Not Big Enough For Both of Us

You know she's just asking for trouble.
A pile of shredded napkins beneath her trembling fingertips, a testament to just how close she is to losing the iron control that she's had for so long, needed for so long. The bar is quiet enough that she feels safe, a little unfamiliar world that is separate from all the places she's been before. The sounds of the living brush at the loneliness tightening slowly around her heart, her throat, her lungs; a terrible vice that cannot be stopped. This one, she does not belong here amongst the cheap alcohol and stale cigarette smoke. She shouldn't be staring glassy-eyed at the wall, not daring to blink and risk the flood of those ridiculous tears. So ridiculous.

This one, she used to carry a spark in her eyes, a knowing smile in the corner of her mouth. She would walk with a swing to her hips and blush when somebody glanced her way. But now she's in lock down, barred against a world that has taken her innocence and kindness and left nothing but ugly bruises on her soul. She should be somewhere warm, in the arms of someone loving, where she can be who she really wants to be. Instead she prepares to wait out the night in this god forsaken hell hole, surrounded by people who don't care to notice the sadness in her eyes or the heavy burden on her shoulders.

She's in so much pain. The shredded bits of napkin are thrown across the table as she stands, chair clattering to the floor behind her, her mind exploding as a scream bursts from her throat. She screams to the non-existent heavens and the hell she's always lived in, the sound so unearthly and filled with sorrow that for a moment it cuts into the hearts of those around her. They feel her loneliness, they feel her regret. They feel the lack of love and joy. They cry with her, and for a few bitter sweet moments she's not alone. The room shares something with her that she's never had before. She is a part of something else, not an outcast, not a failure, not everything she always swore she would never be. The loneliness fades until she can breathe again, until her heart begins to beat again.

But this one, she knows anything good is only temporary. Her screams die out with her will. Her heart stops once more. Her fists unclench and she picks up her things, her eyes on the floor as she leaves the scene behind, her body plagued with shame and guilt.

They all go back to what they were doing, and in the morning she won't even be a memory in their minds.