cat / d4 / FIN

Fairy tales are more than true. I'd know, I'd danced with dragons and slept with the pixies in the dazzling green plains beyond the fence. I've seen it with my very eyes, I know that a paradise like no other is there. Fairy tales are more than true, not because they tell us dragons exist, but because they tell us dragons can be beaten.

My mother would force me to read endless pages of words which sprawled on and on with no true meaning, no real wisdom. I soon understood that "101 ways to kill a man" was no book for a girl aged fourteen and three quarters, and by the time I was sixteen, I was assured in my decision. But I still ate the words like a perfectly laid buffet and took them in accordingly. Torture, sacrifice, deep cuts and deeper stab wounds — There's still ninety-seven more to go.

Aren't we all forced into it? We watch it with our childish, naive eyes when we are younger and take it all on our stride as it is handed to us on a plate. Our simple minds think nothing of the mischief and disturbances, but it's as you flourish and explore yourself that you realise life isn't beautiful and wonderful; all the things that are spoon-fed to you by your mother, all the horrors your innocent ears heard are lies, lies and more lies. No depth, no meaning. Just plain old lies.

I'm the only one of us that thinks like I do. There's five of us, altogether, and you'd think that more than one would have an issue with it all — but if you did think like that, you'd be wrong. Our appearances are somewhat identical, long hair that is fifty shades of sun and gold. A height that is handy when it comes to reaching the dust on top of the cupboards and hands so nimble, even a seamstress would be jealous.

Upon further inspection, you notice there's an odd one out. All so pristine and sweet, wrapped up in a bubble blown by 'mummy dearest'. They are well-kept, yet I am free like a dove in the sky. My youngest brother calls me 'the mess', as I tie my hair up scruffily and do not match their uniform style of hair so short, you'd begin to question if they had any. I'm glad I have my individuality. Yet I am not content with being referred to as 'the mess'. 

But what I do not have in terms of beauty is made up for in my personality. Although my views are not as dim as my siblings, I still retain the same attitude like them. I learn so easily in anything, I've already skipped ahead of my peers and finished school. My training is usually 'brutal' so my father says. I just want to impress them and make them feel like I do care, perhaps when I do not.

It's all I try to do, impress them. Day after day, I feel so isolated by their love and affection for the other four, the younger, more valued four. Admittedly, I'm the oldest but I'm still their daughter. A daughter that is thirsty for the love from a mother and hungry for those special moments every parent has with their child. I'm like a fish out of water when it comes to them — and I'm constantly being starved of what I need the most.

It's why I head out to find my own way. I've slipped beyond the fence and seen things they haven't. The beauty of the wilderness is breathtaking, and living on the edge is a feeling so unique that the initial buzz makes you want to die just to be reborn. I come back, though, as I dread to think of what the keepers of peace would do to me if they found me there — a girl of eighteen years frolicking in the open woods, exposing herself to the 'demons' of the realm. Maybe they'd lay their hands on me and put me in my place.

Maybe I'd make the first move.

If it came down to it, I'd do it. We all would. Every single one of us is a survivor who won't go down without a fight. You feel it in your bones, an electric current which finds it way around your veins like it has a map. There's no escape for it though, which is way we are all fighters. I know for a fact that I am one, because there are dragons in this world.

There are dragons which need to be slain.