by
Kelly Sinacori
As I look up to the sky above, I close my eyes and breathe in the sun’s rays
that gently caress my face. My body is filled with the warmth it emanates,
radiating within me as a yellow golden orb. For a moment, I am the sun. I am
joyous and radiant, glowing with vibrancy and light. I am outside of my body
and high up in the sky, looking down below. I am free. For a
moment, I can imagine what it feels like to be whole and to be happy.
With a swift brush,
the wind passes by and sweeps up a bed of pink petals off the grass from fallen
trees. They dance in the air as they are taken into flight, swirling into
little whirlpools like the spinning twirl of a ballerina. As the wind brushes
by once more, the trees shiver and shed a shower of more petals, twisting and
twirling and swinging back and forth, as they gently journey to a stop at the
ground. I feel much like those petals, twisting and twirling and swinging back
and forth, mindlessly drifting with whatever currents happen to take me by.
The arms of nearby
trees rattle against the glass of my window and my calm and peaceful ambience
is disrupted. Startled, I jump back away from the glass, having forgotten I had
been staring out my dorm window in the first place. I was daydreaming again. Daydreaming
is how I spend most of my afternoons, alone. Whether in my dorm, or in the
practice room, or in the lunch room, or in class, daydreaming is how I keep
myself from not feeling as lonely as I really am. On the other side of my door,
I can hear people walking by. But, I know that as much as I wish someone would
care to knock on my door and see me, no one ever has and no one ever will. Who
cares about me?
If I should find
myself in the company of others, I never forget to put on my mask first. Every
day I parade in-between classes and across campus putting on an act for all to
see. Almost everyone is fooled by it and it’s almost too easy to convince them.
It’s amazing what even the smallest of forced smiles can hide. Sometimes, I’m
so used to wearing my mask that I forget I’m even wearing one. I convince
myself that I’m someone I’m not. But it’s all just fun and games and it’s all
just an act. In truth, behind it is misery. It consumes me and celebrates me in
mocking laughter.
If people were to see
the misery behind my mask, they would catch me at my most vulnerable moment—a
moment I could not dare risk. I wear this mask to protect myself. No one would
understand my pain and the last time I let someone in, they hurt me badly. As a
result, I have learned to trust no one. I am too afraid to let anyone in again
so I shun everyone out as far away from me as I can. Secretly, I wish that
someone would fight against me and pry their way in, but I don’t blame them for
not being able to. I’ve always been told I’m not easy to love. There is a
saying that you can’t truly love someone else until you love yourself first. I
guess it’s the same when you try to love someone who doesn’t love themselves.
What is love anyway?
Jason said he loved me the night he took advantage of me. Is that what love is?
I don’t care to know. I’ve given up on love for now. Ever since Jason hurt me,
I don’t go giving my heart away to anyone. Instead, I stay trapped in this
bubble I’ve built for myself. I know I can’t stay in here forever, but the mere
thought of rejoining life and trying to find happiness sends me down a spiral
of fear. I wouldn’t even know how or where to begin. For now, I let the time
pass me by as I drift through the air, like the petals falling down from the
tree.
Still staring out the
window, my eyes now settle on a pair of birds. Chasing each other into the
infinite sky, they swoop out from a tree that’s settled further away. I’ve
always wondered what it’s like to be a bird and embody such grace and beauty.
I’ve always wondered what it’s like to be so free and wild. I hold my hands
against the cold hard glass. It’s almost transparent, and I am momentarily
tricked by the illusion that there is no separation. I can almost reach out and
touch those birds. If only I could just leave everything behind me and soar
with them up into the bright blue sky. But, then I feel my hands on the glass
again—a painful reminder that I can’t.
Rummaging around my
room, I search for my keys, my sheet music, and my water bottle and leave my
dorm. Keeping a steady pace, I walk down a long narrow hallway through a set a
doors leading to a staircase at the end. Through the doors and down the stairs,
I arrive at another set of doors. Doors doors doors, how many there are in life. Doors we can open,
doors we can close, doors we can walk away from, and doors we can never avoid.
Sometimes, we know what’s on the other side and other times, we have no idea
what’s behind it. Sometimes, we even arrive at the same door to find that it’s
different every time we open it.
With my hand gripped
on the door handle, I swing the door open and walk down a long hallway of
practice rooms. As I walk past each room to my right and left, I can hear the
loud passionate outbursts of tenors and mezzo sopranos, echoing through the
walls. Their vibratos play and bounce off of each other as they cascade through
the hall, mashing into a song of their own. Sometimes they blend nicely, but
most times it sounds quite awful. A soprano cracks on a high note and her voice
shatters through the halls like broken shards of glass. I walk past practice
room 38, 39, 40, 41, and then stop at my left hand side in front of a door with
the rusted golden numbers, 42. I walk inside.
In front of me is a beautiful grand piano with a long wooden stool. As I
take out my sheet music, I sit down and get settled in. Behind the piano, the
sun shines through a small window and its rays light up against the deep
mahogany wood. Upon closer look, I see that the piano’s body is adorned with
scratches and chips from old age and neglect over the years. Suddenly, I find
myself thinking about my own internal scars that have also built over time from
being used and hurt by different people.
