4/24/2023
Goodbye, Alima is a short story a wrote that exists within the YSWSM universe. While it takes place in the same universe, it has no connection to the main storyline of YSWSM.
.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.
I'm stuck in a staring contest I didn't consent to joining. I'm not sure when he started to see me; maybe he was always there. At first, I didn't know what it was. I would find myself rubbing off the mirror and be surprised when the object shown next to my reflection was still there. It looked like nothing more than a speck of dust that wouldn't go away. It wasn't big, wasn't big at all, but there was something daunting about it's persistence to exist. Even when it was too far away for my brain to piece together it's form, I was still terrified. I think it started to show up in sophomore year of college. Did you know I was going to be a doctor, before all of this? If I reminisce on that too much it might make me spiral again, so let me move on. As I was saying, I believe it was my sophomore year of college. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened and honestly, if anything, the last year and a half had been the most mundane thing I've ever experienced. I was scared for college when I first went. Looking back, I'm not sure why I was so terrified. I found myself curling up in my bed my senior year of high school, frantically making it through all the Best Things To Know Before Going To College videos and articles I would find. I think that when you are in high school they talk about college as if it's this fantastical thing, something that couldn't possibly exist in this reality. All of the teachers would talk in this way and then once you get to college you realize the professors in college actually view your existence as one of a human being's, something all of my high school teachers failed to do. Finding out what you thought was true to be completely false can shatter your worldview on a lot of other things, which is what happened to me and caused my slow spiral into anxiety. I was the first in my family to go to college so I had no idea what to expect other than the awful things the teachers would echo anytime a student nodded off. I said that I was terrified to start college but when I think about it more, I think it's stupid to even compare what I was feeling there to genuine terror. I've experienced that now.
I'm stuck in a staring contest I didn't consent to joining. I'm not sure when he started to see me; maybe he was always there. At first, I didn't know what it was. I would find myself rubbing off the mirror and be surprised when the object shown next to my reflection was still there. It looked like nothing more than a speck of dust that wouldn't go away. It wasn't big, wasn't big at all, but there was something daunting about it's persistence to exist. Even when it was too far away for my brain to piece together it's form, I was still terrified. I think it started to show up in my sophomore year of college. Did you know I was going to be a doctor, before all of this? If I reminisce on that too much it might make me spiral again, so let me move on. As I was saying, I believe it was my sophomore year of college. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened and honestly, if anything, the last year and a half had been the most mundane thing I've ever experienced. I was scared for college when I first went. Looking back, I'm not sure why I was so terrified. I found myself curling up in my bed my senior year of high school, frantically making it through all the Best Things To Know Before Going To College videos and articles I would find. I think that when you are in high school they talk about college as if it's this fantastical thing, something that couldn't possibly exist in this reality. All of the teachers would talk in this way and then once you get to college you realize the professors in college actually view your existence as one of a human being's, something all of my high school teachers failed to do. Finding out what you thought was true to be completely false can shatter your worldview on a lot of other things, which is what happened to me and caused my slow spiral into anxiety. I was the first in my family to go to college so I had no idea what to expect other than the awful things the teachers would echo anytime a student nodded off. I said that I was terrified to start college but when I think about it more, I think it's stupid to even compare what I was feeling there to genuine terror. I've experienced that now.
I haven't told anyone about this in-depth, partially because I'm not sure where to even begin but also because . I tried talking to my girlfriend about it but nothing gets through to her, she's just not listening. She tells me to take deep breaths, that the feeling will pass, as if what I'm experiencing is some kind of mental break. I would get angry at her in the moment when she would rub my back and tell me it would be okay. If only I knew those moments I had with her were finite. My girlfriend thinks I'm delusional and dreaming up the things happening to me, my mom thinks I'm lying for attention, and my sister thinks I'm schizophrenic. I'm too scared to tell anyone everything because I don't want what's happened to me somehow happen to them as well. I don't know how this works, I don't even know what it is, so I try to take as many precautions as I can. If I can't keep myself safe from this thing, I will do everything in my power to make sure that the ones I love are safe. I can't see him right now, as I sit at my desk and write this, but I know he can see me. In any reflective surface, I know he's there. It doesn't make sense, I can't explain it, but I can't not explain it either. A one-sided staring contest.
