Someone to tell

"The sad truth is the truth is sad." Daniel Handler
Let's go back in time, say a year or two.

It's been 20 days of absolute hell and now it's time.

Pain was growing, in all aspects. Not a day passed now that she didn't feel it, and it was a different kind of hurt. She didn't think that it would come back, not now. Not October. Everything had come full circle from last October. Though she had events in her life that brought about mental weakness, she was now physically weakening, yet again. Everyday the pain was at least a 5 on a 10 scale, nobody knew because she would never tell and would surely never show. The grafts were coming back, she would soon have to hide those too. Her desire to eat was diminishing along with her immune system. By choice before, she now only wore shirts with collars up to her neck to hide where the central line was going to be, yet again. They said she would start back up again every two weeks for the next six months unless it stopped before then. She was particularly glad that it came back during fall/winter though, it made things a little easier, she didn't have to miss out on the things she really loved. If there was a girl who had a terrible a series of unfortunate events in her life but still loved to live, it was her. The select few that knew, were falling to pieces for her, she didn't see the point in fretting the uncontrollable. Sleep was a rare activity but she was always tired. Her eyes looked sunken and dark most days, especially in the mornings. She had to write to stay distracted, she even wrote this to keep her mind off of it. Though she was already broken and at an irreversible place both physically and mentally, she started to enjoy the small things. She could now sit outside for hours at a time, feeling the wind pass through and watching strangers pass by. She would drive to the beach for the next few months every other weekend to sit with the other grains of sand and take in her most valued place. She never knew when the last time she would be able to do that would happen, it was inevitable though. They said they caught it early this time and with the advancements, it would leave again soon. She could only hope. She was never the type to ask for much but she desperately wanted two things: for this she begged to leave and she wanted to sit and talk about life with someone- she had someone in particular that she hoped noticed but she wasn't picky. It was a process one could never get used to, and in her case, she was still strong, thankfully. Her muscles somehow held true through all of it and for now, she could still play the sport she loved. She was thankful for at least that much. Living to die, it was the sad truth. She had gotten past the fact that it was forever part of her and that eventually she wouldn't be here. She was scared beyond words but it was also beyond her control. People always asked if she was okay on a daily basis without knowing anything but she really only gave off one flat line emotion and said that she was fine even though absolutely nothing was fine. She hoped that one day someone would ask that and she would be able to spill her truths, her loves, her losses, her forced smiles, her burned bridges and that they would do the same. She just wanted to sit down with one person, someone with experience and trenches to tell their story. She didn't care about her own tears anymore, she had become numb to those kinds of things. Perhaps someone else who loved and lost, someone else who was living to die, someone else who loved to write, who loved to actually think and talk about the crazy thoughts sprinting through the folds of their mind, someone who would also listen, someone that would cry with her, for her, and let her cry for them, someone new, someone older, someone who wouldn't tell, just someone who could be real for a moment, for a turn of the hourglass. Maybe the next time someone asked, she would have enough strength to say she no longer had the strength. She didn't care if it was at a Starbucks at 3 in the morning, in the parking lot in the afternoon, or at school at the crack of dawn. There had to be one.