cautionary tale

there was a girl who cried easily, often, and in public. sometimes it was uncontrollable, sometimes she did it to garner sympathy or prove a point. she wanted to express her passion in some way but was too timid to do it through art or love or adventure. she watched people in her dance class balter and groove and throw themselves into the air, but all she could do was something she'd choreographed beforehand, and when it was over she froze. she watched dancers onstage, fearless and weightless and mythological, and she cried not only for their beauty but for the supposed fact that she could never achieve the same.

she didn't apologize for her bad behavior in a timely manner for shame she wouldn't find the acceptable, convincing words.

she watched people in her school cafeteria kiss shamelessly and scoffed at them, secretly wishing she could take that risk.

she watched people at skate parks make friends with each other out of nowhere as she passively bounced her knee on a bench, hoping to be talked to.

she heard other people call themselves unstoppable, beautiful, fierce, and called them obnoxious with her own covert vanity.

she had a thousand vignettes where her own timidity kept her constrained and crying at her own feebleness. often she dreamt of how she would've done situations differently. while everyone else sat at the front of the ship, she sat at the back and watched the wake fade behind. sometimes she'd join the others to watch the horizon and dream of times ahead, where she one day wouldn't be ashamed of herself, or freeze up instead of dancing, or communicate her wishes and woes and apologies. she dreamed that she was someone with something to offer instead of to take, that she was someone who took risks and kissed without regret. but when the curtains came down and class was dismissed and her lunchbox was closed, she was once again the cautionary tale of the one who failed by not trying.