How I Live

I am a secret, the shadow is a lie, and the knife is the bridge between us.

How I live

 

I felt it, you know. There was a coarse wind blowing around me. It was chilly, heavy... and it made me lose my breath with every gust.

 

The words tumbled out of my mouth and into the ears of the thing standing behind me. A shadow without a face; a pale image of an entity I was told by some force to trust.

 

I was kneeling on the cold stone floor, with every secret I held within me spilling forth like a flood. I didn’t know that with every secret I told, the string holding the knife dangling over my back grew thinner and thinner.

 

I told the faceless shadow of my life, my love and my hopes. I told it those things because I felt"and this was a feeling I was told was true"as though there was no way they would betray my trust.

 

Loss? They knew.

 

Failures? The knew.

 

Breaking points? They knew.

 

Weaknesses? The knew.

 

They knew everything.

 

The winds were growing heavier now, and my body grew weaker with the force holding me down.

 

The knife scraped gently against my back, nudging me with false encouragement whenever I faltered. They had to know and I had to tell them.

 

“You promise you won’t tell?” I ask, my voice but a whisper in the wind.

 

They didn’t reply, but for some reason I was compelled to understand that they would keep the promises they never made.

 

So I spoke, the string grew thinner, weaker… the knife continued to nudge against my back.

 

“Don’t tell anyone, but…”

 

And so it started again. The never ending cycle… and it didn’t take much for me to realize how false everything seemed… but what could I do? I was a secret, and the shadow was a lie, and the knife was the bridge that held us together.

This was how I lived.

 

“You promise you won’t tell?”

 

Author's Note

How many of us backstabbed? Told a secret we swore to keep? Had it done to us? I'll be honest, I have both done it and had it done to me. That's why I decided to write this story; it's one of the many evils that connects society together.
Reviews=motivation!! :)

-Mila

Reviews

[Taylor]

This made me hold my breath! it felt as though I were in a cyclone, being sucked into the vortex, building, building so eloquently and devastatingly. So much packed in, so truthful about the lesser nature of human beings. This story is very poetic and gives real pause for thought. Superbly written.

[Mila]

Thank you!!

[Mr_M]

A necessary evil. I love that idea of the knife being a bridge between ends of the spectrum. I was hooked from the get go.

'I was a secret, and the shadow was a lie, and the knife was the bridge that held us together.'

All good short stories leave an impression and this one is no different. Well done.

[Mila]

Thank you very much! :)

[Mayank]

It was like a short movie with powerful imagery, intense at the same time.

[Mila]

Thank you!!

[Riley Justine]

Wow. Such a thought-provoking and inspiring piece. You are a really amazing author, Mila. The messages you bring out in all your writing are impressive. This piece is impressive. Really well penned

[Mila]

Thank you so much!! :)