Are you aware?

They say only about 15% are. Though as someone who is aware, I think I'd rather not be. Whenever anyone tries to speak about certain things you can hear the missing information in their plot holes and the clear bias in their tones. It's haunting to know what others think they do because the reality...the history... is always worse.

Tap...I can see it in the way they walk into my room...tap... I can feel it in the air as a sharp inhale followed by a shaky exhale, disrupts the space between us…tap… I can hear it in their trembling voice when they speak from the empty bowls of desperation. They are hopeless and in anguish for their lack of mental nourishment. It is not the fault of a child if the adult has failed in their pursuit to teach but it is the fault of the child if they choose not to receive. In front of me sits both the child and parent in a single soul, each longing to connect with the other and yet stubborn in their understanding.

I cannot help them for they are co-dependent on their suffering, and they continue to push onward as a machine would. Using the tiny bits and pieces they had cultivated in the community they built before it came crashing down as fuel. They are finite, and they know that because it has been proven to them time and time again in the form of chaos, anarchy, and destruction. And when thats all they know what can you expect me to do? I will not fall victim to their will, but I will not stand in their way.

Talk to me.

Let me hear your whispers

dance from your tongue,

and across my body.

I can feel your eyes linger

the way you look at me,

invites a curious meal

for such a deep thinker.

Tell me, is that desire for me,

or the things i do for you?

or the things you think i can do for you?

Am I, the nectar or the flower Mr.Bee?

And if you look me in my swollen eye

and kiss my tears away,

with a sincerity that i cannot deny

my heart you just might sway.

Right into your waiting arms

To say i love you so,

would be a frail girls idea

of how her fairy tail will go.

Every chance given there is always something to be said about...well...anything. As an aspiring psychiatrist currently in my learning years the more knowledge I aquire, the more the world seems to fall in place. Or better put; out of place, it makes me want to shut my brain off as I ask myself if everything truly needs to be analyzed. To me? yes.

There is something to be said about how under every instagram post good, bad, happy, sad, exciting, tear-jerking, anger-inducing there is always someone who has an oppisite opinion. There is something to be said about American hyper-individualism and how a dependence on ourselves has ripped us away from community and villiage love. There is something to be said about how consummorism is shoved down the throats of people before they're even released from their mothers womb, and let out into a world that will judge them for more reasons than i can account. There is something to be said about how all of our root probelms (since the beginning of the slave trade, to the anti-homlessness epidemic in 2024) can be traced back to the very economic system that keeps this small rock afloat. There is something to be said about the way criticism is percieved, and handled in this country. No one is willing to have a open conversation about the terrors surrounding today and more importantly tomorrow.

There is someting to be said...about compassion, and understanding in the modern world. About trends and friendships, love, hate, and loss. About misunderstandings and defensiveness, about sterotypes and all the differnt ism's. About unity and conformatiy. I say all of this to say that everyone is their own person with their own lives and their own circumstances to shape what kind of life they lead. I am not the same as you but that doesnt mean we're different species. Have an open heart and an open mind because you never know what you might find in the person sitting next to you, no matter what they look like.

"It was paper-thin and sort of slimy." he said holding up a vial of what i can only assume is slime that he had collected from the creature. Taking it from him, I examined it's contents with a closer eye and observed dozens of tiny bubbles. I watched in curiosity as the bubbles slowly blipped in and out of exsistance the color of the slime in the vial slowly changing from dark blues to vibrant yellows to a whole array of colors rivaled only by the color codex itself.

"I've never seen anything like it!" I estatically pronounced, "It seems your adventures have paid off my boy." I chuckled, the different tests I can run pumping through my brain as I set the sample down on my desk. "How much do you want for it?" 20 Gold pieces later and I find myself exactly where I want to be, alone in my lab with a colorful vial of goop i can experiment on.

After putting on my gloves and googles, saftey first of course, I pop the top off of the vial and attempt to pour a little bit of the slimy liquid out onto my workbench. I furl my eyebrows as the thick substance sloshes around in the vial only threatining to come out as a whole or not at all. Perplexed i take out my recorder and begin my verbal journal entries.

"It seems the substace is almost unwilling to part with even a drop of it liquidity, i shall attempt a manuel extraction via tweezers and scissors." With that i pick up my long tweezer tongs carefully pinching and pulling the smallest amount from the vile, surprising myself as i thought it would just fall through. "Substance matter is unknown, acts as liquid in the sense that it takes up whatever shape it is put in with volume but is able to be easily manipulated with tweezers." I make a note to myself before grabbing my scissors and quickly snipping off a small piece.

Immidiatly after I took the piece a high pictched scream arose almost like an alarm, before slowly dying down. I dropped the tweezers and scissors my hands rushing to cover my ear drums to provide myself some kind of relief from this horrid scream. I stayed like that for a few more seconds after the screaming had stopped, eyes shut tight with my hands over my ears. Slowly, i took my hands away and opened my eyes looking down at the vial in front of me that was now changing colors twice as fast as before. Quickly i shoved the top back on tightening it and bringing it closer to my face for further inspection.

"The specimin let out a high pitched scream lasting around 5-7 seconds as a result of the cut. My speculation is that whatever this liquid is may feel pain, theory requires further testing. Colors are visably darker than before and there are more bubbles than first observed as well, possibly from aggitation. theory requires further testing." I say about to put the vile down when I pause, an uneasy feeling settling in my stomach. I can't seem to look away from this vial in my hands, somthing is different, I feel as though I'm missing somthing.

