THE EVOLUTION OF A LIE

I used to lie just to feel alive fake errands, fake smiles, anything that led me to noise and boys and borrowed laughter. Now I lie to protect my quiet. I lie because the world drains me. Because staying indoors is the only place my soul doesn’t feel hunted. The dark room doesn’t scare me anymore. It understands me. It doesn’t ask questions. It doesn’t demand explanations. It lets me fall apart without making a sound. I have wings everyone says that like it’s a blessing but they never tell you how heavy wings are when you’re too tired to fly and too scared to land. So I perch. Frozen. On a branch of endless thinking, arguing with myself about direction until indecision becomes a home. Imagination is my last honest friend. I don’t drink to escape I read. I disappear into pages where pain has meaning and endings exist. Novels hold me better than people do. They don’t interrupt my hurt. They don’t rush my healing. I sleep in other worlds because being awake in this one costs too much. And when I return I return quieter, heavier, older having lived a thousand lives while still failing to fully live my own.