In the midst of sleep
She fell asleep on the couch again in front of her loud TV, for the third time this week. She didn’t know how it happened, she never did. But every time she fell asleep, her mind would ignore whatever tried bringing her back to the real world.
This time, it was different though. She woke up to the voices of her parents arguing over how she had grown up already to still be doing this, and realized her eyes had been wide open way before her mind brought her back.
Oh how badly she wished then, that this could have been one of those days when she’d fall asleep on the couch, and wake up the next morning to find herself in bed, lovingly tucked under her warm sheets. Because her parents were young and patient enough then to carry her all the way back to her room. Her good old days. Now she had grown up, both physically and mentally, to still be carried back there.
Laying on the couch half asleep, she continued listening to her mom as she sounded half-panicking. She was still unable to process any of the words. Her mind started highlighting then all what she’d been escaping reality from through sleep. Her mom continued talking, and her mind continued shifting between the stressful events that took place during the week, then back to her mom’s one-sided argument and her voice that was now too loud for her sleepy ears. Until she couldn’t take it anymore. She broke down.
She broke down into a sea of tears. One that she hadn’t drown into in so long, because she was too stressed out to even weep. She let her tears out, for she realized then she’d never really be able to stop growing up. Growing up meant more stress and more tough experiences that life would never get enough of upgrading for her. And yet, she’d always be a little kid in her parents’ eyes, and a relatively fair portion of the rest of the world. She let her tears out, for they sounded like the only thing that could comfort her. And yet again, she was blamed for deciding to solve her problems through crying like a 6 year-old.
It didn’t matter though, for she knew she’d always feel like a 6 year-old on the inside anyway, no matter how many years added up onto her actual age. She could very normally start crying on her 50th birthday, because she’d still need someone to carry her back to bed then. Yet no matter how much she’d cry, she knew for a fact that she’d never wake up in the morning to find herself in a different place than where she slept the previous night, and the thought of that slowly killed her every day.
