I found nothing, for once I could not place one thing to blame. What did we do? Questions clogged my brain, my head began to heat. My cheeks flushed red my soul sank, my stomach too. Did an Aunt die? What happened?It frightened me, made me question my stability and dared my actions. Little did I know it would essentially break my heart. That’s the thing about heart break, it isn’t when your kitten runs away, not about a failing grade on a test, a fight with your mother or a boyfriend that cheats. Heart break, real, true, ravishing in disgust, seamlessly, edgy, heart break. Is the undesirable fate of all persons who have ever evolved, grown to love someone, and realize you may never see them again. That is where my story begins, with a conversation, that never began, yet never truly ended.


The school bell rang and people, my peers, flooded the halls anxious of the days end. Each and every one of them desired to get home as quickly as possible, however, I did not. Instead I wanted to fall, hide away in a deep black sleep, faint even, give into the questions and the worries, everything that explored my brain. Looking forward to bad news is never something common, naturally I knew it was anything but good news.My sister stayed after school, she’d gotten the message too late. So when I gently turned the knob of my front door, the lock creaking and flicking out of place, the door broke a deafening silence. An almost unbreakable silence, something hung in the house. Like a black smog above everything. An oily black smog that no one could wipe away, as if I’d tried it would just rub in deeper and deeper. Most certainly the smog would stain. Confusion multiplied inside me, secretly; quietly I placed my keys on the table. They clashed together in an unpleasant melody of bells.


“Rachel?” My mother called from her bedroom, that sweet talk. It was ancient, a sincere voice she locked away, only using it in certain manners. Like times of the death of a family member, the sickness of an uncle, or a favor undone. My heart sank.


“Yeah Mom I’m here.” I could barely release the words, or even begin to form them on my lips, the tension brewed inside my head. The knots tightened and my stomach began to shift.


“How was your day?” She asked like she cared. She asked like it mattered. She asked like she’d never sent that text message. She asked like this wasn’t just small talk and she had nothing more to say. She asked like everything was normal. She asked like she wasn’t about to inform me of my newly found heart break. She asked like my world wasn’t about to end just moments later. She asked as if my life wasn’t going to crash down before me. She asked like she cared.


I ignored her question, it was inevitable, I had to. I couldn’t resist the tension, the thoughts the questions; the hot, thick, utterly repulsive soup of acids boiling in my stomach and brain. So I asked her a question, one I had to ask, I couldn’t bare another moment without its answer. Now I wish I’d never wondered, never asked, never even pondered the thought of that questions answer. I wish for the world to change the days to spin, to turn back time like spinning a model globe of the earth in reverse, faster and faster. Release time, change it, but I couldn’t.


“What did you have to talk to me about? You texted me fifth period, you had me worried all day. What is it? Is it something bad? Mom, what happened?” I shot questions her quickly, releasing more words only grew more worries more despite, more tension.


“Oh, I wanted to wait for your sister to come home as well, so I could tell you both at the same time.”


“Mom what is it? What’s wrong?”


“Can we wait for your sister? Or would you rather I tell you now?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know is it bad?”


“Well…”


“Mom, what’s it about?”


“Your father.” I felt like this would be one of those times, like in movies, when the child starts freaking on in another language; French, Spanish, Latin maybe? I wish I fluently knew another language, one I could rage into, course it through my veins, let the dialogue indulge into me. In any way I could. The confusion doubled, flipped over, imprinted, mimicked, copied, replicated, and enveloped throughout my entire body. Each churn of my stomach left a thousand questions coursing through my brain. It felt like my arms were broken, my legs too, my bone structure was fragmented as her sentences. I wanted to agonize but hope gave me the potential to breathe. Hope gave me the prosperity to perhaps believe, it wasn’t that bad, maybe not even bad at all. But the smog fell into my broken vision, smothering me, making my breathing patchy; anxiety pressuring me, pursuing me to ask again. What happened? What happened? What happened? That was the question, but the answer… was it something I wanted to know?


“I can tell you know if you want me to.”Why was she asking me? Why wasn’t she just answering? Why was she making me decide, why… why… why…?


“Alright tell me.” I held my breath in deeply, keeping the air close to my heart.


"Sit down"


I sat. I looked. I looked at her with hopeful eyes, empty eyes, full of empty emotions; just awaiting her words to tell them how to feel.


My mouth felt dry, dehydrated as well as my body. A feeling like no amount of water could ever fill me up entirely, not complete me, make me whole again. Somehow I knew, inside, there was a part of me that had been to the future, a part of me who knew the answers to the questions. A part of me that knew myself better then my conscious will would allow me to. Colliding with a part of me that could barely breathe, think, wish , sigh, remember, smile, drink, eat, talk, or cry. A part of me that wanted to hear the words my mother was holding behind her lips, a part I wish I never needed. But the only part that pulled me through like an anchor stuck to the sea and its water infested ground. Too bad I felt no where near water, or the sea. I longed for that type of tranquility. Maybe if I were actually anchored to the bottom of the sea the pressure of the water would build and build and build, eventually release my fears into a blackness. I’m best at that type of thing, wanting to hide, escape, run away, from all my miseries. I’ve learned it never seems to work out just right, not like I want it to. Not like it should be. I simply cannot run from my fears.

"Mom..."

"Your Father... he's in jail and he's pleading guilty." Bullets. Her words came like bullets. Bullets plunging through the pouring rain, the smog that clogged my vision. Not rain, but tears, the blackness, my mascara racing down my face and that empty feeling inside me.

