Disclaimer: I do not know AJ and I don't pretend to. I don't claim to know what he's going through or what he's thinking, this is just from my imagination. This story was written for an awards site and was something I'd been thinking about writing for a while. This is fiction and should be treated as such. No hate mail please. Just read with an open mind.
Something Numb
Copyright 2003
Staring...listening...longing...aching...hurting...screaming...crying...wanting...lying...praying...waiting.
Yeah, that's what I'm doing...waiting. For what, I don't know. I just don't fuckin' know anymore. But that's what I'm doing now, all of the above. Sitting here, staring at the fuckin' wall cause I don't have a damn thing else to do.
And I'm listening. Listening to all the sounds that I thought were gone, the sounds in my head and all around me. Sometimes I wish I couldn't hear cause then I wouldn't hear all the hateful words and the put downs that are now surrounded by my name. The same voices and the same sounds that used to sing my praise and show their support, are now laced with anger and hurt that I put there, and I no longer wanna hear.
I long for yesterday, I long for a time when things were simple. I long for that feeling that I used to feel, that energy, that love. It's an intense longing, an intense desire to please and not to fuck up what I have, but screw it, I already have...or seem to have in everyone else's eyes.
It's easier to run
Replacing this pain with something numb
It's so much easier to go
Than face all this pain here all alone
The ache is always there now. That constant feeling of not knowing what's gonna happen next or what I'll do next to hurt someone. It's not easy for me; it's really not. I can't describe it to ya ya know? It kinda feels like, there's something missing in me, something that I lost somewhere along the way.
I hurt, god I hurt more than anyone realizes, knows. But see no one would ever believe it. I'm just out to screw everyone over and I don't give a damn right? You don't know, you can't see the pain, but it's there. Every harsh word and every condescending look is another cut through me, another wound that I hide behind a carefree smile and smart-assed comment.
But it's hard, it's getting increasingly harder and harder to hide the pain, and I see everything painful that's ever happened to me, or I've done to myself, over and over again in my mind. It's always there.
The pain that no one thinks I feel, it's there if you look hard enough.
Something has been taken
From deep inside of me
A secret I've kept locked away
No one can ever see
Wounds so deep they never show
They never go away
Like moving pictures in my head
For years and years they've played
Can't you hear me? Can anyone hear me? I'm screaming so fuckin' loud and I have been that I don't think I can do it any longer. I need to be heard and I need to know that someone's listening and that someone cares. Can you hear me? I'm asking for help, I'm screaming, but I'm screaming silently.
So many tears I've wasted, so many soft sobs and loud weeping that no one knows about. It is my imperfect release and the only thing that'll bring me to my knees. A grown man crying. But I need to, I need to cry or else I'll shrivel up, it's the only way I know I'm still real.
I cry for what's happened in the past, I cry for my mistakes, I cry for those I've hurt, and I cry for me, I cry for my life.
I want to not be alone. Isn't that so stupid? To long to always be around people and to always be needed? It's an overwhelming fear, that fear of no longer existing to anyone, to always need that justification from someone. What would I do? What? I can't be alone, no one seems to understand that, and I can't. If I'm alone, I'm left to my own vices and that's not good, I can't...can't be alone. Jesus, just thinking about it has me fuckin' shaking. Shit.
If I could change I would
Take back the pain I would
Retrace every wrong move that I made I would
If I could stand up and take the blame I would
If I could take all the shame to the grave I would
Lying, I do that so easily. I lie and hurt others. It's an easy defense mechanism. I can lie and blame something else for my own mistakes. Lying is so much easier than telling the truth, especially when the truth made or makes you look bad. So what's so wrong with lying? Oh nothing except when it blows up in your face, you're the one left with nothing. But I've lied over and over again, to my friends and family and loved ones. So, why do I keep doing it?
If only god could help me now, if only he would take pity on my plight and spare me the pain and humiliation that I feel every day, every second of my life. And that's what I hope for, that's what I pray for every night when I slip under the covers and close my eyes, wishing to wipe the slate clean. I pray for god to banish the memories, the torture that I live with, the punishment I live with for all the sins and shit I've committed.
And sometimes I pray so hard that the words become jumbled and I can feel the tears streaming down my cheeks, but I keep praying. Praying to leave the past that is so prominent in my present and future.
Sometimes I remember
The darkness of my past
Bringing back these memories
I wish I didn't have
Sometimes I think of letting go
And never looking back
And never moving forward so
There would never be a past
And now I sit here waiting, just waiting. Waiting for a judgement to be passed, waiting for the sentence that will tell me how to live the rest of my life.
It's some funny shit ya know? I kinda already feel like I've been condemned though no one wants to come right out and say it. Everyone knows what I did and I'm not proud of it, but it happened and sadly I can't go back and change it.
So badly I wish I could just, brush it over and forget it and move on, but I can't. No one will let me. It's always there and there are always people who make comments and shove it in my face over and over again to let me know how badly I've fucked up. But trust me I know, and no one's harder on me than myself.
But I go on, pretending I don't care, that's the easy thing to do, it's easier than showing everyone how much I hurt, how much it all hurts. From them especially, those who I wanted so badly to see me one way, has seen me the other.
Just washing it aside
All of the helplessness inside
Pretending I don't feel misplaced
Is so much simpler than change
So I run, I run from the pain and just let myself become cold to the words and the judgement in everyone's eyes. And maybe one day I'll fall, I'll fall and never get up again and then the world will be quiet and it won't hurt so much anymore. Maybe, maybe then it'll be ok. Yeah, it'll be ok then.
I'll be something numb.
It's easier to run
Replacing this pain with something numb
It's so much easier to go
Than face all this pain here all alone
Something Numb - By Linkin Park
