Chop.
It was always loud.
I was always involved, always had to involve.
Wherever I went, I suffered from the same message every blessed day, "You're not good enough"
There were lessons every minute.
Punishments for every failure.
Everyone, eager to remind me that they knew best.
Chop.
At some point I came to realize, I couldn't empathize with other humans. I played with them but couldn't feel their joy. I witnessed their hurt but didn't understand a bit of it.
It all felt hollow.
Fake.
It felt like they only laughed because life told them what mattered. And they only cried because life told them what hurt.
But through this time of my life, one thing kept me grounded:
Stories.
They were the only place I could feel. The only place I could cry when people hurt and the only place I could laugh when they succeeded.
So, I escaped.
Into a hundred different worlds.
Chop.
My eyes snap open to the dining table.
Same scratches along the wood. Same faint burn mark near the edge, from when a pot had been set down without a coaster years ago.
The window to my left showed the familiar skyline — stacked buildings, concrete and glass, the city stretched thin and vertical. Too high up for sound to reach properly.
The chopping continued.
My adopted mother stood at the counter, back to me, cutting vegetables into pieces that were all exactly the same size. My adopted father sat at the table with a tablet, scrolling, stopping every few seconds, scrolling again.
No one spoke.
I looked down at my hands. Older than I remembered. Thinner. The faint scar across his knuckle was there. So was the stiffness in my fingers, like they hadn't fully woken up yet.
The smell of food was wrong. Not rotten. Just… absent. Like the idea of a meal without the hunger.
"You're finally awake," my father said, without looking up.
Not a question.
"I was—" I stopped. My throat felt tight. "Just... thinking"
Mother set the knife down. Carefully. Too carefully. She turned, face neutral, eyes flat.
"You always seem to have your head in the clouds," she said.
The room felt… tighter. The walls hadn't moved, but the space between things felt reduced, compressed like a file stripped of unnecessary data.
My mother placed a plate in front of me. Rice. Vegetables. Protein arranged neatly.
"Eat," she said.
I lifted the fork. The weight surprised me—not heavy, but heavier than it should've been. Like gravity had nudged itself slightly upward.
As I chewed, the chopping stopped.
The sudden silence made my shoulders tense.
My father turned around.
He looked at me. Really looked.
"So Thomas," he said. "When are you finally going to wake up?"
I froze.
I knew exactly where this was going.
"When are you finally going to get a job?" He continued.
'And stop leaching off you guys?' I finished in my head.
I looked down at my hands resting on the table. They were steady.
That wasn't normal.
"Time and again, we've tried to raise you the best way we can, so you will be able to stand up for yourself and your future family as a man."
His fork hit the plate with barely restrained disappointment in his voice.
"Yet you refuse to listen." He paused as my mother joined us at the table for lunch.
"Life's not like this, Thomas. Whatever thoughts roam through your head—that's not the way."
I nodded.
'I know.'
I've always known.
"I'm doing fine," I tried to reply. But the words never could leave my throat. Because they were just baseless reassurances with nothing to show for it.
"I'm still searching—" The words stuck there.
Silence followed. It stretched, awkwardly, pointed. As if silence was the proper response for my senseless and irrelevant opinions.
I pushed my chair back. It scraped against the floor, loud in the quiet room. Neither of them reacted.
"I'm going out," I said.
My mother tilted her head. "There is no reason to."
I didn't respond.
I walked past them toward the door.
Stepping through the narrow foyer, the dull lights flickered with my steps.
'Were they always this faulty?' A calm thought invaded my mind.
Ignoring it I reached the door and grabbed the handle.
It didn't turn
I tried again. Same result.
Thump. Thump.
"Responsibilities don't disappear because you look away," my father's voice resonated strangely through the passage as he approached. It sounded heavy. Rough.
And wrong.
Turning back towards the living room entrance
The first thing I saw was his shadow. I stared at it for a second too long.
Long enough to see that it stretched unnaturally.
Badump. Badump. Badump.
My heart beat faster.
I glanced at my bedroom door midway of the foyer.
I quickly approached it.
The air felt thicker, heavier. My footsteps echoed too loudly for comfort.
Like it was the only source of sound in this place.
I glanced at the living room entrance and saw no shadow.
Reaching the door and I grabbed the handle.
It didn't turn
I tried again. Same result.
'Ah. right. the key.'
Reaching out for the key in my pocket, I froze.
Something was standing at the living room entrance.
It had father's face.
The same tired eyes. The same thin mouth pulled into a line that suggested disappointment rather than anger.
But the body beneath it was wrong — hidden in the shadows, but unmistakably so.
Its limbs bent where they shouldn't. There was nothing behind its eyes.
It didn't move.
It didn't breathe.
"You should be better at this by now," it said, in father's voice.
Steadying my trembling hands my eyes remained locked on the being, as I shoved the key into the lock.
The thing lunged — fast, wrong, its limbs scraping the walls as it moved.
Click.
Pushing through the door, I slammed it closed behind me and tried to lock it.
Chk. Chk.
The key wasn't working.
"Shit!"
Turning back to grab a shelf to barricade the door. My hand grasped air.
I wasn't in my room.
Instead, I had somehow entered the building's main hallway for our floor, outside my apartment.
Without a second thought I made a run for the elevator at the end of the hall.
Ding.
Halfway down the hall. The elevator chimed.
I stopped.
Sniff.
The doors folded open revealing a small figure hunched over with its back facing me.
Sniff.
"I—t hur— Hick"
It seemed to be crying and murmuring something.
I pivoted towards the staircase doors.
Barging through it I found myself to my apprehension back in my living room
Badump.
Only the figure of my mother was present in the room.
Cling.
Cling.
Her movements as though she hadn't a care in the world.
"You know, we both just mean well for you" she began, as she kept eating.
Creeping towards the exit I responded, "I know."
"That's why we gave you everything you needed."
I reached the door and grabbed the handle.
It turned.
Swinging it open, I saw what waited for me beyond it.
Emptiness.
'Whoa'
I took a step back.
"You know there's no going back if you take that step, right?" her voice resounded still apathetic as always.
CRASH!
I looked back to see that thing crash through the guest room's door.
"Close that door Thomas. NOW!" It lunged
Taking a deep breath.
'Thank you'
Facing the abyss before me,
I stood there a moment too long.
Badump.
Then I stepped forward.
…
It was dark.
Always dark.
And so quiet.
I just kept falling.
Alone.
In this void.
Until suddenly the darkness retreated.
As I fell, I saw a lone spark. It was fickle. Like a small wind could blow it away anytime.
But even though it was alone, it never died out.
Whether the wind blew. When the rain poured. Or when the snow fell.
It just kept burning.
And it looked so beautiful.
So pure.
So… peaceful.
'Ah.'
In the end I guess, all I wanted was some peace.
At some point I just stopped.
I stopped being afraid of failure.
Stopped chasing people's approval. Wanting their respect.
Or seeking their trust.
I just, wanted to be free.
Free from responsibilities that weren't mine.
Free from burdens.
Free from them.
SPLASH!