control | lillybird iii.

♛

I'm not sure I could ever call those people my friends. I mean, my allies. There's just something about placing trust in someone that doesn't sit right with me after what happened with M word. Because why would I want to place the weight of my emotions on someone who would buckle under the weight of a promise? 

Family ties were much easier to sever than my chosen ones. Every moment, even in the ones where I promise not to think about him, he's there, haunting me like a ghost in the back of my mind. In some, he is laughing at me for being so stupid and volunteering, but in others, he's petrified that we're both going to die alone - and if that's the case, and he's really thinking that back home in Five, then we'll have both broken something worse than a promise: a heart.

I'm still consumed by the rage he's poisoned me with, though. I think that's why it is becoming easier to slip into the regime of the Hunger Games and fight for nothing and everything all at once. I've no time for playing the hero when the villains in my life are the ones who have raised me; secrets in alleyways and warnings from rooftops forced me to learn lessons much better than my family ever could. In the shadows, that is where I truly felt safe.

Sometimes I think that this isn't all that different to home, but then reality punches me in the gut and I taste blood on my tongue. Home never had dead bodies - well, human ones anyway - but home had the same sense of uneasiness that nurtured my chaos into sharpness. I don't fear this place like I should, and maybe the fact I'm aware of that should make me scared, but I'm not and I won't be. The stakes are too high to get caught up in major feelings played in a minor key; if the melody of  my emotions isn't even a song then it doesn't mean anything anyway.

Feelings are just there to be picked up when I want them. I pick and choose when I want to be angry and I pick and choose when I want to be confident. Happy or sad - I am the one in control and that makes this easier, I think. It makes it more bearable, at least, because if I just keep denying myself the energy to feel anything other than confident, then how can anything ever feel wrong?

Everything happens for a reason, even the bad things. The wounds painted red on my body heal to a blush and there's something beautiful in that which makes the pain feel justified. It's okay to get hurt because I'm capable of getting back up. It's alright to be knocked down because I too can knock someone else down, and if we're both on the same level, it is anyone's game.

The trees rustle, they carry riddles of runes and lore which I should probably care more about but I don't let myself. With my knees tucked into my chest for yet another night, I stare up at the sky and count the stars. A thousand tiny knives hanging above me are waiting to fall - but I'm a star too. Cut-throat just like those blades, and I can burn and scorch in the same way they can.

A constellation of my own making. Singular and alone, but still shining. Why would I need anyone else when I trust myself as much as this?

I pick at the dried blood on my rapier, scratching away what's left of Leonora, before placing it gently next to me. I give it a kiss and lie down with my eyes closed. Alone and in the open, I am exposed, but completely unafraid.

I don't care who is watching, in fact, I'm glad.