1. Chasing Shadows

He was tall and slender, bony and elegant. His facial features were sharp yet worn, hiding in them an eerie wisdom prominent enough to scare most people off, but that was her favourite thing about him.

                She was ill, confused, struggle to cope with the forces of self-actualization coming at her so fast. She was lonely, unappealing. She had choppy brown hair, never wore makeup. She reached his chin, average height for a woman like her.

                She would watch him from afar, dream of the day they’d form a relationship, the day she wouldn’t be lonely anymore. Sometimes she didn’t need him, her mind was so vivid that she could feel his hands on her waist when nothing was really there. She couldn’t be sure nothing was really there, she struggled to grasp the boundary called reality. Instead she ignored it, as much as she could.

                He knew who she was, but she was always so quiet. In her damage, she never opened up. She was too afraid to talk to him. He got this but never did anything about it, he never pursued her. He had his own life, his own friends, he didn’t see a need to work for her. They were both lonely, but she wasn’t appealing, not by appearance.

                So they didn’t end up together, not after she gathered the strength to reveal herself to him. They went their own ways, and she spent the days dreaming of him, hopeless in her efforts but accepting the failure in dismissing her feelings for them. And so months went by…