For Whom the Belle Tolls

by Jaysea Lynn

Trying to live. Trying to die, once. Trying to be kinder. Trying to be worse. Trying to make an impact. Trying to not make things worse. Trying to love better. Trying to heal. Trying.

Beauty feeds the soul, my sweet boy. It takes many forms, some of them obvious, like a flower in bloom or the laughter of a child, but sometimes it is hidden, though it is never absent. Find beauty.

Seeing herself as unimportant was safe. Unimportance was safe, being a disappointment was safe. There were no expectations, no standards, no more pedestals to fall from.

It had gutted her when the community she’d always known, the community she’d always believed would be there for her, had thrown her away when she’d dared to ask uncomfortable questions about God’s grace, especially after she’d read the book of Job. When she’d gone to them for help after her assault. When she had the audacity to be different, listening to secular music and reading fantasy books, something acceptable at home but not in the church. The unconditional love she’d been told to expect had had some conditions after all.

How many times had she told her friends that no one’s opinion of them mattered more than their own? She’d cheered for them as they learned to care for themselves, to see themselves as wonderful and flawed and complicated and unique, convincing herself that while others deserved to take up space in the world, she was inherently too much, required too much space and effort.