I fall off the edge.
The wind rushes around me, pulling my arms up as if it wishes I could be back on the ledge. I guess it’s just too late for that.
I let the sounds of the city below me and the whisper of the clouds above me lull me into a kind of peace. I wanted this, I tell myself. I needed to feel free. I gasp as my clothes blend into my body and reach for the sky.
They always tried to pin me down, to tell me what I want. What I need. But they don’t know anything about me. And now they never will.
I always half wanted all of them to just hurt me or betray me or do anything that would give me a legitimate reason to hate them. But they never did any such thing. They continued being absolute darlings with only a subtle taste of malice.
And I couldn’t resent them. I couldn’t resent anything about my absolutely perfect life. But I didn’t want that. I just wanted to be understood or to be heard or to have someone who loved me as much as I deserved.
I was never one to fall for peer pressure or to sink beneath conformity or the daily anxiety every teenager faced. No, I had too much will power and self-worth to do that. I knew that I was smart and kind and I tried so hard to stay that way. I showed everyone a face. The face of someone who was happy and blessed and plain old jaunty. But I wasn’t that, I wasn’t even close.
  I think no matter how much we think the contrary, we all have a face we wear. One for family, one for friends, one for absolute perfect strangers. We like to think other people know us. We like to believe that somehow we can trust the people that blur around us like city lights.
But if they only see one of our faces, then how could they possibly see us for who we are? How can they truly love us?
I mean I have had bad experiences and I certainly have dreadful qualities, but even if I tried sharing them, they would still belong to me. I would shoulder their weight. Just me.
I haven’t felt real pain though. I don’t know what it’s like to starve or to live with no roof over my head or to be an orphan. I haven’t felt anything but insubstantial pain. How can my feelings or my thoughts or my so-called-issues possibly compare to the real world problems? How can I possibly matter?
Yes I have felt depression and anxiety and more pain than I care to admit. But it doesn’t feel like enough if I am not diagnosed with something or if no one else understands what it is like. To live everyday and feel so much pressure and so much emptiness.
I have seen therapists countless times. They tell me not to compare myself. That I am my own person devoid of anyone or anything else. But that’s not true. If I cant look outside of myself and see the reality of our horrible world then how can I even live there?
They tell me that I have a support system. That my family and my “friends” have my back. They will protect me. They are always there for me. I can’t help but question that. How can I simultaneously have such a support system and feel so alone. All. The. Time.
Sure, I have felt connected to people, I have loved and cared for friends and teachers and boys that never bat an eye in my direction. But they don’t know who I am. And even when I try to open up, it doesn’t go my way. I have no idea how to deal with them afterward. I can’t grip that closeness. It slips from my fingertips just as I have a hold of it.
I am falling still. Falling towards who knows what. My eyes are sealed shut but somehow my cheeks are wet with impossibly salty tears.
I didn’t choose this. And yet I want to live. I want to see the future and how my kids turn out or how the world progresses. I want to know who I will become. If all the work pays off sometime. I want to be able to look back and laugh at how ignorant I was. I want to recall my emptiness, and revel in my happiness. I want to feel. I want to live. Through all of the hullabaloo and chaos, I want to live. If not for anyone else, for me.
And then I realize. I’m not falling anymore.
I’m flying.