She's visiting again

She was back again today.

Sometimes it feels like she never leaves. 

And then sometimes, she goes away for days.

I think I like how she makes me feel; like all I have to worry about is making it through this day and this moment. Like brushing my hair away from my face is an important task. Like laying on my bed and looking at the clouds is enough. Like I am enough.

But she also makes me hate it. She makes me cry and she makes me feel alone. She makes me want to run away and crawl into a corner at the same time. She makes me want to leave so that they can finally see her instead of me.

I think, sometimes, the way she occupies my body, it feels like it has always been hers. As if she never went away, never stepped a foot down from her pedestal. I think sometimes my body feels more like hers than mine.

She acts her age but she doesn't let me act mine. We cannot co-exist. We live as two anomalies in a single body. She makes them look at me and see someone who needs to act like a grown-up, while she still colours with crayons on the pages inside my head.

I don't think she likes torturing bothering me this way. Maybe she has just lost her path. Or maybe she misses me. I know I do. 

Sometimes I think that she needs to be set free. Maybe she needs to live the path that was laid out for her then, the one that I protected her from. I could never let her face all that hurt, all that agony. I still can't. How do you tell her, such naivety on her face, all the wrongs this world is made of? It would take someone with a lot of bravery to do that. I'm not that brave.

She visits me for days. She reminds me that I need to let her feel. She reminds me to remember all the things that went wrong, to let go. I don't think I can. She'd leave then. I can't have her go. I can't feel all this agony and also let her go.

Yes, she makes me lay on the bathroom floor and cry for hours. I think she gets inspiration from all these movies. Sometimes I break through her spells. I try hurting her, throwing her away; willing her to let me go. But she is me and I am her, and all I end up with is my hands on my skin.

Sometimes I wish I could cradle her in my arms while she talks of her demons. She's too young to have seen them. Maybe I should have protected her better. Maybe she hates me for this and that's why she stays for days. Maybe she wants to punish me. Maybe she knows that she reminds me of them.

But I want to cradle her in my arms while she cries herself to sleep. I want to wipe away her tears while she babbles all the things that went wrong, all the memories she is too embarrassed to let go of. I want her to pour all that hurt out into the world and into my arms so that she can stay with me forever. So that we can chase butterflies and stare at airplanes together. I think she'd like that.

I wish I could do all of it on my own, this taking away her (my) pain. I wish I could listen to the stories inside of me and unravel them myself. I wish I could cradle myself in my own arms and hold me while I cry myself to sleep. I wish that I didn't need you to listen to me to set her free.