The Bane of Light

The Bane of Librarians

The chasm shifted. It was no longer inky mass with a substance of deep, dark water. Instead the space opened up above me, the pressure in my ears popping with the rotation of the world. I went crosseyed as everything shifted, and I suddenly found myself on solid ground, a sky of black opening up above and all around me. I didn't stop running, and running, and running, as though trying to reach the edge of the chasm, though I knew there was no real edge. There was no real end, no real limit. It was all darkness. Everything was darkness, me included. The world had gone dark.

I don't know how long I sat there, but I refused to allow myself peace of mind. I refused to blank out, to simply sit in a transe and forget everything that burdened my mind. I usually blanked out when I was in the shadow realm. I usually forgot everything that happened in this perpetual darkness, but tonight, I refused to let myself calm down. I needed to think. To evaluate. To reflect on what the hell was wrong with me.

What the hell was wrong with me? What the hell wasn't wrong with me? Everything was fine. Everything was more than fine, and one look at Paris' dilated eyes sent me into a panic. The sight of them terrified me to the point that I ruined everything. I was so irrationally panicked that I managed to convince myself that it wasn't him staring down at me. I was delusional. That spilt second delusion, was enough to send me into a blackout and lash out. I managed to restrain my panic about my neck and about him touching me and about my feelings and all those other things, but in the end, it was his black eyes that scared me. I was weak. We were doing so well, and I ruined it.

I had absorbed myself in an uncharacteristic sadness, my entire essence completely swallowed up by this self-hatred. I was tired. I was tired of trying to make this work with Paris. I didn't ask for this. I knew from the very beginning that it would not work. I knew this from the start, and wishing that I wasn't like this—wishing that I could function properly, that I could be normal—didn't change anything. Me wanting to be something I have never been and will never manage to be, changed nothing.

I was so tired. I was so tired of trying. Trying to restrain myself, trying to be normal, trying to stay calm when he touched or looked at me the wrong way. When he gave me a look that my mind panicked at the sight of, or a touch that made me loose the ability to breathe. I wanted to be normal. I didn't want to have to fight my every instinct at every moment. I didn't want to panic and have a meltdown at every sudden movement, like some abused animal, to the point where Paris had to constantly be on eggshells around me. It wasn't fair to him.

I didn't need him having to deal with me when I couldn't even deal with myself. I was tired. I never wanted this. I did everything I could to avoid this from the very beginning, because I knew I would reach this point. I knew there would come a moment where it would be painstakingly clear how messed up I really was. How this wasn't just some act to feed into some quirky individuality complex. How I had issues, real, constant mental issues that didn't just go away when I was lonely, or horny, or simply just sick of them. Because I was sick of them all the time. All the fucking time.

Why would I want to be like this? Do people think I like not being able to be touched by those that I love? Do people think I'm not tired of constantly being afraid and panicked and shaking, unable to simply have one moments worth of fucking peace? I was tired. I was sick of myself. I was sick of being me. Why is it that everybody else got to live peacefully, while every day had to be a battle for me? What did I do to deserve this never ending fucking struggle? What did I do? Why was I so different from everybody else to deserve this?

I was rot. I was rotted wood, in a tree that he kept peeling layer after layer from, hoping to find the core—hoping to find some semblance of unobstructed purity—not realizing that I was the rot. I wasn't the tree—the healthy, innocent tree that was helplessly being feasted on and tarnished. I was the rot and he was the tree. I was the rot.