Destroy Me (Shatter Me, #1.5)

by Tahereh Mafi

I have an extremely low threshold for disorder; it offends my very being. I shower regularly. I eat six small meals a day. I dedicate two hours of each day to training and physical exercise. And I detest being barefoot.

Sometimes I wish I could step outside of myself for a while. I want to leave this worn body behind, but my chains are too many, my weights too heavy. This life is all that’s left of me. And I know I won’t be able to meet myself in the mirror for the rest of the day.

“My opinions,” I say to him, quietly this time, “should not so easily break your own. Stand by your convictions. Form clear and logical arguments. Even if I disagree.”

No one will speak to me as anything but the chief commander and regent of Sector 45. Friendship is not a thing I have ever experienced. Not as a child, and not as I am now.

She is a soft, deadly creature. Kind and timid and terrifying. She’s completely out of control and has no idea what she’s capable of. And even though she hates me, I can’t help but be fascinated by her. I’m enchanted by her pretend-innocence; jealous, even, of the power she wields so unwittingly. I want so much to be a part of her world. I want to know what it’s like to be in her mind, to feel what she feels. It seems a tremendous weight to carry.

I lost sight of my purpose and my greater goal; the entire reason I brought her on base. I was stupid. Careless. But the truth is, I was distracted. By her.

There’s something so personal about this journal; it looks as if it’s been bound together by the loneliest feelings, the most vulnerable moments of one person’s life.

It’s a strange thing, to never know peace. To know that no matter where you go, there is no sanctuary. That the threat of pain is always a whisper away.

We purchased lives confined within 1, 2, 3 stories already built, stories caught inside of structures we could not change.

But this is all a lie. The Reestablishment has no plans to move them. Civilians are caged on these regulated grounds; these containers have become their prisons. Everything has been numbered. The people, their homes, their level of importance to The Reestablishment. Here, they’ve become a part of a huge experiment. A world wherein they work to support the needs of a regime that makes them promises it will never fulfill. This is my life. This sorry world.

On the battlefield, I’m able to disconnect myself from the motions I’ve been taught to memorize. I’ve developed a reputation as a cold, unfeeling monster who fears nothing and cares for less. But this is all very deceiving. Because the truth is, I am nothing but a coward.

I’m well aware that the majority of my soldiers steal from our storage compounds. I oversee our inventory closely, and I know that supplies go missing all the time. But I allow these infractions because they do not upset the system. A few extra loaves of bread or bars of soap keep my soldiers in better spirits; they work harder if they are healthy, and most are supporting spouses, children, and relatives. So it is a concession I allow.

I’ve come to believe that the most dangerous man in the world is the one who feels no remorse. The one who never apologizes and therefore seeks no forgiveness. Because in the end it is our emotions that make us weak, not our actions.

People seldom realize that they tell lies with their lips and truths with their eyes all the time.

I’ve had an obsession with cleanliness for as long as I can remember. I’ve always been so mired in death and destruction that I think I’ve overcompensated by keeping myself pristine as much as possible.

I could live here, I think. Live where gravity does not know my name. Here I am unbound, untethered by the chains of this life. I am a different body, a different shell, and my weight is carried by the hands of friends. So many nights I’ve wished I could fall asleep under this sheet.

In one week my entire life has changed. My priorities, shifted. My concentration, destroyed. Everything I care about right now revolves around one person, and for the first time in my life, it’s not myself. Her words have been burned into my mind. I can’t stop picturing her as she must’ve been, can’t stop imagining what she must’ve experienced. Finding her journal has crippled me. My feelings for her have spiraled out of control. I’ve never been so desperate to see her, to talk to her.

I wait until he’s finally sitting down again before I take a sip. It’s a strange, obscenely bitter sort of drink; not at all what I expected. I glance up at him, surprised to discover that a man like Delalieu would begin his day by bracing himself with such a potent, foul-tasting liquid. I find I respect him for it.

Swallow the tears back often enough and they’ll start feeling like acid dripping down your throat.

I almost forget that she still hates me, despite how hard I’ve fallen for her. And I’ve fallen. So hard. I’ve hit the ground. Gone right through it.

Love is a heartless bastard. I’m driving myself insane.

Every nerve ending in my body is awake. I’ve never felt so alive or so desperate in my life, and I’m sure if she could hear what I’m thinking right now, she’d run out the door and never come back. Because I want her. Now. Here. Everywhere. I want nothing between us.

And I can’t help but be amazed at the power such small, unassuming animals wield over us; they so easily break down our defenses.

Our abilities are taken from the universe, from other matter, from other Energies. We are not anomalies. We are inevitabilities of the perverse manipulations of our Earth.