a metaphor

Imagine a garden full of life and wonder. A place filled with calm and silence, but not the kind when waiting for something sudden to happen in a horror movie, but the soothing kind the kind that gives you a sense of peace and time to breath. In this garden there are the liveliest, greenest flowers, bushes, trees surrounding almost every Inch of the place except for the just right clearing in the middle of the garden with four paths from all different directions leading into it, each made of a mossy stone flooring that always seems to shift around with all the intricate designs it holds. In the center of all of this sits a tree, with the strongest branches that could hold anyone climbing them and the most vibrantly beautiful dark green leaves you could ever imagine with cherry pink blossoms sprouting right next to the stems. A tree that who knows how long has been there, listening to all the secrets and whispers of however many people have come across this majestic place. The very place that is now yours, your place the place you go to whenever you are in need of a place to relax, to think, to get away from all the troubles and worries of and in life, when in need of a place of comfort, where you can be yourself instead of worrying about judging eyes, a place for you to cry without having to worry about the disgusted looks of family members. This is your place for calm, to be you, and to live, to breath, this is the place that is closer to a home then you could call anything else.
But then one day, while sitting and merely minding your own business, doing whatever it is your doing, in the comfort of the place you've grown to love so much and always seem to find yourself at after a long day. This very place...burns. Disappears, vanishes the only trace of the beautiful place you once loved are the ashes of fallen plants and flowers you always stopped to smell. You're one place of tranquility that had kept you sane from the worlds insanity, gone. In the place you spent days, weeks, months, years even, the only place you fully trusted...all gone in a matter of seconds. Everything lost, the tree in the center that even though could not speak seemed to hold the wisdom of many and more, the calming scent of fresh lavender carried by the slight breeze that only slightly gave you goosebumps, yet never enough for the need of a sweater. The bright shining spirit of the garden that held so many mysteries yet to be discovered, taken away from your grasp with out a single warning or sign. And yet all you can do is stand there with tears in your eyes and a heart that had only just been torn by the cruel ways of nature and faith.
After that day everything seemed to go dull. The color in not only the life around you, but the color of your spirit that always seemed to shine even after the hardest of troubles, dulled to shades of gray and white. The life behind your eyes taken, vanished, disappeared along side of your heart which to you was burned away along with the garden, for it was the only thing keeping you together, keeping that scratched and worn out string from snapping, and now its all gone without a trace in sight. The words of people seemed too get to you more and more, all of a sudden they seemed to matter more than they ever did before. The looks of the people who birthed you into this dreadfully cruel world, the ones that make you want to coil back in fear or run away into a world nothing like your own, just so that you can finally go back into your room without another scratch bruise or mark added to your already tarnished skin that though was once as fine and smooth as snow, is now hidden behind a blanket of wounds, both emotional and physical, given to you by the people in your home, the people you once looked up to. And yourself with the sharpest end of the blade, not thinking much of it since what would another mark do to all the others I have already been given. It was these very thoughts that seemed like they were going to drive you farther and farther away from the edge of humanity, until there was nothing left for you to stand on. And that's exactly what it did.
After years and years of simply living yet not really, more like just being there for the heck of it. A broken doll, with a shattered heart and cracked body. A tool in the shed that's only used for the most troublesome and deadly jobs. A match that's fire has been blown out and now is simply nothing more than a simple stick. The words and bruises and looks of the people that surround you, finally crack you, they finally dig into the area under your skin that they had tried so hard to break through, starting from the skin under nails to the deep cuts on your thighs. The final string of hope and will to keep going, snaps in a blink of an eye. So that very day you go home and straight into your room ignoring the shouts and threats from your parents to go back to them that instant, an act that you once would have never dared to do, yet today you could not care less for the consequences of your actions, for not only had your will to live vanished but your body has gone numb. The sound of the door smashing open and the looks of two seemingly angry people in your doorway, don't phase you the slightest. The scratches and punches thrown your way, don't make you coil back in fear. No. Today you merely sat they're taking in all the pain that you had felt so many times that you had grown used to the feeling, it would have felt odd without it. With each hit with no reaction the beatings seemed to get harder and harder, this does not make dread boil in you though, simply hope. Hope that they will go too far and finally end your misery, but right when you're at the bridge of death, they stop and leave, a look of anger and disappointment never leaving their faces. And while you lay their limp like the doll you are, that is when you make your final decision.
The new day has come, a new chance for life and adventure and hope...for most that is. Your story is a bit different though for instead of a day of new beginning and promises, it will be a day of last words and death. That day during the time you were supposed to be taking notes in your history class, you wrote letters instead to the people you once loved and trusted, yet they chose to crush it. Not letters of apology, but merely a letter stating what you have done and why, explaining word by word of all the dread and misery they have put you through, through your shortened life. As you walk home that day, you don't stare blankly at the air, but instead you look around at all of the plants and trees that surround you, none, nearly as beautiful as the plants in your garden that had died years ago, just like you should have. Walking into your house and noticing the missing presence of your two abusers, not giving it a single thought other then this will be easy. You place the letter inside the fridge near the piles of both full and empty alcohol glasses knowing for fact they would find it there. Once that is done you head to your room dropping your backpack on the ground and opening up your computer to your destination knowing that they will most likely call the police, only after cleaning up the house and disposing of the letter of course, thinking why not save them the trouble. Once this is complete you make your way out of your house and down the street.
Hours later, when the sun is setting with rays of pinks, blues, and oranges blanketing the sky, You look back down but closing your eyes, listening to the calming call of the ocean waves. A few moments pass of you simply taking it all in, but then you take your last few steps, starting your descend into the icy waters of the sea, you go deeper and deeper, first knee deep then thigh deep soon enough neck deep into the violent splashing waters. Taking a moment to savor your last breaths of life, you quickly submerge your head into the dark abyss of water letting it drag you deeper and deeper down into the storm of the sea. As you are slowly approaching your longing death you think, you think about the what if's of time and life, what if the garden had never burned down, what if I hadn't chosen to give up, but soon enough those thoughts drift away along with the current of the ocean, and instead thoughts of the afterlife fill your head. Maybe you will be given a second chance at life. A chance to live a life you can truly, actually live freely, not having to fear everything and one around you, a life where you can smile and it won't feel as if you're being stabbed right in the gut. A life where you can day dream about the friends you never had and think of crazy scenarios of a future you have a chance at living. Maybe just maybe, you'll be given the chance to live the life you always dreamed of in your sleep, the life you thought and hoped for under the whistling leaves of your favorite tree that lays in the center of your favorite garden. And with those final thought you let the darkness of the ocean corrupt you as you're now, lifeless body floated away.
The End.

A_lunar_original

Side notes:
The metaphor is the garden, in most cases the garden would equal a person or even in some cases an object, no matter what it is the person ends of losing said person/item, but that person was their lifeline their last piece to the puzzle, and without it/them the person feels incomplete.