His words were like fingers plunging through my chest. Grabbing hold of my still beating heart.

Instantly stealing my breath. Grasping

crushing

ripping

then pulling

you freed me of its rhythm so easily.

It still beating in your hand, momentarily hoping you will place it back where it belongs.

But instead you drop it onto the floor.

stomping on it until it beat no more.

Then with a cocky grin you walk away as I lie dying on the floor in a pool of tears.

Unable to breath.

And with a heart which no longer beats.

That is heartache to me.

Lands of flame,

Skies of ice,

Her day brought by burning frost,

Her nights swallowed by frozen flames,

Her only love cast away,

Brought to a world of L'eau,

To bolster a life source,

To slave until Impatience releases him,

To free him from his burden,

Fireflower holds a pendant,

Clutches it close,

As she sheds molten tears from her burning eyes,

Her heart seeps into the molten ground below.

World of L'eau,

Water runs freely in the sky,

And flames are kept under close eye,

His fiery spirit,

Trapped under the saturated atmosphere,

Brings him to fiery tears,

Scowling at the aqueous horizon,

A curse rings from his lips,

Swift and slow tyrannical torment,

Holds his heart,

Binding,

Wrought with thoughts of insanity's release,

And hatreds bittersweet kiss of power,

To avenge his enslavement,

And to return home.

Nights run through,

Days slide past,

His anger growing,

His power building,

The night brings dark cover,

He smirks and lunges in a feral state,

He sheds blood in contempt,

He screams in agony and in victory,

Slaying all opposed,

Dripping blood from his worn hands,

He smiles and recedes into the dark.

She stands alone,

Gazing into the fiery depths of the Molten Sea,

Hoping for her lovers return,

And wishing for his searing embrace,

A hand creeps upon her shoulder,

A dark figure stands behind her,

In the body of her love,

But his spirit far too dark,

His eyes gleam black in the light of the Molten Sea,

Her heart stops,

Her body tense,

She smiles,

Flaming tears rain from her eyes,

She embraces him in her arms,

Their souls combine,

A twisted black flame engulfs her,

She screams,

Her soul crystallized,

And she is encased in an obsidian flame,

Her love cries as he drops on bended knee,

His heart now gone,

Sealed with Fireflower,

His body wanders aimlessly,

Free of all emotions,

Free of all existential trappings,

His soul lost,

Never to find her fiery embrace once more,

He haunts the rocky shore of the Molten Sea,

Protecting the Obsidian Flame,

Fireflower's tomb.

My beautiful Wisdom; I look up to her in so many different aspects of my life. She has always been there for me, my loving friend who keeps all my secrets.

But there was one secret that she kept from me.

Wisdom's perception of herself is twisted, tainted by her ED. You and I would see her as a beautiful young woman, not as stick-thin as a Barbie doll, but rather a dark-haire mystery, with large doe-eyes that shine in her happy moments and beg you to ask for her name.

Wisdom sees herself as an ugly glutton that needs to shed her layers to even be considered human.

She's gotten help of course, but not before her ED infected all of us.

Her friends wondered why she'd disappear into the school bathroom after lunch for what seemed like hours. I wondered why she'd squirm so mucb when we watched shows that flaunted size-00 women in swimsuits, telling us that we needed to look like them to be considered beautiful, to be worth looking at. She didn't actually believe that, did she?

The EDPeeps, her support group that I am a stranger to, was able to help her where I could not. She was able to meet others that suffered from the same poisonous thoughts that inhibited her from seeing how truly beautiful she is, and take comfort in knowing that she is not the only one suffering from that torture. I, being an outsider, will never fully comprehend how someone so beautiful can feel so ugly and worthless, how looking at a mirror can instantly shatter someone's self esteem. But the EDPeeps live it; day in and day out, they must silence the voice in their heads that tell them they're worthless and disgusting for feeding their bodies. They fight battles that leave their psyches disfugured and their hearts scarred, battles that I will never see in my life. They have no choice but to be strong, no choice but to live through a perceptual nightmare every day, hating how much body mass they carry, always trying to get rid of one more ounce of matter on their bodies that can't shed one more sliver, lest they shrivel up and disappear altogether.

