Truth or dare or dare to tell the truth

A few days ago, my friend told me that he noticed I like to write from the points of view of imaginary personas. The next day, another person told me that I always write as “my ideal self,” hesitating to say what I really feel and choosing instead to hide behind a façade of words. I realized that they were right, so I took out my pen and paper and told myself that no one would ever read what I was about to write. But I fell into the same trap once again, and ended up inventing a character:



She is an empathetic person, for the most part, but sometimes she decides that it’s not worth it to care anymore, because caring is a very tiresome occupation. Caring turns people into onions, because they make her cry.

Sometimes she looks around herself and tries to memorize everything she sees. Remember this moment, she’ll think in her head. Days will pass, then weeks, maybe years. Sometimes she remembers that she tried to memorize a moment, but she can never remember anything about the moment. Most times she doesn’t remember to remember at all. This is usually because there are not that many significant moments in her life.

A shadow grabs onto her ankles and follows her wherever she goes. On rainy days he is not there because he drowns in puddles.

The first time she said “I love you” was in her head, in a daydream that never became reality, because she realized he didn’t love her back. The second time she said “I love you” was in a text message that she stared at for a second too long before sending – causing her to brake the car too late. That should have been a hint that he was bad news, but she loved him blindly, and getting her heart fixed later cost a lot more than fixing her car. 

She always thought wishing fountains were silly. Who came up with the idea that tossing pennies into a fountain could make our dreams come true? What messed up logic could make people believe that their most ardent wishes and wildest dreams could come true with the petty payment of one measly cent?

Handwritten letters make her nervous. She doesn’t like things that are out of her control; once she drops the envelope into the mailbox, there’s nothing she can do to make sure it gets to its destination.

One of the things she hates most is waiting because waiting is wasted time, and time is the only thing she has. She wonders if time would still go on if the whole world went still.

She is a writer, but she knows she will never really be a good writer because she is too afraid. Her writings are never quite real because she worries that if they were, the world would think she is a monster. She tried it one time, but pretended she invented a character.




…I’ll leave it up to you to decide if some (or all) of this is real. But I assure you it's not. 


4 comments

  1. "Unreliable narrator" he decided "totally nuts, this one"

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    1. "unreliable narrator" reminds me of discussions in english class about edgar allen poe :(

      also, i see what you did there...i think.

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