And just like that, the world has become a jail. Our houses the cells we live in. Life came to a pause so abruptly and I can still feel my thoughts racing as fast as ever, trapped in this quiet and seemingly peaceful empty room.

Isolation. By force we have to face ourselves, our non eternal nature crafted by our dispensible bodies succeptible to damage by the smallest of creatures, unseen by the naked eye, not even alive, they are not.

I never realised the walls of my room were made of mirror. Inside them, I face myself. The life I crafted; is it one I cherish or one I'd rather hide from?

My home, a place of security has come to symbolise uncertainty and fear. Control, the fake idea of it, has crumbled to nothingness, a construct so carefully crafted that right now seems at least laughable.

I don't know where the future will take us. Such a powerful realisation that I've spent all my living moments running from. Did you also used to follow your little imaginative crafted path, step by step? Did you also disguise it as stability? Prisoner. I was a prisoner of myself and only at the face of physical captivity have I managed to shed light to where the real isolation lies.

I don't know where the future will take us. Every fear I have ever faced of letting go seems pointless, every time I decided the risk wasn't worth it. Now, pushed off the cliff edge, with only faith that a parachute will save us, I think I will suffocate, or maybe, just maybe, I will breathe harder than ever before.

I don't know where the future will take us. Sobering reality. Shocking I would say. But really, did I ever know? Did you?

Your eyes.

A deeper blue than the ocean they crossed.

They sparkle.

Of determination and loss and fear.

Your laughter.

Louder than the explosions you fled.

It echoes.

Of strength and realness and pain.

Your scream.

As blood curling as death.

It penetrates.

Of audacity and life and hope.

Sometimes I wonder if everyone's insides are full of contradictions. If everyone longs for what they hate and loves deeply what scares them.

Barefooted I like to walk when I stroll my mind’s paths. Sometimes near endless blue oceans and sometimes enclosed in a cage. And somewhere in between, on the border, I walk a tightrope. Step by step. If sometimes I lose my way, I am not scared, wherever I walk to I am always there, in the same cliff, the same chasm. Sometimes I stand on the edge and look at the vastness. The emptiness. I’d like to know what’s hidden inside it. In this absolute, vertical but at the same time unknown, undefined, indefinite, full of fear. I deeply breath its fresh air and I suffocate. I guess there is freedom in suffocation, or suffocation in freedom.

I often think of letting go, allowing my weight to drop in the void but then I always smile bittersweetly. Only for a few seconds I flirt with the idea, a few moments walking on the edge before I decisively turn my gaze to the damp soil and lay on the ground. I like its smell. Its known, safe. Every sound of it is mine, or maybe I belong to it. I close my eyes and feel the earth swallowing my body until I become its blood and my insides pulse following its rhythm. I like its warmth but...but sometimes, I become its root and it chokes me.

What am I scared of the most? Why?

What would happen if I removed this massive, limiting binder that I myself wore? What would the beat of my heart sound like?

Who would I be in the unknown? Who would you be?

I was scared, so I closed my eyes and ignored the abyss inside me. But no one has ever truly lived with a white peplum blocking their view. I sometimes attempted opening the lock of the predefined jail of my mind and all I found was a wall. So I stayed there; safe, empty, a captive of myself. Other times, I allowed the wind to pick me up and as my body lingered in its angry, manic movements and my insides bled and fractured, there, in the middle of catastrophe I found peace.

But really, which side of the wall is my true form resting at? And in the end, who is the one that controls and who the one that rebels? Can it be that the one that enforces boundaries is the one trying to break them? Or is it maybe inevitable that the one who locks the door throwing the key, to be the one looking to escape? Because deep black is closer to white that to any grey and the edges are always parts of the same coin. And maybe full control or the lack of it always send the guilty one exiled in the same island.

when

I ceased being me

and reduced to the sadness inside me

I never realised

when

the whirlpool of despair

it chased me everywhere

now rested at the base of my lungs

defined

my nature

suffocated

my thoughts

claimed (the anthropoid)

my head

restless

shell of a human

threatened and threatening

it won or I did

either way

I was already lost

drowning

letting go

it felt good

for a moment

then beat of my heart

longing for air

under the blue

I emerged

I was always more

than a beast

a beast

Somedays

I don’t want to be your gorgeous one

Your happiness

Your sunshine

Somedays

I am a cloudy sky

A raging rainstorm

A feeble sinner

Somedays

I don’t want to hold you

Or to apologise

To save you

Somedays

I’d rather stumble

And cry

And hurt

Someday

I’’l take off my costume

The fake smile

The puppet dress

Someday

I know; I will sneak out

Through all the openings

Like light, I’ll fill the gaps

Someday

You’ll see my power

My desire, my scream

Will break the room

Someday

My wilderness will stun you

My chaos will choke you

My freedom will captivate you

The sun, coming through the large window next to her bed, was seductively kissing her naked body when she woke. Soon, the calmness surrounding her underweight figure disappeared and her red swollen eyes widened abruptly. A buzzing noise was ringing in her ears and she quickly stood up and started searching the floor for what she needed. You could see Ariadne's arms shaking as she looked underneath the clothes scattered all around the floor, losing her composure more by the minute. Her body, frail and exhausted followed her around passively, while her thoughts fixated on one thing: the needle.

Where is it? Where is it? Where is it? She yelled, when suddenly she was interrupted by a loud sound of ringing. What is this? Ariadne asked herself, confused and lost deeply in an abyss of darkness, swallowing her existence. Unable to form cohesive logical thoughts, she sat there, wondering, before she caught a glimpse of her phone on the floor, with the name of her sister written on the broken screen. She didn't dare to answer. To disappoint her again. To cause her pain.

Soon, a familiar notification came up and she clicked to listen to the new voicemail, longing for her sisters voice, calm and sobering, to stroke her ears and somehow save her from this pain. "Ariadne, please pick up. I listened to your voicemail from last night. Please Ariadne. Don’t say goodbye." Zoi caught her breath before continuing. "I love you Ariadne" She continued, sounding calm and composed with only the crisp aftertaste of her words revealing her pain.

Ariadne's expression didn't change. She hovered her finger over the call button for a few seconds before collapsing on the floor. Every cell of her body was refusing to move or fight anymore. "Maybe its better this way" she thought, tears streaming down her cheeks as she allowed her face to touch the cold tiled floor. And suddenly there it was. The needle.

She extended her arm, just enough to reach it, but once again the ringing on her phone interrupted her actions. "One last time", Ariadne told herself, sliding her finger across the screen.

"Ariadne? Ariadne? Can you hear me?..”

Silence. Silence overcame her.

“Please don’t do this to me.” screamed Zoi. “We can do this together. I am on my way to your flat. Just hang in there for me”.

Somehow her sister's words didn't comfort her. Ariadne was too far gone. Her mind, broken and tired had given up. Her chest felt compressed. Entombed but alive she raised her arm and brought the needle closer, the cold pin touching her skin, piercing her forcefully before she let her eyelids rest and allowed her being to be taken, at least for a moment, by pure bliss.