crash - muke / cake

leaving

song of the chapter: wait for life - emile haynie

hello frens i hope ur ready for this im finna actually try to update more than once a fckn year lmao

one year ago, 15 years old, summer

This body traps me like I'm in a cage at a freak show. I wonder if I were to be exposed to someone I would scare them away. Would they be disappointed the moment they saw me? Shocked? I live in a constant underlying fear that my body will expire before I do so I try not to think about it. I try to keep my thoughts stagnant but I can't help that the bars on my cage are always there; always in my line of vision. This, I cannot ignore.

I wake up half past three, always careful to give myself enough time to get ready to leave for the airport. It's been happening for three months now; flying across the state to New York City for medical appointments every three weeks. I wait a few moments before getting out of bed, immediately enveloped with a sudden coldness and I just want to go back to bed.

I tug on some jeans and my go-to white v-neck and drag my tired body into the bathroom. I get ready quickly so I have time to do a few lines of Xanax before going to the airport. 3:57. I call out for my mom, "Mom, I'll be in the car," before grabbing my headphones and my wallet, sneaking a bar in as an afterthought. I never get caught anyway. Shortly after I get in my mom's white Rav4, she climbs in. It takes me ten minutes to realize that I've forgotten to take my (perscribed) pills. "Mom," I start softly, not wanting to irritate her, "do you have my pills with you?"

"Why didn't you take them before we left?" I sigh. "I forgot." She raises an eyebrow at me, "They're in my purse. I wish you'd be more responsible, Luke."

"Yeah, me too." I mutter under my breath. "And that you'd stop mumbling," my mother says, taking a right turn. I sigh, staring out the window into the black four AM sky, the only light being my mom's headlights shining on the empty road. 4:29. We reach the airport and I walk mindlessly to security, not really waiting for my mom, just kind of strolling, letting the high from the pills guide me to where I was going. Ease. I don't really care that she will be offended by me leaving her behind, I don't check behind me until it's almost my turn in security. It finally occurs to me that at only fifteen, I still need her to show her ID for me. Of course she's a few people behind me. Of course. So I go to her and we continue until it's over and she strays to get a coffee while I sit at the same gate it always is, the five-forty-five  flight to the JFK Airport, New York City. This is routine.

You would think this is where the story begins. Me, going through my many plastic surgeries, a followup to a childhood trauma. But no, it doesn't. It starts with a boy. My best friend, in fact. His name was Michael, and my feelings for him were as confusing as all the decisions I had to make that early in life. Complicated. I often wonder what would have happened if I never let him go.