The EDPeeps, and my Wisdom. I'll always admire them. They remind me how precious the little things in life are, and how easily we can take for granted a genetic trait, a mouthful of nutrients, even our own reflection in the mirror. Because not everyone can.

My mother has fibromyalgia and for those of you who don't know about it it's not as scary as it may sound. It affects her in the sense of what kind of towels or bed sheets she can buy because it can cause serious discomfort and pain. It makes doing certain things very hard and painful- like washing dishes or opening a can or even keeping hold on something- but she still works very hard and doesn't use it as an excuse not to do something. There are certain things that are difficult for her to do due to fibromyalgia that myself and the rest of our family around the house have to do but it's always been that way so I wouldn't say I think it's out of the ordinary. She's very determined and hard working and she has taught us that as well. It can definitely make some family activities harder or unpleasant and she hates the fibro (short for fibromyalgia) and sometimes blames herself for it. But it is just one more thing in a world of so many and we pull through. As for some advice for someone with it or someone who knows someone with it; don't make it who they/you are. Cause it's not, and it never will be. Stay strong and don't push yourself too hard.

(I apologize if I upset or offended anyone with this post by not explaining the difficulties of fibromyalgia enough. This has been my personal experience and I am by far not an expert. There are definitely other aspects to fibromyalgia and I again apologize if I did not capture that.)

I'm a selfish reader. When I read, I immediately must decide if I like the protagonist as an individual or not, and judge the crap out of them. Books like Hardy's 'Tess of the d'Urbervilles' and Chopin's 'The Awakening' gave me headaches, since the personalities of the protagonists and my own way of doing things differed so drastically; in my humble opinion, Tess should've grown a pair and Edna needed a Prozac prescription, but I digress.

I'm a selfish reader because of how I engross myself into the texts, allowing my own opinions on how the plot plays out to poison my opinion of the book, even the writer him/herself, which is why it actually takes a lot to impress me when reading a novel. A book like 'Tess' makes me marvel at how poorly women were viewed in the English Victorian era, whereas Hawthorne's 'Scarlet Letter' made me laugh out loud with how pathetic it made the opinions of society seem. And of course, the ironic and almost humorous way the men were portrayed pleasantly suprised me. (Dimmesdale. What a weenie.)

And the biggie:

While reading Nabokov's 'Lolita', I constantly had to remind myself that Humbert was a pedophilic psychopath, not the kind of person the reader should be rooting for. He disgusted me and intrigued me, and when I finally finished the book I took a shower and forgave myself for empathizing with Humbert and succumbing to Nabokov's literary genius.

And if you've read this far, I'm actually impressed. The way I go on and on, it's selfish. My opinions actually don't matter that much, but here they are. And the next time I read a book that impresses or disgusts me, you're gonna know about it.

If I find a book I really like, whether it be because of characters, plot, or flow of the novel, I will become obsessed with it. Even after I finish the book, I find that I don't know what to do with myself. On some occasions I will proceed to draw scenes, characters, or quotes from said books. My most common symptom of my self-diagnosed novel addiction would be shipping. Yes, I did in fact say shipping. For those of you who do not know what I mean by this, I would suggest researching it for yourself. But in a word, it's like matchmaking. Overtime I begin to come down from my book high, and eventually will return to a regular life...

That is, until I can get my next fictional hit.

"Before we go, how about more than a kiss?"

He slowly inched his fingers from my bare shoulder towards my equally bare wrist.

Any other time I would have laughed him off and I would have told him to behave, but at that moment it was his touch that I craved.

I glided my hand down his chest 'till I reached the edge of his shirt and he inched his hand up to the base of my skirt.

Hesitantly I said, "This isn't something i normally do-"

With a sparkle in his eye he whispered, "I love you."