i feel so heavy and slow and clumsy and stupid.

the world around me seems populated by happy chirping birds, flitting around. i can barely hear their twitter-speak. it just sounds like cruel knives, needle jabs. and i- i just can't keep up.

i hear laughter even when it doesn't emerge from lips. i walk tenuously down these halls, and people look at me, and avoid me. i'm not sure why... or rather, why wouldn't they? i am of some different element, like clay or syrup. no one wants to- no one can- communicate with me.

"i'm sorry," i'd say, but they'd misunderstand, or flitter away before i could even begin to explain.

***

i'm looking for my exit pass now.

***

i lay down, watching my hand slowly close and open.

i can't hold onto anything.

i feel so very tired. and there is a pain in me, and i think it is so pervasive and eternal, that it almost mimics a numbness. but now and then it reminds me that it is pain. it is the pain of- never belonging?

i want to sleep and forget it all away.

***

i'm looking for my exit pass now.

***

when was it that i stopped caring? or have i?

there are things that i love. children. my family. i have no friends to speak of, not really, not people who i could honestly say enjoy my company...

***

my former student, one of my first students, abrianna, came to visit me. i almost didn't recognize her, she was so tall. she seemed so articulate, far more articulate than when i first worked with her. she seemed happy to see me. i was certainly happy in her company, thinking that perhaps i had helped her in some way.

most of the time, i wonder what sort of effect i have had on the world. all my attempts to help. i really- REALLY- only wanted to make people happy. it seemed the proper thing to do. for someone who- all his life- wrestled with this despair and feeling of worthlessness and alienation- it seemed a way to make it alright. if you smile, then maybe- maybe i was not what i felt inside.

but nowadays... the visits are rare. and people don't regard me as something all that great. most of my former students, they kind of look away. maybe they feel they've let me down. maybe they know i have.

maybe they understand what a crutch they are to me. like i can only look to those in my charge, because the larger world thinks i'm a piece of shit. "look, see? i am a nice, kind person. these little ones seem to think so."

***

the world is my brother's eyes. and it is always unconvinced.

no matter what machinations i may make, or things i may do, those eyes seem to deaden me, make me heavy and stupid again.

i see those eyes all around me now.

where is that damn exit pass?

***

i love my sister. maybe if i repeat it enough times.

i have memories of us. of us always playing together.

i failed her. i wasn't able to protect her from my brother. i never knew. but in any case, i failed her. and when she needed my help, i was so self-concerned. so full of self-pity. i hate myself for that. my sister never deserved the hell that she is in. i would go there myself. i wish i could. i'm not so much in love with this crappy self of mine that i wouldn't give it up if it would make a difference.

my sister, so vibrant.

yes, the world would have loved her outside.

they would have long since forgotten me.

please, take me instead.

***

i am so sorry everyone for the trouble i have caused. i didn't mean it. i can't have meant it. it was just what i was. i never belonged here, i was told that repeatedly at the start, but i pretended there was a way for me, a path and a skin to walk in, but that was all pretend. you all saw right through it, you rubbed out my footprints, and you looked away from what i was... so now i am like sisyphus's boulder, poised on the apex of the hill, relentlessly thirsting to fall again and again.

don't. DON'T pick me up.

i want to break and be forgotten forever.

***

i am close to my exit now.

i'll see you
(or not)