Shaking my head to try and clear my thoughts i come to the conslusion that i am overthinking and put the vile down with a soft tap, turning my attention to the sample I collected from the vial. I layed it out under the light of my workbench and all of the tiny bubbles reflected back at me only this time the color of the substance way dull grey. "It seems once a piece is detached from the specimen it reverts to a dull greyish color scheme as opposed to the once vibrant one were used too seeing, theory requires further testing." I say staring down at the blob "Although the bubbles seem to stay in tact-" I freeze"...bubbles? When observing the vile they pop in and out frequently, to say it happens when exposed to air would be a jump but these are in tact." I reach over grabbing my magnifying glass and taking a deep breath before getting a closer look at the reactive sample in the jar. I looked and looked and realized very quickly that the bubbles were always in the same place. Everytime the blip out of existance they come right back in the same spot, I turned the vile around slowly observing the same phenomina repeatdly on all sides. A lump began to form in my throat as I realized I am not the only one doing the observing.

"Bubbles? No...not bubbles, a correction for the record. The speciman I have been observing for the past few minutes is covered in tiny eyes, previously believed to be bubbles. Theory requires further testing" I swallow nervously now aware that whatever was in this vial is fully aware of me and upset that it just lost a limb. "I hesitate to remove the lid from the vial once again for fear that i may not be able to protect myself. I think i shall conclude my research here for today until i can work in better...safer conditions." I say before cutting off the recorder and shoving it in my pocket before collecting my messy desk. I go to grab the tweezers only to realize the dull greyish blob I pulled from the original vial had disappeared.

Frantically i searched but to no avail, the situation has become too much for me to handle i turn around rushing to grab my coat and shoes before reaching for the vile and feeling, air. I snap my head just in time to hear glass shatter and my heart drop. I heard scuffling movements all around me, my eyes switch from area to area in the small lab. I slowly make my way across the room, the door seemingly much farther than when I walked in this morning. I sprint towards the door and three steps was all it took for me to let my gaurd down. Too bad the door was 4 steps away, too bad i slipped on the 3rd, too bad i heard that same ear piercing scream as my head banged against the floor imparing my vision. I looked down through my clouded vision to see what i had slipped on only to see a skid mark of grey sludge across the floor.

I grabbed the table using it to stand up as I held my head and attempted to stumble through the door. I put my free hand on the door and felt a cold liquid on my head slowly sinking down. It felt nice and cool on my swollen head and i wanted to fall into the coolness. I opened the door stopping dead in my tracks as the coolness covered the top of my head and seeped down to my eyes...ears...nose and finally my mouth. I clawed at my face the material paper thin but unbreakable my nails were like a butter knife trying to cut through a wooden door. I flailed about hopelessly until i could no longer hold my breath, I gasped inhailing the substance. Almost as quickly as it begin suffocating my face by wrapping its body around my head it went down my throat tubing and into my lungs.

I gripped my chest hard, my eyes bloodshot and my chest in an abnormal amount of pain. I writhed on the floor as blood spilled from my mouth, and the pain in my chest grew. I lay there staring up at the ceiling my eyes wide open as the last attempted gasp choked out of my open blue lips, soon followed by something that was paper-thin and slimy.

Tik...Toc...Tik...Toc...

The clock on my wall is my only friend here, throughout years and years it is the only honest thing that I can count on. Through its simple sound; it comforts me with the thought, time will pass. This I have always known however, it has taken me a while to accept.

I have had many loves to look after, all of one liniage and all with an aroma of regret. Wine glasses turned to whiskey bottles turned to beer and back into wine every 60 years or so like clockwork. And through the sound of days ticking by I have come to believe that my loves hate me. I reek of the one thing they most desire and serve as a reminder of the time that has passed. It is not their fault, I do not blame them, they are constantly met with peaceful faces and when I look into their eyes I see a deep longing.

Funny how they help so many others with peace, but struggle with their own.

And when their desires are granted be it by their hands or someone else's I cradle them deep in my bosom and shower them with the love they have shown to so many before them. Time does not pass for those in my care but it does still pass, and there has not been a new bottle opened yet. Only dust and sheets are left for my old creaking walls and I...am content with that.

Ya know, I always thought I would die alone but there was never any sadness in my tone when those words would dance from my tongue. I never truly knew this kind of love, truly new to it I suppose; People say you fall but this was more like a shove. You made me see the beauty in relationships and handed me a colorful kaleidoscope bursting with possibilities waiting to be nurtured into fruition. I could travel to the ends of the earth, shout my loves name from every rooftop of every skyscraper in every city and still feel as though you will never know how much I truly love you.

A heavy old book, a dustcloud and a gust of wind. My fingers graze the soft pages

that smelled faintly of vanilla. Ouch. How can such soft pages make such a cut? A drop lands on the empty page and like a water droplet entering the still pond; it rippled. Neat lines of ink come into focus and before i knew it my lips were moving on their own. The passage read "I shall grant you evergrowing power, it will give you the strength to overcome your obstecles, defeat your enemys, win the heart of your lover, topple kings and queens alike! You will be a consistantly growing unstopable force, just like your strength. As you start to age your power will not stop growing, you will be overcome by it and driven to maddness because of it. Rejoice! for i have bestowed upon you the gift of a new life and Repay me for my kindness tenfold with that which i need." Silence. Then, screams as i felt the overwhelming strength start to course through my veins the air leaving my lungs, and my vision was blurred by red but the feeling, wasn't all that bad...