I found a journal. Not just any journal but an old diary full of secrets and deep stories. I never meant to find the diary, but I came across it whilst hiding from my mom in the attic. I read some of it, but pages were torn and the attic was dark, so I took it to my room. The first thing I noticed was how old this journal really was. I guess you can't see aging in the dark. As I flipped through the pages, something shiny caught my attention. There was a ring, small but beautiful, taped onto one of the pages. Immediately, I read that page, hoping for some sort of explanation, but all I read was "For the distant future that would never arrive." I became curious, so I decided to read the journal from the very beginning. I gathered just from the first page that this diary was written by a man all about the love of his life. In it were stories about their dates, love notes, and even poems. Towards the middle of the diary something changed about the man's writing. He became worried about his love, Scarlet, but shrugged it off as her having family issues. He began asking more questions and talking to Scarlet's friends about her well-being. Her friends didn't know of any issues going on, but advised that he talk to her directly. After speaking with Scarlet one day, the man knew there was something wrong. "The tone in her voice was off, and I thought she wanted to break up with me." He wrote that the next day they would talk about their relationship, and if she wanted to break up, then it would be so. As the next day came, the man told Scarlet what he thought. Scarlet looked sad at what the man said to her, but told him that she loved him, and wasn't quite sure how to tell him. The man was overjoyed and relieved at this statement, and said it back. The man left Scarlet and went home, happy as could be. He decided to set up a date on a rooftop of the highest building in the town, to watch the sunset and have a picnic. After deep planning and consideration, the man thought about marriage. He came to the conclusion that this love would be eternal, and so he should set it in place with a ring. He went out to the finest jeweler in the town, and asked for a diamond ring as beautiful as Scarlet. Now the man was ready, though nervous, for his date and proposal. He told his soon-to-be fiance to wear something stunning, because it would be an important date for them. When the preparations were finally completed on the rooftop, and the sun was about to set, the man called Scarlet up to begin their date. At first glance, Scarlet was absolutely gorgeous, but as the man looked into her eyes, he saw sadness deep within. The man disregarded it as nervousness and carried on with his plan. After dinner on the roof, the man led Scarlet to the side of the building to watch the sunset and propose. As he left Scarlet there and went to the table to get the ring, he happened to turn, seeing tears in Scarlet's eyes. "What's wrong, darling?" he asked. With brief hesitation she whispered, "I'll be going, take good care of yourself." 

I stopped reading for a second. 

The next words written were "That's the last thing she ever said to me or to anyone else, because after that, I saw her on top of a wrecked car, bleeding to death after jumping off the building. The look in her lifeless eyes was full of pain and misery. She wanted it to stop, and so she stopped it."

I was enraged with the ending of this pure love story. I was mad at the man for not doing anything about the sadness he saw. I went to attic to look for anything else that might have belonged to the man. Without finding anything, I flipped back to the page with the ring. It was beautiful, and I now understood its being there. Now I wanted to know about the man. Why was his journal here? Did he live here before me? I decided to ask my mom if she knew anything about a woman named Scarlet who committed suicide. 

As I crept down the stairs, my mom asked where I was. "Just looking around in the attic," I said. "Oh so you found the diary?" I stood on the stairs in shock that she even knew about its existence. "Umm yeah, I-I read it," I stuttered. "And now you're here to ask me what I know about that couple," she said. "Yeah I was just wondering--." She cut me off. "My sister was Scarlet Filmester." She became teary-eyed. "I didn't know that she was in pain. I would've helped her... That man who wrote the diary, did you ever find out his name?" "No," I answered, "he never said his name." Well, your father, Jeffrey Walton, dated my sister Scarlet. He watched her die, and it left him in utter misery. I felt the same way after my sister's death, so we coped together. Years later he asked me to marry him, and here I am." "So that's dad's journal?" I asked. "Yes, honey, I'm sorry this is a lot to take in, but I think it's time you know the truth... your father had a brother as well." 

I watched you as your body heavily dripped. One second happy, and the next melted ice cream. I walked up to you and tried to convince you that boys are stupid, but you shrugged and turned away from me. I ran after you, trying to say something that would make you believe me. "You deserve better," I screamed. And you stopped. I watched as your tears, soft and clean, fell into the dewy grass beneath you. "You deserve better," I repeated in a whisper. At once her arms gripped my body in a hug, and all of her emotions set free into thin air. 

The calm before the storm

Is like no other serenity.

No human being can compare

To the stillness of nature in this brief moment.

It almost seems perfect; too perfect to ever be true.

You look around-

The grass is greener,

The sky is bluer,

And clouds are whiter and fluffier than ever before.

It almost seems blurry-

Life, I mean,

And everything is impulsive:

Lived in the moment,

And without regret.

In the blink of an eye,

The sudden flash of lighting

And rumble of thunder

Begin the storm,

Warning like a yellow traffic light.

One by one the beautiful white noise starts.

But the time goes on,

And the white noise pursues a different tempo.

The rain is my music,

Being played by the fallen angels of the sky.

I feel like a broken record. 

The same depressing track keeps playing

And there is no way to stop it. 

