Religious Gray

I wasn't allowed back into my church after I was released from the Hospital.  I guess I should have realized that, seeing as I'm the one who burned it to the ground.  No matter how "cured" I get people won't forget what I've done.  What I am.  Just another barrier between me and Them.  Like I needed another one.

They rebuilt it while I was away.  The parents of the kids who died had a big fundraiser.  They also donated some to mental health research.  To help kids like me, they said.  Victims of circumstance.  There's a statue out front of my dad and the two kids.  A little garden and a plaque.  I don't know what it says, I'm not welcome there.  I pass by it on the bus each morning.  Why do I sit on that side, by the windows?  I think it's some form of penance.  Or self torture.  Every time I see that statue I remember why I deserve to suffer.  But now that The Kor's back he looks at it too.  Each morning we watch it pass by together, and I feel his rage.  He still hates our father.  And it's reminding me that maybe I should hate him too?  But I don't feel any anger.  He's the fire, I'm the smoke.  

He tells me that he would burn that church down again and again if it would save me from our father.

I don't know if I'm thankful for that or scared by it.  A little of both, I suppose.

I believe in God.  But why did He make me broken?  I prayed a lot, in the Hospital, and I asked Him that.  Of course He can't respond.  I just want to know why I'm like this, half a person.  I was whole at first, was it my own weakness that ruined God's creation?  Or was I a failed attempt.  A mistake.  Have you ever thought that maybe this monster that follows us is an agent of The Lord to reclaim those that were never supposed to be born?  I think about that.  It seems like divine punishment.  I know why I would be punished.  I stare the statue down every day with the other half of my soul looking through my eyes.

Today He was there, right beside it.  As if He knew that it was the beginning of my unraveling.  The loose string He will pull on and pull on until I come undone.  I am already halfway broken.  Too many souls in one and yet not enough.  A wrong person.  God's wrecked creation.  Soon to be recalled, broken down into my components and recycled.

Maybe when my souls are in hell, the clay of my body can make something that actually contributes to this world.     

That is what I pray for.

I don't know what I'm writing.  I'm tired and it's late and I shouldn't still be up.  I hope all of your tomorrows are brighter.

Contagious Gray

I had to walk home from school today.  Some bullies stole my math notebook that I need for homework and decided to play keep away with it.  That kind of thing doesn't usually happen to me, mostly just being ignored and stared at as I pass by in the hallways.  Whispers and pointed looks, you know?  I'm used to that kind of thing.  Most people aren't brash enough to approach me directly like this.

I was honestly more worried that they would open the notebook and see what I had drawn inside and become infected.  Even idiots like that don't deserve the disease I could give them.  It's bad enough me still going to school.  Like leading the piper to the children.

So I jumped around a bit until they got bored of my tears and dumped my notebook in the trashcan.  By then it was far too late to catch the bus.  My English teacher offered to drive me home.  I like to think the sentiment would be there for any student with tear streaks down his face clutching a dirty notebook, but I know that the teachers have been instructed to handle me like I'm fragile.  I can tell in the way they look at me, and speak in especially soft tones.  As if I would break with words.  They're not worried for me, they're worried about me.

I don't blame them though.  I turned the ride down.  I lied that I lived close enough to walk.  I put everyone here in enough danger by existing, the last thing I want to do is get closer to anyone.

I only just got home now.  I'm tired and my head hurts.  And the whole way home I saw Him with His terrifying somehow-smiling lack of a face.  I live in the middle of a forest, it's only a matter of time.

The best I can do for the world is to hide myself away from it.  They deal with the most contagious diseases with quarantine, right?  I wonder how much longer I'll be able to keep going to school.  Even now it's only for the semblance of normalcy.  It doesn't mean anything anymore, I have no future to prepare for.

It doesn't matter what you know when you're buried, everyone's the same kind of dead.  It's only a matter of time.