Shades of Green

Burning Within

I am exhausted. I am a candle, burned down to the last
centimeter, waiting for the flame to be snuffed out. My
will is dying, and my body feels as if it wants to fall
apart. I feel little happiness alone, and now, so little
seems to be able to help.

Something is wrong with me. Mind, spirit, body, I feel
weak. The strain of everything is gnawing away at me, like
rats worrying a rotting piece of meat. My energy comes
only in bursts now; I periodically find myself lying on the
ground, holding myself together with only my own arms,
barely able to think beyond the fires that are threatening
to tear me apart from the inside out. The only thoughts
that keep me going, keep me from hiding away and choosing
the weeping darkness that protected me years ago, is the
thought that things will get better. The thought that I
can be happier, and be with Her.

But that is where things have begun to go wrong.

Lately, when I am alone, feeling the pain and stress,
feeling myself slowly wasting away, I wish to see Her. I
wish to see Her smile, to hear Her voice. To hold Her
close to me and just... relax. But, at the same time, when
I do have a chance to speak with Her, I feel something
wrong. A part of me immediately grows cold, turns bitter
and harsh. Sometimes it is more evident than not, but
always, I can never fully explain it.

It frightens me. It frightens me so much, because it
threatens the love that I have for Her. I can only hold it
back for so long, before it starts to leak into me, before
that vile miasma taints my mood and emotions. It is in
part that portion of me that hates myself, and in part...
something entirely different. Perhaps it is the embodiment
of fear and insecurity. It brings to mind all that could
go wrong, and amplifies anything that is wrong.

What could go wrong? She could leave me. She could
find someone else, and go. In my heart, in myself, I know
that She would never do that. Because She is far too good
of an individual to hurt me like that, because She loves me
too much to do that. But, in that part of my mind, the
part that knows only fear, it dwells. "What if She wanted
someone else?" "What if She thinks that She'd be happier
with someone else?" Those questions flit through the dark
recesses of my consciousness, like battered moths brushing
close to the candle's flame.

It is my greatest fear, my most apparant worry, that
She will finally realize that She would be happier with
someone else She knows. Why? Because I do not believe
myself deserving of Her love. She is far too beautiful for
me. I love Her too much, to let Her be unhappy, simply
because She is with me. I would rather Her leave me, if
She wanted someone else, but at the same time, I would be
paralyzed by the pain of making Her go.

Why am I so insecure about Her? Why must I witness
this fear within myself, this poison that threatens our
relationship, even if She does not realize it? I think
about my problems when I am not occupied, but lately, with
the stress of what I must do, my mind has not been... as
focused as it normally is. I have tried to understand, to
figure out why I have been having these feelings, and what
could be triggering the darker moods I have when I speak
with Her.

Writing this now, I believe I have begun to
understand. I think that, in some strange, twisted way, I
fear Her happiness. I am not normally, as I have painfully
realized, a very happy individual. I never grew up with
the coping skills that She had the benefit of learning.
How I cope, is an amaglam of escape methods, or means of
bottling things up. I live as a boiling pot, shoving my
pains away in a dark cauldron until they begin to pollute
my being. Because of this, of my realization of the poison
I carry within me, I feel that I am wrong for Her. She is,
undoubtably, the happiest person I know, when She is not
fretting over some angst She blames Herself too much for.

Her happiness, the sheer brightness of Her energy and
Her love, is in part what makes me love Her so dearly. No
one I have known before lives quite like Her, so brightly
as She does. Yet, because of it, I feel a certain
detachment from Her. Her brightness illuminates my own
poisoned soul, burning away the impurities, but at times,
the malignant feelings within me cloud my emotions, keeping
away Her light. They remind me of my fears, my worries
that She, because of Her happiness, can not relate to what
I feel. And with every happy time that I spend with Her,
each darker moment of my life seems more painful.

Even despite how small my troubles may seem to others,
I must wonder if She realizes how it feels, to go through
what I go through. To need comfort by the end of the day,
to find someone to hold, and just relax with, without being
hurried away. To be pushed away, when I am still stressed,
hurts far more than the pain of staying awake, because it
reminds me of how little time I have to relax.

We live only 30 minutes apart now, but because of the
strain I am going through, it feels farther. The first
week with Her was so beautiful, that I could have just died
with it being so perfect. But this week has been utter
hell, a constant run through of stress with the occasional
ray of light. Every single day, with the exception of this
one, I have burned my energy away to near nothing, leaving
me stumbling on my feet by evening. Yet, the only thing I
wish, the only thing I look forward to, is Her. To speak
with Her, hear Her voice, or even that hopeful chance to
see Her in person. But now, I almost fear being with Her,
because I know that my time will be short, that everything
has become minutes and seconds, because She will push me
away. I know that She is only concerned about my health,
but sometimes, I have to wonder if She is doing more damage
than good, by altering my perspective of the time I can
share with Her.

I already fear asking to see Her, so when She told me
that I don't give Her a chance to surprise me in turn, I
felt... hurt. My view of spending time with Her has not
changed; they are still moments to be cherished and watched
for, because while they have become more abundant, they
have also become increments of time. Hours, minutes,
seconds, all laced with the those urgings to go home,
urgings that make me nervous and anxious. I know it is
because I am tired when I see Her, as burned out as I am,
but I go to see Her because I hope to be comforted. And I
do find that comfort, that source of Love that I need so
much, but that time is lessened so much when She pushes me
away.

I am so tired. So utterly exhausted, even after
today's rest. It is because I have begun to lose hope, in
ever truly being happy. She doesn't seem to realize how
hard it is to change, to be rid of that part of me that
hates my happiness. She doesn't seem to understand the
severity of how it has plagued my life, and the seriousness
with which I treat it. The lightness with which She speaks
of it, saying how She will "beat it up" and the like,
brings a smile to my face, but even so, it raises the
question of whether or not She just how much that part of me
frightens me.

There is so much more I wish to speak of, wish to let
out into word and text. But I'm far too tired, what energy
I regained already drained to feed the fires within. I
need Her this week, more than ever, need Her presence to
hold me together. But how can I tell Her? How can I ask
Her, when I already fear? I feel so lost and sad... and I
am afraid that it will only taint my feelings more. In the
week that I need Her the most, I have seen Her the least...
and that fact alone reinforces that part of me that
believes that I am only meant to feel pain, for who I once
was, and who I am not yet.

Good night, my Tenshi. I love you, and miss you so
dearly.