A Chance at Something Never Meant to Be?

Are You There God? Because I Am Trapped.

You will not believe what happened! Well, I guess You will believe it. I mean, You're... You. But nevertheless, I must retell the whole event to You. See, the way I view prayers, they're almost like a way to talk to a friend. Because that's what I view You as, God. A best friend whom I can tell anything to. And You understand. At least, I can pretend that You understand. I never really am assured about really anything with You, God. I never seem to hear anything back from You, God. But I just keep believing that You're there. At least it's better than pinching my eyes closed at night when I lie in bed, hoping someone, anyone, hears my radiating thoughts. So I'm going to keep writing. And hope that You really are there.
Dad still hasn't given me back my lyrics. In fact, I don't know where they even are. I hope they aren't gone for good. Oh, I do more than hope, God. I'm telling You about them, isn't that praying? But the night he took them away, after talking to You, I wrote something else on a spare piece of paper from my math binder. It was the start of a new song:

I guess I found out you love me
Some time ago
The decision was made
But it wasn't by choice
And the consequences come out
When you looked down and smiled

Do you regret it?
Do you wish you didn't have to?
'Cause your love doesn't seem
As real as I would've liked
Loved

After that I had to stop, because my dad came in to say goodnight, and apologize for losing his temper. Before he made it to my desk, though, to keep up his assumption that I was working the last problems of that math homework he had explained, I quickly stashed the sheet of notebook paper somehow in my math binder.
Apparently, the next day at school, it had fallen out. Because today, my English teacher stopped me in the hall, and pulled me into her room while the other students were filing to their Connections periods. She told me that she had found that sheet of music in the hall, and had just happened to realize it had come from me, the last one tripping into History. She didn't tell me, and instead had read it. Then, today, while the other students were either involuntarily sweating in Physical Ed or getting educated on abstinence in Health, I got to spend two whole periods singing my heart out to Mrs. Mary. She's the only teacher that insists we call her by her first name, so I guess that's the first hint that she's something different. Also, she's quite a bit younger than most of the other teachers. When at first she asked me if I'd be willing to sing some of it for her, I panicked. But she gently and slowly coaxed the notes out of me. I sang the whole that had came to me lying in bed the night before, and she actually listened. She seemed genuinely interested! She gave me little bits and pieces of note changes and pitch advice. Turns out she had a minor in musical theater when she was in college. The second bell rang suddenly and startled us, so we quickly recorded what we had so far, and she said that she would speak to me tomorrow.
Lord, do You get why I'm so happy? Can You believe this? It seems so surreal! I feel like I finally have a chance out of that pipe that I'm wedged so tightly in. I actually have a little bit of breathing room right now.

I'm Trapped.

I Am The Underdog

I am The Underdog.
I am the one that is suppressed.
I am the one that is expected of neutrality because I have been nominated as the one most likely to put up with hatred.
I am the one that doesn't know if outbursting would be betrayal.
I am the one that screams inside, because anyone knows I couldn't, wouldn't, outside.
I am the one that is constantly being pushed down by those who believe they can do so much better than me.
I am the one who is afraid to admit that I am more than what the world thinks.
I am who is tired of being continuously belittled because I don't measure up to their superficial judgments!
I am the one who waits... Because I can't stand to imagine what would happen if I don't.
I am The Underdog.

I can't separate the lies from the truth. Only words are fed to me. And the occasional action when I'm needed. And the thoughts. I can hear all the thoughts. In the simplest of movements, I can see beneath their eyes, what they really think of me. What am I? Just a tool? Am I only someone to be summoned when needed, and discarded with use? And every time I seem to find someone that I can trust, whom I think I can trust, they simply press delete.

And now, I just still haven't learned. Now, I'm still tagging along. Saved as a distraction for targeted embarrassment, or as a procrastination tool, a way to work without working, or as a stuffed figure, used only for my presence. I haven't told anyone. Because I can't. What would happen if I did? I would get several various scoldings for overreacting and lectures of "This is not like you"s, but then they would forget, and I would go back to this. This. Crying in my sleep and slowly going insane.

So I console myself. I put all these things I would say, but never have, all the thoughts that I let pent up. I put them all down. They are my "Things Unsaid."

I'm Not an Idiot! Yeah... Right?

Are You There God? Because I am Trapped.

