She glares at the ceiling, the patterns on the white washed surface, swirling with a mocking implication that her own mind is in a complicated array of colors reverting to dark reds, evil greens, sickening greys, and malicious blacks. Her heart feels tense, as if prepared to tear into two pieces. She knows this is impossible, but her mind wanders with thoughts of creating this terrible remembrance of her past, as if to mock her, to torment her, to knock her down just like they did so long ago. She remembers how it was in that school of hers--the teachers, the atmosphere, the students, especially the students--it was torture for her emotional, physical, and mental states. They were the reason why the colors followed her everywhere and why the imagination of her mind played out the different circumstances of what could have been.

It wasn't always that way. Usually the colors came to her in bright neon glows and dissipated when she wanted them to. She was exactly like that: vibrant and bright full of color with a serene and peaceful sense of the world through innocent eyes. There was a type of security behind her worldly barrier, like she was in a peaceful mindset of what would be for her when the real world came close to her walls. She knew what she wanted and she knew what she was going to do and that barrier would slowly be taken apart by her one piece at a time until she was ready to face the world. That was the most logical way she thought and she knew there would be forces trying to break that shell and was prepared to fight them off--or at least, she thought she was prepared.

That was before... before the shadows emanating from her classmates began to slowly swallow her barrier into a dark cloud of negativity. At first she couldn't tell, the colors still came in all their vibrancy with only a bit of dilution. It was only towards the end of her eighth grade year that it came in like a storm and nearly threatened to destroy her. The colors were her--they described her strength, values, and beliefs. It deteriorated and seemed to swallow up in a black hole of oblivion; her heart was strong, beating and alive, but her spirit was ill and dull in a piercing weakness. She was no longer capable of empathy, of thought, of motivation, or of heartfelt gratitude. Her eyes were clouded with slumber, her thoughts were filled with doubt, and her heart ached for expression. She was at her falling point, teetering on the edge of utter torture that seemed suicidal, but weren't. She swears by it--she values life too much to waste away or to let the demons inside (and outside for that matter) win.

She thought she had escaped from her miseries when she had graduated. It would all go back to normal--the colors would return and they would be vibrant and happy.

It seemed thought that the dark sphere that had entered her life had sucked away everything that led her to dispose herself of motivation. Her hopes, dreams, plans, and driven image of a bright future were dimmed and she was left to torment herself of the guilt and weakness that came with it. Her innocence was gone; her naivety was replaced with caution; her happiness and emotions were torn apart to broken pieces like those of complicated clockwork pieces--the gadgets, gizmos, turntables, switches, and nobs--all of them broken.

The colors were now trying to push her past the breaking point. They did not support nor assure anything for herself; they only brought further destruction. She was led to a dark part of the spectrum into one that seemed to tear at her soul—with her parents: yelling, fighting, screaming, pushing, and letting out every raw emotion she had when they tried to be of help, when they tried to bring her back; with others: silence. It was a huge hypocritical irony one that had torn the deeper part of the spectrum into two halves: She wanted to be silent with her parents; she wanted to tear the throats out of those around her who made her feel that same weakness and bitterness that had entered her life.

Her heart was tearing apart in another sad irony of heartbreak and sadness from the pain of happiness when it would appear before her on occasion for a visit, as if to torture her further as to be totally unattainable for her grasp. Her spirit was shattered where she could no longer care less what others saw her as, yet it contradicted herself for making her feel vulnerable, inferior to everyone else for trying to speak out; for trying desperately to reach out and find help. Crushing, aching, violent pain shooting through her that made her feel weightless when in truth it made her sink.

She longed for the companionship the colors once brought to her. She longed for the vibrancy of her emotions encasing her—assuring her that her actions were in the right path. She knew that if she brought them back, she would still never be that same little girl who had the colors float all around her; she would be a girl that had colors popping out from serendipitous moments in her moments, who said goodbye to her innocence, childhood, and all the simplicity that had surrounded her.

So, as she lays there in her bed, staring up at that blank, white ceiling in her room that seemed void of the colors in her life, she realizes that she had made it back. She realizes with shock that she had broken the barrier that had captured her into a current of turmoil and pain and that dark world. She realizes that all of her choices up until that moment have been because the diluted colors of her black sanctum pushed the buried light to come fighting back—within her subconscious thoughts.

It is a great epiphany, one that trickles slowly from the center of her core—a burst of orange, a shine of neon yellow—before exploding into a multitude array of crashing, brazing, and impulsive colors. They are much different than that of when she was a child—they were abstract rather than imaginative; more reasonable than impulsive; more mature than childish; more controlled than free. Despite the difference, she could feel herself healing, mending, repairing and evolving into something more substantial and efficient for the world she was in presently. She feels the strength, the love, the compassion, and the positivity that had come from her parents, her mentors, her friends.

As her eyes glaze over to enjoy the ecstasy of the colors—her colors—returning to her, she felt alive and whole again with maybe one or two crack in her heart and a slight dent in her mind, and maybe a slight rip in her soul…Still, she smiles and reminisces in the moment, capturing it in her memory before discovering that it will never go away.

And that’s quite fine with her because despite not feeling whole again, she feels more powerful and crucial to the world, and despite herself not feeling completely whole as before, she makes a rift in her memory—to never think of those days filled with darkness as a part of her that was weak…

Instead, she thought of it to be the mark of her power…

And the colors…one must never forget of the colors.