“Damn it, how will I ever get out of this labyrinth?”




- Simón Bolívar



“I HATE YOU,” I screamed at my mom as I slammed my room door shut in a rather advanced form of teenage angst. I didn't exactly hate her per se, but I did hate her boyfriend. Then I remembered that she allowed this to happen to me, allowed him to happen to me, and then I sort of began to hate her. I didn't know why I blamed her, but I did, and the more I thought about it the angrier I became. In my state of mind I didn't want reasoning, I wanted to be allowed to be hateful. I wanted, in this moment, to be right. I wanted to be in control of my life and what I felt.

Now, I've seen a lot of jerks in my day – after all, I am in high school – but I have never encountered someone who is as big of a jerk as my mom's boyfriend. For a reference, this guy once performed the Heimlich on someone, and for the next two whole days he couldn't talk about anything but about how that person probably would have died if someone there didn't know what they were doing. Sure, performing the Heimlich on someone is worthy of acknowledgement, and he probably did save the guy, but the way he acted so full of himself afterwards just made me want to throw up. If I ever choke, I would just as soon die than let him do the Heimlich on me and give him the power to proclaim that he “saved me,” like he was the freaking Messiah or something. That was another thing about him, he was always shoving his exclusive religious ideas and beliefs down everyone's throat, not caring a bit about how uncomfortable he was making them. I mean, I was religious, but not that religious. Anyway, if I ever let him do the Heimlich on me, he would probably rub it in my face for the rest of my life. He always had a way of hitting you right in the gut with his words, especially if you ever got into an argument with him, which is exactly why I am currently an emotional train-wreck, feeling sad, angry, frustrated, and somehow at the same time, numb.

This argument was the argument to end all arguments. I had never been so heated, and I had never seen him so heated. But what really irritated me was that about halfway through, he just dropped his whole side of the argument and said, “Well at least I care about your mom.” As if I didn't! The nerve of that guy! Unfortunately, being the reserved person I am, I felt that I had no option but to just stand there in shock, the stability of my person dissipating like clouds fragmenting in the night sky.

I locked my door and jumped onto my bed, contemplating what to do about this guy ruining my life. I was always locked up in my room nowadays, just to stay away from him. It's funny how I couldn't show my face in my own house without wishing I hadn't been born. If only he would get out of my life. I had told my mom that once before, but no, if I wanted her to be happy, I would just “deal with it.” Needless to say I found the notion that it was acceptable for me to suffer for the sake of her being “happy” to be crazy; especially because she wasn't happy. And neither was I. In fact, I saw everything in my life crumbling down because of my emotional state; grades, relationships, friends, and even my self-esteem. I needed to get away.

I got up and looked under my bed, ignoring the large accumulation of dust which looked like sad, gray snow adorning that stretch of rarely-seen floor. I was kind of like that floor, in a way. I was also ignoring my mom and her yelling at me to open my door and how if I didn't she would have her boyfriend take it off of its hinges. I reached over to retrieve an item that I had been saving for an occasion such as this one. I laughed quietly to myself, thinking, she thinks unhinging the door will affect me? My life has already been unhinged, a shallow wake of what it once was. And it was true. I was done with being stuck in this labyrinth, and I knew the way out. I grabbed the item, a knapsack full of my most precious possessions. I had prepared this knapsack years ago when I had the intent of running away, but I figured my life here was necessary as I couldn't provide for myself. Now I was older and that had changed. I dusted off some gray snow and checked the contents of the knapsack. I added a few items; a bottle of water, books, and some cash that I had accumulated; I didn't believe in banks. I grabbed a notepad and a pen, and in the style of runaway teens, wrote a comprehensive letter about why I was leaving and where I planned to go (which I didn't know yet, to be honest). I included that I loved my mom and that she wasn't the problem; I would take my phone and she would be welcome to keep in touch as often as she wanted to. I didn't mention that I blamed her. I was never one for burning bridges. I snuck to my window, slid it open, popped the screen out, and jumped the mere three feet to the ground. I got to thinking about what would hapen if she never found my note, like if she just gave up on me and assumed that I had become a primitive caveman, residing solely in my room. I figured that eventually she would have the door broken down and that's how she would discover my note. I really wasn't up to thinking about anything, though. I just felt engulfed by freedom, by myself, by everything possible. And then, for some reason unbeknownst to me, I began to cry. I just sat right there on the ground outside my window and cried. I didn't even know why. I didn't know what or why or how and I didn't care, because I could finally be me and be free.

Once I had gained my composure, I got up, and began to walk without any particular destination in mind. My destination didn't matter; now it was only the journey I was going to create for myself. I would go wherever the wind would take me, like a delicate piece of paper floating around the world. As I walked, the sun over my shoulder, I could hear in the growing distance, expressed in a now distinctly irritated scream, that my mom was losing her patience. I was glad to be getting away from that place. I wouldn't look back. I will never forget the feeling I had, I would never succumb. I would just continue, out of this labyrinth, and allow myself to be engulfed by my life anew.