It's been five years. He's closer than he's ever been and I can tell he's itching to be even closer. I can feel the weight of his breath on the back of my neck whenever I leave my room. He wants me to know that he's there, that he's watching, but I don't know what else. I don't know what he wants from me, whether he just wants to taunt me or he's waiting for me to give him something, nothing is ever enough. I've tried giving him so much, even hurting myself just for him to go away. I don't know what he wants from me, there's not much more I can give. My skin is sliding off my bones and my hair lays in piles as if I'm at a barbershop. The torture I've put myself through to try and finally be free of this thing is incomprehensible to anyone. My mom has stopped visiting me, as seeing my body makes her feel sick. Maybe this is what it wanted all along, for me to slowly make myself nothing. If that was the case, then why is he still there when I look at car's driving past? Nothing is not enough. It has ruined my life form the outside in and I still don't even know what it is. I've lost everyone that I care about because of this. I'm too scared to leave my house, I can't drive to see my friends or take the train to see my mother, but not one of them deserve to see me in the state I'm currently in. I'm slowly rotting away and once I die there will be no one to pronounce me dead. Maybe in a few years when they discover my body in this shed, they will be able to identify my corpse from the few teeth left rotting in my mouth. I can't do anything to escape this fate. I'm absolutely trapped by this beast. Maybe this is what it wanted all along, maybe it wanted to trap me, make me it's pet. I just wish I knew my keeper's name. Perhaps by putting a name to the face that haunts me, by humanizing it, I will be able to coexist with it.
The first time I ever saw it in clear view is a memory that replays over and over again in my head, never becoming less terrifying. My sister and I were on our way to a football game; our family was really into sports. We had no clue who the teams were but it didn't matter, this was just something to get together with the family and do. I miss those days. My sister wanted to drive but it was my car, my new car, and I was excited to drive it. this point was about 6 months after it began. I had bought three news cars in that 6-month period, this being my third car. At this point, I was explaining it off as some sort of malfunction with my car; I didn't know what else to explain it off as. As my sister and I got our bags ready to go to the football game, I felt my heart sink in my chest. The reality was setting in; this is the third car I've bought. I haven't driven this car other than when I test drove it since I had my sister bring it back from the dealership for me. He wasn't there when I test drove it, but what if he's there now? I can't explain to you the fear that I felt in that moment, its almost unreal. I can't talk about it to my sister because she wouldn't understand, so I try and put these thoughts in the back of my head and forget they were even there in the first place. With our bags on our shoulders, we reached the car and I unlocked the back doors so that we could put our bags in the backseat. I made sure not to look at the rearview mirror. Even though I hadn't looked in the mirror yet, I felt a wave of relief wash over me as I put my bag into the car with no problems. Something so simple as that has helped alleviate some anxiety that's been suffocating me. I let a deep sigh I was holding back past my lips as I allowed this small victory to give me some false hope. I slowly made my way over to the driver's side door, my sister was already in the car. She gives me a confused look from the inside of the car as if she doesn't really understand why I haven't entered the car yet, why we haven't left to go meet up with our parents yet. I look at her and a feeling of jealousy creeps into my mind as I think about how this isn't even a big deal for her. For her, it's just entering a car and she can't even begin to imagine what it means for me. My eyes drift to the door handle and I feel each beat from my heart within my chest. Part of me wants to run back inside, regardless of how confident I felt after putting my bag safely in the car. I hold my breath and slowly pull on the door handle. When I get inside of the car, I don't look up at the mirror, I don't even open my eyes. After a moment of awkward silence enters the car behind me, my sister, still looking at me with this puzzled look on her face, says, "Are you okay?" A question I have no idea how I can even begin to answer, so I don't and instead I turn my attention to in front of the car. Instead, I let out the breath I was holding. As my eyes started to drift upwards, the hope I was given before was quickly extinguished.
The scream leaves my throat before I can even process what I saw. I feel my sister jump next to me as I can't tear my eyes from it's. In my peripheral, I see my sister has a grip on the seatbelt, holding it back, doing everything she can to be as far away from me as possible without leaving the car. My hands have found themselves on my face as I look in terror at the figure staring back, its face crystal clear. I'm not really sure how events are progressing at this point, all I know is that I am absolutely petrified. It's looking back at me. Its eyes have met mine and haven't let go. It looks human but slightly off, with eyes that are a little bit too far apart with no eyelids to accompany them. Without needing to blink, it is able to never lose this staring contest with me. I don't know what to do at this point, since I've already shown my sister that I'm still 'unstable' as she put it. I hear my sister shifting in the passenger seat, looking for her phone, is she going to call someone? I finally am able to avert my eyes from its and my head falls into my hands as I sob. I hear words being spoken, I'm not sure if they're directed towards me, I can't make them out if they are. I slowly lift my head and look in the mirror. I look back at him and it sees me. It's still looking at me. I don't know if it smiles or if it's a trick of the mind, like when your brain starts making faces in a pit of darkness. It feels as though I've been acknowledged. I'm looking at it, its looking at me, we're looking at each other. From that moment on, I knew that I would never be able to escape it no matter how hard I tried. For some reason though, I can't allow myself to give up hope.
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