Small Moment of Happiness

White cracked lips, snow kissed face, as she breathes in the snow flakes, exhaling the cold smoke that accumulates through the brisk air. Her dark brown hair, is huddled under her hood, as she shakes uncontrollably. Her pale blue eyes, like the arctic, reflecting a scream drowned in her throat.

The sky, grey with melancholy, lets out its own tears as the clear moisture trickles from her eyes. Puddles form on the city streets as pedestrians pass by. They occasionally look at her in repugnance, or revulsion, but they don’t know her. They couldn’t possibly understand her story.

The puddles form portals to her memories as she stares down in surprise. She was a baby created in a late night escapade. A depletion of her young parent’s college plans. Her mother, still a child herself, turned to substances to numb her pain. Her father, who was a high-school football star, turned out like his own father, missing, lost from her world. She didn’t even know his name.

Her mother tried to find love, where love was extinct. In the arms of many but in the hearts of none. Multitudes of men came and went. Soon, the girl did too, knowing that staying there would be the wrong thing to do.

Now she is 18 with the face of Aphrodite but the mind of Medusa. Her untamed hair spirals around her, like snakes, as her mind becomes damaged by the drugs that become as normal as breathing to take. Unable to escape from the demons in her closet, the domino effect hit her too. She went to the red liquid praying to forget, even though the shadows followed her there too. The girl found “friends,” but they were like dancing with fire, she never knew when she would get burned. She thought they would take away her pain but instead they took away her soul.

She became comfortably numb as the needle would pump relief into her veins. Her blood became cold as ice and her bed where ever she lay. Her mind fights on the battlefield trying to break through, but the pills, liquid, and venom wouldn’t let it break down the walls. Her “friends” soon left and she was left alone to battle the demons inside her mind. Ones, which she desperately wanted to forget. As the battle grew so did her need for alcohol and drugs. She would do anything to get the things that she loved.

Her body became an obstacle, in the way of getting what she needed, so, she sold that too. She would do anything she could to get what she needed to.

After a late night rendezvous, she held the needle in her hand singeing her skin. But then she realized that the pain came from deep within. She began to think as the room began to spin around her. Her throat burns like fire and her eyes gloss over as if she is starring at herself through a mirror.

She falls through the wind landing on the cold hotel floor and her river of dark hair cascading in a heap around her. She lies there for a moment looking up at the ceiling letting the pain all seep away.

For a brief moment, she feels utter peace, a ray of happiness, then everything fades to black. She would wake up hours later and do her ritual again...

All for that small moment of happiness.