You Will Never See Me Cry - Draft 3 #amwriting

It was pre-dawn, just. The birds were gossiping outside the window. The gentle 'hhh-hhh' of breathing from the peaceful body laying warm and content next to her seemed to fill the gloomy room like a heavy blanket. Her head was churning with thoughts, ideas, plans, worries, regrets, ambitions, fears. She had been trying to quiet the rumbling and go back to sleep for an hour now, but like the birds outside, her mind had too much to say.

She knew that this could go on for hours. That she could lay listlessly staring at the wood-chipped ceiling for the rest of the day, hoping that the weight that seemed to be resting on her would lift. But she also knew that if she did nothing, the weight would get heavier until even her eyelids were too heavy to lift. She didn’t want to reach that point again. A flicker of determination appeared. She would make a hot drink, grab a pen and paper and start trying to get some of the noise out of her head.

Numbly, she sat up, wiping crust from her puffy eyes as they refused to fully focus on anything. She tucked drooping locks behind her ears, dropping her legs over the side of the bed, oblivious to the piles of dirty clothes and discarded crisp packets left to fester on the cold wooden floorboards. Pouring herself in to the tired old dressing gown, her sinewy arms too long for the sleeves, she shuffled noiselessly out of the room.

Where to start. When this heaviness invaded her, it spread through every atom in her being, deadening her senses from the split ends of her cardboard brown hair, to the neglected souls of her feet, curdling around her torso, pooling in her belly, making it hard to exist. The world seemed a dull and joyless place. The birds sang out of tune.

The kettle boiled with a chattering and clicking. She thought it sounded too proud, too excited to have performed its only function. She poured water in her mug and unplugged the kettle. Her peppermint tea, which, on a good day, filled her with a delicious cooling sensation, today tasted like murky green sawdust. The sun was peeping in through the blinds, checking in to wish her a good morning, but all she could see was the grey layer of dust gathered on the dark wooden slats. Another job that needed doing. She sighed. Not today. It was too much today. Today she would make a start by just... writing. The thought left her feeling exhausted.

Where to start. She stared blankly at the page. It was sticky where the table needed wiping from some forgotten meal. Another job. Later. Back to the page. She was holding a pen that she didn’t remember picking up. Her fingers looked wrinkled; sagging flesh dripping of stick thin bones. When had that happened? Had they always been like that? The remnants of last week's nail varnish stared at her without comment. Last week had been a good week. She had been out, washed every day, even painted her nails the colour of the summer sky. Now the remaining blue chips just felt sad, like the tips of her fingers had been covered by the same dusky pink clouds that seemed to fill her heart, leaving no space for feeling.

Where. To. Start. 

Still the page was empty, the pen leaning against her hand as if to prop her up. A tear rolled down her cheek. 'oh' she thought. 'That, again' as another followed sluggishly down the other cheek. This was too much, she realised. She had taken on too much today. She didn't have the energy to assemble the letters into words in her mind, and then tell her mind to tell her hand what those words were, to make her hand pick up the pen and put the letters into the shape of the words on the page. 

She would go back to bed.

She climbed the stairs. Careful not to disturb the slumber of her companion, she wiped away her tears. 'no, you will never see me cry' she thought to herself as she lifted the leaden duvet, and oozed limply back on to the mattress. 'you will never see me cry' she thought as a fresh wave of silent tears ran from her, escaping to the welcoming embrace of the pillow.