"I don't belong here".
That incessant thought kept racing through her mind, taunting her, making her heart beat faster and faster.
She could not identify what it meant, and why it was presenting itself at this time. She could not read what came before it, and she could not continue where it had stopped.
She tried breathing slowly. Inhaling long breaths and exhaling longer ones. But still, the panic that had taken possession of her soul would not cease.
It was not even a nightmare she had woken up from. It was not a moment of epiphany. It was a grilling, slow, relentless hum, that would not get louder, nor go mute. It was like the trickle of a faulty faucet, continuous, rhythmic, and incapable of ending.
She felt the prick of tears sting her eyes.
She had spent many years lost, floating like a dead fish on the surface of her life. Sometimes embracing the chaos, more times detesting it. She had searched for harbor after harbor; somewhere where she could finally throw her anchor and rest. But the more she searched, the more she withdrew, alienating herself from anything that was familiar or comforting.
Maybe it was her inflated pride, maybe it was her reluctance to fit in a pattern that did not have jagged corners. Maybe it was her restlessness, her endless desire for more, always more. Nothing, no one, and no where had ever quenched her thirst for more.
And now she lay, next to him, willing herself to want to stay more than she had ever willed herself to go anywhere. She had chosen him, with a wilderness in his soul similar to hers, a haunting hollowness she had recognized instantly the moment their eyes had met. She had thought their wanderlust would drive them together, not rip them apart. She had known their passion would spark stars to light the path for others. She had found her harbor, and thrown her anchor with all her might and force.
"I don't belong here".
"I do!"
She slithered her body closer and lay her head on his shoulder. Her breathing slowed down, and her heart stopped the hammering that had taken over her entire body.
She closed her eyes.