I didn't understand a thing that Mrs. Clerk taught in math today. It didn't make sense! I only saw numbers and lines and dots. Then, they would shift around in an unknown order and turn into another number. I went home and I asked my dad to help, because he's the best with math. In fact, he's an accountant at Suntrust. He's very proud that he was able to get the job, what with Indian stereotypes and all. But, when I asked him, he was dismayed to find how bad I was at computing the "simple" equations. His plain disappointment soon elevated to an anger, as I continued to be confused. Then, I noticed that he had started drawing out simple elementary number problems. That's when I started crying. He was treating me as if I was an idiot just because I didn't get one little pebble of concept in the glacier of math. He only stared at me and told me, "Stop crying, I'm only trying to help you." Of course, that only prompted me to cry even harder. I know that he's trying to help me. I get that. But, listen. I am the assumed smartest student in all of my classes. Because I'm from India. I have the highest average. I am not an idiot.
Did I mention that this whole scene was over one problem? I told him that I didn't completely understand her teachings that day in class, and he took that as a request to check the answers of the whole sheet. Turns out I had had some sort of an understanding of Mrs. Clark's teaching, as I had configured all of the problems right except for one, which was caused by a simple mistake. But he took it as if I had completely misunderstood something else we hadn't even covered in class. Expectantly, whatever he was lecturing me about through the problem I understood after a second glance, I had no idea of. But instead of understanding why I was absolutely flummoxed, he finally slammed the worksheet down on my desk and told me, "Your main priority right now is your academics. Get your head out of the clouds. Stop that ridiculous hobby of yours. Your singing is distracting you from your schoolwork!" The feeling was dreadful, with those word simply piercing my heart, leaving a metallic aftertaste in my mouth. With his thick Indian accent, and the way he was so intensified that he was spitting. It took all my urge not to wipe my face and furrow my brows in incomprehension at his words, for that would have been disrespect.
What happened next was what hurt me the most, God. He took my lyrics that I had been working on. He took my accumulation of thoughts, hums, and tunes over a total of seven years. Now he won't give them back. It's like he has confiscated my heart, God. My only hope is that he'll take the time to read them, and change the way he feels about this. I know that in his mind, he did what he believed You would have wanted him to. He did what he thought was best for me. He did it out of his love.
Just... Why doesn't it feel like it?

I'm Trapped

Hopeless Expectations and The Death of My Business

Are You There God? Because I am Trapped.

My life isn't my own anymore. Instead, I feel like a rag doll in that Apple game. I'm being fired from cannon to cannon, without any say-so, because my words are incomprehensible. For some reason, I have suddenly grown up within the short period of the last two years of my life. Now comes the never ending fretting about my so-called future. God, I've been skimming some of Your Word after Madeline invited me with her on Wednesday. Nothing much serious, just some famous verses Google provided. And it says not to worry. Why does it seem like everyone I am supposed to trust is an intense hypocrite when it comes to that? I am young! I want to scream it out to the world.
My parents have started piling up on me with ever more things to do. Especially since I told them about Wednesday night. My dad immediately ordered a stack of countless books comparing and contrasting religions. He says these are to strengthen my faith. That's not what I thought being a Christian was about, God. I thought it meant realizing I was really loved by You, and that the love that you had for me is everlasting. It meant having never ending joy because I know I am loved, and that I don't have to do anything for it.
Now it's my sophomore year and my parents have already hopelessly decided that I must go to Princeton. My GPA is a 3.98, but it isn't good enough. They pile on extra credit work, and I feel as if I am in a hard, narrow tube. It's hard and sturdy, and it isn't big enough to fit me, but I'm stuck in it, about waist deep. And with every book my dad plops for me to read, with every assignment my mom finds unsatisfactory, with every harsh comment to stop that ridiculous singing in the shower, with every hard lecture I have to sit through about time management, I feel as if it is a rock carefully balanced on my head. And with each rock, I sink deeper into the tube. It's too thin, and I am starting to have difficulty breathing. But I can't move. I can't give a sudden cry for help to pry me out of this pit of despair, because then the rocks will fall. And as the rocks fall, one tribute that I value goes with it. I try and wiggle to breathe better, and my mom's pride in me, that rock, it falls. I push against the sides, and my dad's hope that I can do great things, that rock, it falls. It falls, and I look down to where it falls to. My world is no longer there. Instead, there is a huge chasm, and I am suspended by seemingly nothing in this tube that I can't escape. The rocks fall, until they are out of sight. And I look at this tube I am held in, and for a second, I panic. I am placed in space, with nothing of support that I can see, feel, hear, or touch. But I am reminded that I have not fallen. Things may look very bleak, but I'm still managing to stand. And I realize, that invisible support, it is You, God. You are holding me up.

I'm Trapped.

Are You The Underdog?

I have seen The Underdog.
She is the one that is alone.
She is the one that others notice, yet ignore.
She is the one that is used.
She is the one that seems like too much of a hassle to help, so they don't.
She is the one that is so much like me, yet is still blind. Even she is.

I see her. The class is divided up into group projects. I am the only one that sees her ever so slightly cringe at the mention of her name with the other girls. Through the rest of the class period, she is the one doing all the work, while the others gossip. Wow, she's a great actress. Of course she laughs along with them, and sort of mentions, off to the side, that she's kind of doing everything. The others don't get it, do they? I see her, and for a moment when she doesn't realize I'm looking, I see her eyes flare with rage quickly. But she recovers herself. Because she is not known as that kind of girl. Oh, Underdog, I feel your pain, yet even you don't recognize me.

