FicWad

There she is, no, over by the left side of the floor in the dark outfit - yes that's her. The one who moves like a bird in a glass cage. I've been watching her for quite some time now. This place is where she comes to exercise her demons. Fool, she doesn't realize that those very demons she runs from are of her own making. Look, watch for a moment:

Sweat flies off her, hits the ground and hisses like poison. She wants to peel away her skin, to crack out of her body and escape, but all she can do is raise her arms and move faster. She lets the suffocating heat from inside her leak out and evaporate into the pulsing crowd, strobes of neon cast odd shadows on the faces of the dancers around her. Something claws in her chest; you can see it moving just below the skin, it makes her movements even more frenzied. Eyes slit open, pale and burning like diamonds set on fire. But there's nothing left to burn, just ashes and a brick of coal where her insides should be.

She has lost her self. I've seen her bury it deeper and deeper under many different masks, living to please everyone but herself. She's beautiful, isn't she?

Everyone tells her so, and she's grateful for that, but where she lives, all the mirrors are turned facing the walls.

I was there the day it first happened, when the first spider's web crack appeared on her face. So small at first, but it grew larger and larger until she fractured. Her whole being split into thousands of different pieces and the masks that were set free overwhelmed her and her own true self was swept away.

It was then she became the chameleon, no colors of her own, but instead using those around her to blend in and cater to her surroundings. She became their clown, their princess, and their whore. Anything she thought they would want, so many multitudes of faces, how could she keep track of them all? But for the first time people accepted her, or at least what they thought of as her. And she gloried in it.

But I could tell that she was still broken underneath the painted facade. She wouldn't listen to me though; she'd throw me away and pick up another face. I could make her whole again, but she would rather warm herself in their cold admiration. Soon she couldn't hear me anymore and all I could do was watch as the masks piled up.

She breaks from the sea of bodies on the floor and makes her way to the shadowy corners of the building, toward the bar and something cold to drink. I can feel her pulse beating in her mouth from here. Look - how their eyes follow her appreciatively and how she moves on without acknowledging them. She's never loved anybody fully, always one foot on the ground. That's not to say she's never had a lover, but they always went away in the end; besides, they would only love a mask anyway. I'm the only one who knows everything about her. Only I know why she comes here. In this place, you can let go; you don't have to be anything for any body. She thinks that if she wears herself out enough she could sleep at night, but she's beginning to realize the truth. Lately, she's been coming more and more frequently. She'll show up as soon as the sun goes down and dance until the throbbing music and faceless people fill up the empty places inside her. But it just festers in her bowels and rises, dark and bitter inside her. It moves inside, scratching at her skin, looking out from her burning eyes. That's why all her mirrors face the walls. Somewhere deep inside her she knows what I've been trying to tell her. She has all these different personalities and faces, even the dark, bitter one, but without her true self - without me - she is nothing.

But I'm so tired now; she's left me to bear all this knowledge. If I forget, she's lost. So I remember, every second of every day. Of what we were like before the box was opened, when we were whole and not separate pieces. I remember our true self, I remember and wait for her to put me back in my rightful place and heal the cracks in her soul. It's only a matter of time now, anyways. Either the masks will consume her and I'll fade away; or she'll remember that the only face she needs to wear is her own and we'll be whole again.