Invisible in the City | Teen Ink

Invisible in the City

May 5, 2016
By Luckystar78 ELITE, London, Other
Luckystar78 ELITE, London, Other
114 articles 0 photos 97 comments

Favorite Quote:
"..though warm as summer it was fresh as spring." (Thomas Hardy) ("Far from the Madding crowd")


I fumble with the sticky packet in my pocket, scrambling for a packet to sedate the burn on my tongue, the food stains on my almost perfectly white teeth.


I take a stick out, and the gum in my palm pops inside my mouth and soothes the churning uncertainty writhing in my bones; much better, cleaner, than a cigarette.


I bask in the minty freshness of my small treat, consuming a filter of air, no doubt breathing in carbon dioxide and all the other filthy pollution floating inside the smoke in the city.


The rock-hard, cemented pavement is the only sound that drifts inside my ears, drifting inside my soundless being, the emptiness rotting away inside.


I inhale another gasp of air.


The raucous conversations of passer-by’s and the screams of traffic screeching through the evening light hum inside my head. I focus on the blurring buildings as I walk, glass doors reflecting the burning pain in my eyes, the pupil widened for help, for attention.


Why doesn’t anyone ever see me?
Why am I invisible in the city?


I choke on the dirty air, clutch my bony sides, feel a hot teardrop squeeze onto my cheek. As I flatten my back against a vintage shop door and close my eyes, a faint pink shade darkens my skin, betraying my shame.


I wish I could go home. But it isn’t home anymore, hasn’t been for a long time.


There are over ten million citizens in the city. And not one of them stops by to see if I am alright.


But I am alright. I always am.


The shadows of the haunted are used to fading into darkness; irrelevant, worthless, insignificant, invisible in the city.


The author's comments:

This depicts the experience of loneliness and alienation in a huge city; from the perspective of the underclass in society: how we hurry past their pain and torment and turn our eye away. The city can be a dark, or amazing place.


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