And I see her again. With her acclaimed best friend, the precious one. She treats The Underdog like trash. But oh, she's used to succumbing to others. So used to it that she doesn't notice that she should complain. She only tucks her bits and pieces of anger inside, deep down, to save. And when it grows too big, I know that she will explode.

I wait for the day that The Underdog is able to get her justice again. She's such an underestimated girl, if she truly speaks her mind, so many will be blown away. She has a voice. She doesn't realize it, but it is the most powerful.

But she has a somewhat idea. Maybe. I see those crumpled pieces of notebook paper, blue lines smeared from the tears she cries. She puts it all down, using that tactic we know so well to cling to sanity. Writing everything down, forcing secrets from pen. I find them everywhere. In the trash can where nobody else cares to look. Crammed in the edges of bus seats. Shoved in abandoned desks. I find them. I find her "Things Unsaid."

I Am The Trapped

I am The Trapped.
I am the one that hates my parents for not loving me in a way that I can comprehend.
I am the one that doesn't know if I should follow my heart or my path.
I am the one that can't stand the weight of the world thrust upon my shoulders by myself.
I am the one that wants to please my parents, yet with what I love.
I am the one that will not give up.
I am the one that is afraid to be unloved.
I am the one that doesn't know who to believe.
I am the one that is confused.
I am the one that knows that I know myself better than anyone else.
I am the one that is only understood by God.
I am the one that won't comprimise.
I am the one that is trapped.

I am trapped between working for my parents' love, yet never reaching that goal. I am trapped within the fear that I am a disappointment to the ones who birthed me. I can't decide whether I am more important, or the ones controlling me. I am trapped in this confining prison called time, where an evil monster called Overwhelment seeks to destroy my soul. I try so hard, yet seem to fail every time. I can never seem to measure up to that level of perfection that is expected out of me. I am expected to do whatever is said to be best for my future, yet what is my future? I am controlled by everyone but me. I am trapped into feeling like I will never break free.

I am in love with singing. It is the only place where I can perform without having a fear of not being recognized or downsized. The only place where I can not be judged, because everyone's opinion will differ. Yet, still, I am not allowed to enjoy that sense of freedom from judgment. I must steer along the right path for me, as everyone tells me. I must think about my future, and get my head out of the clouds. I must stop focusing on this simple "hobby" of mine and give it up. Because they tell me in that I will never measure up. But I am convinced otherwise. I know that if I never give up, I will succeed.

The only way that I can be understood, is when I reach out to the only person who understands everyone. When I ask the question, "Are You There, God? Because I Am Trapped."

Are You The Trapped?

I have seen The Trapped.
I see her, frantically rushing to complete everything on the level that she sets for herself, because she wouldn't be able to live with herself if it wasn't.
Inside, she is so scared of taking a single wrong step, that would send her whole tower of righteousness that she spent so long building tumbling down.
She doesn't know that I watch her, getting inside her mind.
I see her inner sigh, panicking in front of her computer. She fakes serenity, to reassure the ones that aren't watching.
One day, I heard her in the bathroom stall when the rest of the students were at Connections. She was singing softly to herself, being her only comfort to herself.
She's trapped inside her own, harsh evaluations.
I watch her struggling at her lockers, eyes and hands too uncoordinated to open it, because her mind itself is too far off. When it finally springs open, her books and work come tumbling out, and I see her near-let out frustration, the silent scream. But she regains it.
No one has noticed but me. And I notice one more thing.
A composition book, cow skin, as normal as possible, which she leaves behind.
I pick it up, again unnoticed.
The Trapped has a way to let out herself. In words. To the only One she trusts.
The Trapped writes her prayers, giving herself all up to God.

I'm that girl.

I'm that girl.
The girl that you don't notice at school, yet inside she's dying.
The girl that slinks down in her bus seat, feigning sleep but really listening.
The girl in school that is quiet in the corner, with an actual mind.
The girl with the unthinkable knowledge that is underestimated because of the hate in the world.
The girl that watches from the sidelines, because she is ignored.
The girl that cries in her dreams.
The girl that sees all. All that is hidden.

I have seen betrayals concealed under friendships.
The hatred concealed by love.
The fear concealed by confidence.
The souls concealed by hearts.
The thoughts concealed by words.
The pressure concealed by encouragement.
The need concealed by the want.

To some it will come as a slap in the face.
To some you will nod as you read, believing you are exempt from everything I say.
But everyone is guilty.
Some will not realize their own hypocrisy.
Some will not want to change, hanging on to their stubbornness like a child to his mother's skirt.

I have found my voice, and will finally reveal it all.
With every Character that I write with, with every word that I write.
This is my revenge.
I will reveal what I have seen.
For I have seen...
The Awful Truth.