I am stuck in a cloudy haze,

And not even the inevitable rainbow can cleanse me of my storm.

My heart is a box, but the key is nowhere to be found. 

I am bottled up in this cage, unable to speak or to breathe.

I am numb.

I feel nothing.

Not even the love I see in front of me can snap me out of this. 

I crave what I can't have,

And it drives me insane.

I've become lost in a bubble,

Searching for my own sanity.

No one else realizes, 

No one else knows

That there is a sword being driven through me,

Piercing my emotions and making me dumb.

I hear nothing but the shrieks of pain within me.

I see nothing but the tears and puffy eyes on my face in the mirror,

Waiting for somebody to notice the fog surrounding me,

Engulfing me in my loneliness.

I speak nothing but cries of help.

They see me as normal because of the mask I wear.

I guess it's called a smile. 

Laughter is foreign to me,

As I have never heard of such a language.

I myself, am a locked diary, unable to be read by anyone who ventures near.

Those who search for my keys give up easily and drift away- slowly and then all at once. 

I am misunderstood as a book of secrets, when really I am a book of chained feelings. 

I have a heart and a soul, and a brain, but to them I have nothing but a fake smile. 

The words written inside of me bleed ink of sorrow and regret and embarrassment,

So much that I cannot bear to think of them in the wrong hands-

Hands that strangle the necks of those to show emotions.

Emotions are meant for within, so I've learned. 

It's better to keep your mouth shut, so I do. 

Yet I am still hurt, still burdened, still shamed. 

I am pushed away only to come back. 

"You're okay," I tell myself, but another truth awaits. 

Next to the victory of happiness, far out of reach. 

Cold coffee, dried out markers, torn pages, unfinished reports, and one-sided love.

You were everything I needed to get through my day. All the things that would keep me alive and out of trouble, but you made our love incomplete.

The coffee, my pick-up on those days when sleep just wasn’t an option. You made it cold. You stole the heart, the warmness, the coziness, and the love out of it. As much as it hurt me, you forced me to drink every last drop.

The colorful markers that I used to draw with when I was stressed out of my mind. You took them, wasting the ink and leaving them for me to use. I guess neither you nor the colors wanted to stick around long enough.

The pages I read when I wanted to be someone else, live in another story, and escape my own destiny. You stole my books and you burned them in the bonfire I wasn’t invited to. I became stuck in this life for good, with an inevitable fate.

The reports I had known about for weeks. The ones I had started and was nearly done with. You erased my data, everything I had, and left me with nothing to turn in. Writer’s block overwhelmed me and I failed those classes the same way I failed our relationship.

The love I gave you every second of every day. You took advantage of it. You wasted it like energy and stripped it of its vibrant colors. You burned that love, leaving only those ashes of the remains in my view. And you erased all of it; all that hard work gone to waste. I was trapped on my own with nowhere to go, no one to run to, and no escape from this fatal reality.

Complicated, exaggerated, overstated, overrated.

So many different words, and so many different meanings.

Every flower blooms, but no two are the same.

Endless weariness, sleepless nights.

Fear is the only thing keeping me awake.

Who is there to live for,

When everyone else leaves you in the dust?

DNA is superficial,

Family- unrealistic.

Perfection is dead,

Yet it has never tasted a drop of life.

People talk, and they talk loud.

Stories spread by word of mouth.

Save me from this world,

This cage,

This trap door.

I’m exhausted,

And I need something to live for.

1. You put me down.

2. You only acted like a friend. 

3. You treated me like shit.

4. You betrayed me. 

5. You backstabbed me. 

6. You left me for someone else.

7. You damaged my soul.

8. You hurt me mentally and emotionally. 

9. You made me feel worthless. 

10. You broke my confidence. 

11. You were selfish.

12. You killed me without me dying. 

13. You didn't love me back. 

A sudden drop rolls down the cheek of she who is hurt.

She deserves the world, but all she gets is water,

H20 that cannot be preserved. 

One tear turns into several as she realizes that the only thing she has left, 

This water on her soft cheeks, 

Will soon evaporate, leaving her with nothing. 

The only thing binding me with her are the letters. These letters do not come often, but I yearn for the day that one arrives in my mailbox. I want so badly to be able to see her face and feel her touch. As much as I despise that woman, a boy needs his mother. I wish that I could visit her and see the coldness and despair surrounding her cell, where she deserves to be. But I also recall happy moments of her bringing me dessert after a long day of tiring work. I miss her smell, but sometimes I imagine it to be within the lining of the paper that is sent to me. The words she writes, and the letters that are contained within speak nothing but distant lies. "I'll be home soon," "I miss you," and even the worst, "I love you buddy." Yet even with the hurt that engulfs my spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical self, I dream of a loving mother coming home to her son every night. The son has a faith and trust and love set in her, and without continually saying "I love you," the mother knows. The thing about these letters is the lack of emotion that is sensed. I am unaware of her mood while writing it, and even though I see the stains of bleeding ink from her teardrops, I am unsure if she misses her child or the life she used to have. The letters make me feel remembered, but I am left alone, unwanted.