The blank lines of the composition notebook stare back up at me in deft indifference. What do you want me to do about it? It seemed to be mocking me; my palm began to itch as I got the sudden urge to answer back in an impolite way.

Shifting in my seat for the umpteenth time, I tried everything to get my creative juices flowing along, from turning up the volume to my favorite song, then scribbling incoherent nonsense on the paper hoping it would transform into something with actual meaning. By the time I wrenched a third sheet of paper from the delicate spine of my journal, I was already beginning to give up hope. I grimaced at the sudden upheaval that I created. Crumbled balls of paper littered my desk, filling up my garbage pail to the brim.

I paced back and forth in the small cluttered confines of my room, my frustration growing with each quickening pulse that predicted an oncoming headache. The thin peeling walls did nothing to block out all the raucous bickering sounding from the next room. The television was playing a cheesy sitcom at full volume and the annoying tittering laughs of my younger siblings didn't help my current dilemma much.

I was at my wits end.

"For crying out loud, can you all just SHUT THE HELL UP!?" The words are ripped from the back of my throat, like a guttural growl and my anger a living, breathing thing. I fling my journal at the half closed door and with a loud thud; pages escape the confines of the marble composition book. I feel guilty for about a millisecond. Scowling blackly, I snatch up a sweater from the floor while muttering obscenities under my breath. How on earth could anyone concentrate in this black hole? As I fly down the stairs and taste the fresh open air, my unyielding mind gives a sigh of contentment.

Hands shoved deeply in my pockets, I shrug deeper into the thin sweater. My eyes take in the beautiful night sky as a silver crescent moon finally catches up to the smoldering embers of the sun.

Ah, there we go, I thought, a slight smiling twitching at my lips. The gears beneath my skull begun to creak and turn, my imagination peaking its timid head around the dark lonely corners filled with cobwebs. I reached into my pocket for a piece a paper, and slide the pencil from my messy pony tail.


'Time.

Forsaken and abused. "If only, if only..." A broken woman croons as she suffers in silence, her pain invisible to the rest of the world. Her words hang thickly in the air, drifting towards that special place where dreams go to die. Eyes turn away, indifferent to her plight. When the pelting rain drops splash against the cool surface of my skin, dripping off my hair and face like ribbons of distrust, I know that I have been forgiven. To forget would be divine, but to remember would only cause the scabs to fall of dead skin, infected...'


"What the hell are you doing out here?" I jump badly, nearly taking out my eye while hastily looking up to find my older sister staring down at me. Her face was just a smudge of cinnamon in my blurring vision. My words dry up in my throat, as I try to hide the water logged paper under my jacket. She purses her lips, with an expression that read ‘I don’t want to know.’ She shook her head before moving around me to go inside.

If only I had more time, I sigh as the door slams shut in my face.