I remember my mother sitting on the couch across from me taking in my actions. She looked at me hopeless as I was, her eyes soaked up my tears, took in my pain. Her big brown eyes gazed at me, I couldn't help but look back. I have her eyes, that same wonderous brown. All I'd wanted was to turn my head, tear away the newly born tension. My vulnerablities became impossible to conceal, as she watched me lose myself.

I could feel the emotions raging inside me, it's all mush like a bundle of feeling twisting and twirling, spinning throught my head, ready to burst. Interwined, tangling inside my brain. Then completely combining into mush undecipherable mush. Leaving me not knowing what to do or how to do it. My emotions sprang through my lips, like broken shards of glass, stinging me as they pushed through my broke sobbs and tears. What was I supposed to do knowing my father would be gone. Gone. Gone. Gone.

"Mom i dont know how to deal with not being able to see my father and knowing that teh reason why is beacuse he is in jail. even if i never so him that much when he wasnt in jail it doesnt matter. knowing that my father is dishonorable i dont even know how that makes me feel and im trying to explain what im going through and how i feel but i dont even know and thats part of the reason i just dont know what to do, i just dont know how to cope." The emptiness came over me, all she did was hold me tightly and she never let go.

"I know. Sweetie I know. It's going to be okay. You didn't do anything wrong it's alright."

"I know I didn't do anything wrong Mom but should I be crying? Do I have the right or the reason to cry? I don't even know how to feel, what I'm feeling or how I feel. It's just so many different emotions all at once. I can't even explain it."

"Just remember what I always say, everything happens for a reason, even if that reason is unknown, everything is in the hands of the universe. When one door closes, another opens. I promise only time can tell. It's okay to cry, just let it out. Just let it out."

And I did, I cried there for what felt like hours, I released all the pain but it seemed like in the speed of light it was back again. Who knew my eyes could form so many tears, so quickly too, like I was a generator for water. I couln'y contain myself. My head felt heavy and light all at once. My eyes felt cold and hot. I felt empty but full of emotion. Emotion I could not tear apart or decipher. Emotions that altered my insides, twisted and turned me. I could feel my chromosomes changing, my head, the train of thought I once knew so well suddenly steered off the track. Confusion kept boiling over in my head, foggy, cloudy, bewildered confusion. It was stuck there, alienated. Even it didn't want to be in my thoughts, but as confusion it was trapped. It was heart break, live in the making. The real thing, something I'd always wished to never meet. Real heart break, knew me instead. It was abnormal to me and I promise, It isn't something anyone gets used to. Heart break is static, it just about never fully heals.

From there the night went black, the moon fell upon the sky, and unbelievably the sun rose at six as usual. The world had not ended, but mine did. The life I once knew, the life I had grown so accustomed to had changed forever as I knew it.

Even the air felt different, breathing in deeply choked me. Litteraly, I couldn't breathe. I could feel that same black smog that hung in my home the day before, resting all around me. Clinging to the air like humidity. Thinking was out of the question. Surprisingly I never realized how it works, when your head fills up to the brim and overflows for hours, days, weeks, months, even years, there is no room for a concious to tell you what to do. No room for a concious to tell you what is right and wrong. No room for a concious to tell you how you feel. No room for a concious to control you. So there I was, static, barely controling my actions, as the smog, the confusion, the inevitable sadness took control of me, and changed everything it came in contact with. Infesting my body like a virus, feasting on my personality, my endorphines, hormones, sleep cycle, and believe it or not my sanity.

In school that day i hadn't decided whether or not I should hide my sadness, but in depth all I wanted was to be happy. Happiness was something i feared I'd never feel again, so instead of going straight to my support system of friends, to Joyce and the others, I locked away all emotion and turned on a static happiness. But theres something different about actual happiness and a smile that is fake. There's something noticably different, something abnormal, something edgy. A million times I felt my true emtion slipping like third grade again, I felt just like a baby missing the feeling of love. All I wanted was to be loved, as simple as that. Everything I thought about was self-concious, 'what was wrong with me, why can't I just move on?' The more I convered my emotions, the quicker I masked my personality, my kindness.

One day I overheard Joyce talking with my other friends.

"What's wrong with Rachel?" Kassie said, not entirely concerned but almost testy.

"I don't know but i don't like it she's acting so weird, what is wrong with her!" Joyce's voice pinched my heart, it sputtered like an empty fountain, I felt as if the pieces fell to the ground and my blood ran empty.

"We can't invite her anywhere with us anymore, I feel like with the way she's been acting, she'll ditch us for some popular friends." Tiffanys voice strained my molded smile and forced it into a frown. I leaned up against the wall, let me knees give in as I slid to the floor. All I did was sit, all i could do was sit. I felt so empty, everything was changing, and I hadn't even noticed my friends felt it too. So I cried. Again I wanted to run, but i knew that wouldn't work. So I did all I knew how to do, I locked away my fears, my worries, and my tears, and I lost the key.

Tension grew thicker, but I ignored it, locked it away because I couldn't deal with my problems. I knew I was to weak as to release them from my overflowing chamber piling inside my head. I just kept packing them away, what else was I to do? I couldn't think, my life was slipping away with me and I wasn't in control.

The more i strived to be myself, to break through their wall of tensions and judgements, the more it seemed to grow thicker. A brick wall, contructed with a million flaws, not a single brick penetratable. Each time I attempted to break through it grew thicker. Even if I'd try to climb over it, the peak was unreachable. It was absolutely impossible to get through to my friends. So I locked away the wall as well.

I was alone, dealing with the worst hardship I'd ever met. Alone. My father was gone. My friends were gone. My life seemed to be gone too. Gone. Gone. Gone.

I was heart less, I was broken hearted.