Prose

A cloud grew over me—a cumulonimbus. It was dark. I made no noise as I crouched in bed. I was hiding under the covers. The door was locked. The lights were off. I could feel the air getting hot as I breathed in the air I had breathed out a second ago. I was hiding under the covers. There was limited oxygen. I began to find it hard to breathe.
The cloud was not pretty. It was not happy. It was a dark, ugly cloud. It made no noise. But I knew it was there. It had the dark, ugly grey of a cumulonimbus cloud. I hated it. I hated it was there. But for some odd reason I had a feeling I had summoned it here.
Under the covers. I was crouching, my head on the pillow and my legs bent up and my arms hugging them. My glasses were somewhere. I don’t know. I lost it in the rain.
My eyes were wet and my upper lip was salty and I, I, well I was under the cumulonimbus. I hated it was under it and I hated myself for being there. I hated.
Yet for some reason, I wanted it to be there. Some dark pit of my stomach, some dark pit that had summoned the cumulonimbus—that dark pit wanted it there. It wanted that cumulonimbus lingering, it wanted it looking over me. So I secretly wished it to stay. And it did.
I felt weak, and I hated that I felt weak. Crouching so pathetically under the covers. Under the cumulonimbus.
I had locked the door. I was wallowing, I was pounding myself and letting myself get hit by the lightning, the rain, of the cumulonimbus. And I didn’t mind. I didn’t like it. But I didn’t mind. I let it bruise my skin and my heart. I let it rip my hair out and poke at my eyes. That cumulonimbus. I didn’t mind.
The room was dark, so I had no sense of place. I was in my room. But I was under the cumulonimbus. I was here. But I didn’t want to be. I didn’t want. To be. I wished myself a lightning from that cumulonimbus that would strike me down. It would strike me down and I wouldn’t be able to help myself or get up. I secretly wished that. I wouldn’t mind.
Crouching in my bed. I was shaking, a soft rhythm of tears. It was not loud. It was not soft. It had anger and remorse and sorrow and guilt. I let myself be washed by the acid rain of the cumulonimbus. It stung. It felt good.
It hit me again that I was, indeed, under that cumulonimbus which I had somehow summoned, I think. Suddenly I hated it. A minute ago I didn’t mind. But now I hated it. I hated myself for calling it.
Under the cumulonimbus, cursing at it, yet secretly wishing it to stay, I scratched myself. I scratched a small patch of my arm, my inner arm, under my wrist. At first it was a scratch. A few raindrops. Then I scratched harder. A downpour. I scratched until I couldn’t feel my arm. I scratched until it stung. I scratched until I could no more. I was afraid to turn the lights on. I didn’t want to look at my arm. I didn’t want to be under the cumulonimbus. That cumulonimbus. Why did I call it?
Yet I secretly wished it to stay.
Holding my wrist in pain, I cried. I cried until there was no tears left. I cried until all I felt, all that was left, was the soft throbbing in my left wrist.