About the Author

A Story by scarlynn

No one will ever fall in love with me because my hair is neither dark nor blonde enough. Who can I ensnare with my mousy, thin, opalescent in some sunlights, exhausted, burnt, brune if I've ever heard of the term? My purpose is hidden underneath layers and layers of attempt and try. I am no one's half-way muse.

I am important because I explore deeper space, larger stars cooled to cerulean indigo, my stars don't shell the earth. I am the shadows and the paranoia you feel alone in your suburban home, I am the thing at your heels you're sure you've only imagined. I linger after you shut your bedroom door. I am the celestial body you know of but won't consider its realness. You hope I never manifest.

I am the lipstick stain you swear you saw on his neck last night, I am the glaze in his eyes, I am the unfocused of his pupils and the seedy, rotting persona he takes on when you ask him what he's been doing out so late. I am the bulge in his veins as he white-knuckles the conversation and you start to quiet down because you don't want any more china broken. I am the thing you're really hating when you whisper it in your pillow and he's out cold and unaware. I'm the euphoria you sip through the air in gasps when he whispers in your ear, and I'm what you'll be missing when he's gone.

I'm the ascent into half dimensions you find and explore when you can't tell if it's working or if you're in a dream. I'm the tap at the glass to level it out and your nervous glance away because it's your first time. I'm the silent validation that if something goes wrong, you were suicidal anyway and half of what's written in your diary could be your goodbye note if anyone looked at it the right way. I'm the glimpse through the smokiness of one light you swear you saw before you were born that you're chasing, I'm the only reason you're a bad girl now despite every constitution of your childhood.

I am all you refuse to make yourself aware of and I am the ethereal presence you feel - the pins pricking your skin, the obnoxious, heavy thing weighing across your back. I am that which you seek when you turn your head in fear, but am eternally alive in only places you won't look. I thrive on all secrecy and conspiracy and that which is undoubtedly pulling all marionette strings. "Pretty girls don't know the things that I know."