Dark (Excerpt)

As I lay here, I think. The thoughts were coming in again. I can't stop them, nothing can. No matter how many pills are downed, no matter how loud you scream, you can't stop thinking.

I reached over to my bedside table and shut off the music (Appetite for Destruction by Guns N Roses on a sad loop). The silence deafens me but I just can't listen anymore. My head aches.

I turn over and stare into the darkness of my room. My eyes fill with tears but I don't want to cry, boys don't cry. Instead I flip on the light beside my bed and grab my notebook and pen. The notebook is everything I can't bare to say. It's all my thoughts, my emotions (sadness and anger), it's everything on a page.

Gray, the book by Pete Wentz, came today. It was weird to read, to know someone thinks the same way I do. I guess it's just odd to not think about myself. Me. Everything's about me. I'm selfish. At least I can admit it. It made my heart drop in the best way. I guess I just like to hurt myself (the scars on my leg are proof but they're old now, because I've given up). But the book, it also gave me some weird sense of hope. Like I can do it.

But I know that's bullshit.

I flick passed the old suicide note and other shitty poetry I thought sounded good late at night. I put the pen to paper and begin to write. I read the words as I write them, surprised by the ink on the page. Nothing really registers in my brain until it's too late. I check the clock on my nightstand. It all comes out at night. The world sleeps and thoughts come alive. Secrets come out, things people regret saying are said.

The world falls apart during the night and in the morning, nothing is said. Maybe someone, somewhere, is doing the exact same thing as me right now. Someone somewhere is making the biggest mistake of their lives, someone's on the receiving end of that decision.

Sometimes I think that I'll never get anywhere. I'm staring to wonder if a world exists outside Enniscorthy. I'll never leave this small town. I know it's true but I fill myself with this false hope.

Fake caring about something until the feeling becomes real.

Music is all I've got going for me and let's be honest, it's not going anywhere. Nothing ever works in my favour. I'm a train wreck. I'm the star of movie where everyone dies in the end. Because everyone does die in the end. Then they're forgotten.

I put the pen down and roll back over. I turn off the light. The ceiling stares at me, empty and dark. Daunting. If walls could speak.. well mine wouldn't say much.

I think about what's happened today. I have a habit of living in the past. The past is something I try run from but can't help go back to, like a relapse. It's like trying to run from yourself. It's impossible.

I spent the day with Addict. Addict is a suiting name for her, in my opinion. I'm not calling her a druggie or alcoholic (though that's where she sees herself ending up. She doesn't sugarcoat shit.) but she believes everyone's addicted to something. And she's right. We all need something to keep us going. I don't know what my addiction is yet, maybe music, maybe putting myself down.

Addict is the bass player in my band. She's amazing. She's the one I trust with deep shit because I know she won't make fun of me or tell me to man up, because she understands and she knows when to keep her mouth shut. We used to date, it's irrelevant now, all in the past. Nothing's changed between us and I'm thankful for that.

Addict and I added another guitarist to the band since we all know I'm no good. His name is boring for a guy like him. He's a good guy, into the same shit as Addict and I. He's a violent guitarist and I look up to him.

The singer bitched about it. We all agreed, except her. I sat there and read her messages about her precious feelings that I had hurt but I couldn't care less.

I'm not emotionally connected. I just don't have it in me to care that much. I bottle stuff up, then late at night, on certain nights, the truth will out.

The truth does that, finds its way out no matter how many doors you lock it behind. The truth is a bomb waiting to go off. One word. That's all it takes for a flood of words to follow and drown people in the sorrowful truth. They can act but no one likes the truth.

I stare at the ceiling before letting my eyes shut out the world. I'll probably apologise tomorrow. I always end up doing so. The world is a horrible place. I hate it. I follow the same routine as every single other night of my sad miserable life;

Get off and shut off.