Go Away. It Is Well. You Are Not Back There.

Sufjan Stevens - The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades Is Out To Get Us!

I just woke up from the most stressful dream. My phone (like always) freaked out and wouldn't stop playing the song I use for my alarm, and now it is off as I write this.

I don't really know where to start, so I guess the best way to say it is, most people didn't like me when I was in middle school. I was not popular. In 6th grade my friends alienated me for a new girl, and spent their lunches running away from me so that I didn't have anyone to eat lunch with. I felt completely and utterly alone sometimes. That's when I got the first signs of depression.

My dream was set in present day, and I don't really know what the event was, but it was with everyone I graduated with. We were in a big venue that reminded me more of a house than anything else. I could not find any of my friends, so I went into this dining room and sat with people that I went to middle school with. As I walked in, I could remember a story about every one of them.. I wrote that guy a secret love letter. That girl hated me. He dated my friend when he knew I liked him. 

I sat down at the last chair in the farthest corner. I started eating my food, trying to join in in conversation, but nobody listened. After what seemed like eternity, Ronnie Nolan, sitting next to me, turned and said, "Yeah.. I hope you still don't hate any of us." I had this flood of memories that brought me back to when I felt completely, and sincerely alone. I was, at that table, alone once again. As I was about to speak, another girl piped in and said, "You're still the same girl as you were then."

I'm still the same middle schooler that everyone hated. I'm still that girl with short hair and the bandanas. I'm still the one that never had lunchables. 
I turned to her, and I really wish I could have remembered what I said in the dream, because it was epic. I stood up for my middle school self, telling her I was not the same girl but even then I was too good for them. As tension rised I could feel more and more eyes on me. No, not on me, on little 6th grade Alexandra with short hair, no boobs, and crooked teeth. 

That girl sitting a few seats down for me was making me relive my nightmare one more time. And I didn't know what to do. I felt helpless, no one was there to protect or comfort me. The best I had were Ronnie Nolan and Kemp Stanford looking at each other like, "what do we do?"

The girl and I got up. She was sick of talking over people. As she came in closer to me, my heart started beating faster. She told me I was worthless. I haven't grown up. I never will. She told me I was ugly. I told myself all of this.

As I got more and more angry, I told her what I had wanted to tell everyone back in middle school.. "Why don't you just hit me? Why do you have to say all of these things?" I said it with force. It was a beautiful, angry force coming out of my mouth.

As I went in to hit her, I realized her size. She is so much bigger than me... What am I doing.. Why am I here. Why did I ever sit with these people, the people who brought so much pain in my life. I throw my last attempt at her. 

"You are useless. You always have been."

I have given up.

I turn back to Ronnie and Kemp and say, "You are forgiven."

I walk like a child taking its first steps.

The Predatory Wasp Of the Palisades Is Out To Get Us!

I jolt awake.

My cell phone will not stop playing.

Go away. Go away. It is well, Alexandra. You are eighteen. You are not back there. 

You are not back there.

It is well. I am eighteen. I am not back there.

I am not back there.

I am not back there.