Immediately, I think
of Jason again and that awful night that has now left with me with a gash in my
heart; a scar that reopens every time I think about him. He was my best friend,
my only friend. We were like brother and
sister and we shared everything with each other, even our deepest secrets and
moments of weakness. I thought I could trust him. I thought he cared and was
someone I could rely on. But, when I needed him most, he took advantage of me.
I still remember
every detail of that night. I remember the movie we were watching, the couch we
were sitting on, the time of night, the clothes I was wearing, and even the
clothes he was wearing. To this day, every time I
see my red v-neck t-shirt, I’m reminded of that night. But the thing that keeps
me remembering most is what he left me with. What he left me with was the
feeling of his disgusting hands groping my body and his breath crawling on my
naked skin. It still lingers in my ears.
I grit my teeth and
bite my lips, fighting off the anger and pain that wants to come back to
memory. Able to regain control, I release my breath and return to the objective
of practicing. “1, 2, 3, 4,” I count aloud and keep a steady pulse, as I read
the music and start to play. But, about a quarter of the way in I mess up and
hit the wrong note. Instantly, I beat myself up and thoughts race through my
head. “You’ll never be good enough”. “You’re a failure.” I give it
another shot, but, no matter how many times I start over and keep trying, I
can’t get it right and each time the thoughts get louder until I can’t take it
anymore. I rip the music off the stand and throw it onto the floor. Still, the
thoughts don’t stop. I lay my face on the keys with my arms covered over my
head.
Off to the side,
there is a long mirror. In the mirror, I can see the girl with her face still
laying on the piano. She sits up to face me directly and I inch my stool
forward to get closer to her. Her face is pale and frail with long dark hair
framing the sides and hanging down to the small of her back. As I reach my hand
up to the mirror, she does the same and our hands touch. For a while, I just
sit still and stare into her deep brown eyes. People say you can see someone’s
soul when you stare into another person’s eyes, but all I see is a void as deep
as the ocean.
The longer I stare at
her, the more I realize that void is really me. I’ve merely become a vessel of
emptiness, hiding in my bubble and harboring my pain deep inside me where no
one can see. But, when I look into the girl in the mirror, when I look into
myself, I can see right through that bubble and right through that mask I use
to fool everyone. Behind the mask I can see Jason and all the hurt I’ve buried
away, hidden in a cloak of shame. But most of all, I can see a girl fighting to
let go of the past.
In this moment, I’ve
never felt more vulnerable at the sight of my reflection. It is a confrontation
I cannot run away from. It is a confrontation with Jason and what he did that
night that has now left me so broken and incomplete. As I stare at myself in
the mirror, for the first time in very long time, I can feel something emerging
from that void. I can feel something emerging from behind my mask that I’ve
buried ever since that night. And, for the first time in a very long time, I
let myself feel.
Suddenly, I burst
into tears and cry out in uncontrollable sobs. No matter how much I want to
push away the pain that wants to come back to memory and the emotions rising
within me, I let them continue to fight their way out. They quiver through my
body, wrenching every string of my heart as they tear through every stitch I’ve
made on every scar. As the tears run down my face, my mask melts off to reveal
all the vulnerability I tried so hard to shield. I am then left with my raw
reflection, still staring back at me.
The tears begin to
dissipate, the sadness quickly fumes into a volcano of rage. I look around the
room and find a wooden door stopper, launching it full force at my reflection—launching
it full force at Jason. The mirror shatters on impact and the shards break
apart into tiny little pieces, crashing to the ground. No longer can I see
Jason, no longer can I see the hurt, no longer can I see the shame. I run out
of the practice room leaving everything behind. I run through the doors, up the
stairs, through the long narrow hall, and past another set of doors and into
the wild.
Running, running,
running, I pick up my feet as fast as I can and don’t look behind. Where I’m
going, I’m not quite sure of. Somewhere away from here, away from that practice
room, away from that mirror. The ligaments of nearby trees sound off like a
line of fire crackers beneath my feet. For once I can feel the ground and
gravity pulling me to the earth. My chest is heavy, my eyes sting from the air,
and my heart burns as I run faster and faster into the birds, into the sky,
into the ground, into the trees, into the freedom.
With every stride I
take, my limbs grow more tired and my body eventually surrenders. I collapse
forward and my body slams onto the ground. Instead of getting up, I let myself
lay motionless, panting against the hard earth. I find myself resting on a bed
of pink petals, just like the ones I saw out my window. I had been running so
hard and so fast that I hadn’t even noticed the cherry blossom trees along the
way. As the wind passes by, a shower of more petals journey to the ground,
twisting and twirling and
swinging back and forth. But, for the first time, I don’t feel like I’m drifting
anymore. I feel like I have finally reached the ground with the rest of the
petals.
I turn myself around,
now laying on my back and facing up towards the bright blue sky. The sun’s
still shining high up, peeking behind a few clouds. I close my eyes and breathe
in the sun’s rays once more, as they gently caress my face. As I am filled with
its warmth, I can feel its joy and vibrancy once again, radiating within me as
a yellow golden orb. I am outside of my body and high up in the sky, looking
down below. A smile breaks across my face and this time it’s not forced. I am
free. Free from Jason, free from all of my hurt, and free from my mask. But
most of all, I am free from the girl in the mirror who was chained to it all.
And this time, instead of imagining what it feels like to be whole and to be
happy, I actually feel it.
