"I was sick of letting the world run me so I decided to run the world."
~~~
Isabelle Cane was taken from her family at 6 months old, leaving behind 7 older brothers and a twin sister. In the 12 years she's been away, Izzy has faced hardships no chi...
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They tell you patience is a virtue. That good things come to those who wait. They tell you your time will come, that everything will fall in place when it's supposed to. They say everything happens for a reason. I've been patient for years. For almost all of life, in reality. Patient with my mother, patient with my classmates, patient with the world. And still, none of them have ever treated me better.
My time for the ease, simplicity, and joy everyone else got to have has yet to come, even after all these years of undeterred patience. For a long time, I thought it was unfair. Or maybe I still did. But for most of my life I was angry about it. Fed up and tired of waiting for an ideal that had failed me time and time again.
But eventually I got tired of waiting. I got sick of wallowing in the unfairness of life I'd come to know so well and simply accepted things how they were. It was the first of many times I had accepted the inadequacies of the world for the sake of my own sanity.
But even with the acceptance I'd given all those years ago, there were times when I still found myself waiting. Times when I would beg and plead with the universe to give me the kindness and ease I so desperately wanted. And every one of those times, my patience has been as futile as the last. But that never stopped me the next time. And it seemed it wouldn't this time either.
I'd been lying in bed for over an hour, my eyes shut and my body as still as a corpse, thinking and making silent pleas of the universe that perhaps my years of patience may finally do me some good. I begged shamelessly to whoever may have been listening to the desperate words filling my brain. I hadn't dared to open my eyes, fearful that when I did, I would come face to face with the very source of my dilemma.
Other than a few short instructions from my oldest brother, me and Tyler hadn't spoken a word to each other since last night. I couldn't decide if it was because I didn't know what to say or because there was nothing to say at all, but either way, we'd barely looked at each other since we'd left the porch. Guilt ate at me. Had been eating at me since the door slammed behind Tyler last night.
He'd said he loved me. Said it twice, actually. And I hadn't said a word. Hadn't even made a sound. The look on his face still haunted me. It was burned into my brain like a branding on a cow. He'd been hurt. Hurt by me. It was an alien notion that I could cause someone else pain, and by the way it made me feel, I was content to keep it that way. I couldn't face him. Not last night, and not yet today, even if I could see the morning light streaming in through the glass door leading to the porch.
I'd been making my silent pleas while pretending to be asleep for the last hour or so. It was an act of fruitless patience, or maybe just plain denial, but whatever it was, it kept my eyes anchored shot, and my body still as cement. It was times like this when I was grateful for my lack of hearing. It was easier to pretend to be asleep when nothing could technically wake you up.
A part of me didn't want to get up at all. Wanted to stay in bed, and wither away in my own sorrow until the universe succumbed to the weight of my unwavering patience. But another, denser part of me, was all too aware of the inevitable discomfort that was headed my way, and wanted to get it over with. It would only make things worse if I left them alone for too long. And considering I was up before the crack of dawn most days, it might seem suspicious if I stayed asleep for too long.
