Sometimes I Lie

by Alice Feeney

Once satisfied that everything is safe and secure, I go to leave the kitchen, lingering briefly in the doorway, wondering if today is a day when I might need to turn back and begin the whole routine again. It isn’t.

Love a fellow ocd queen

I fix a smile on my face before stepping into the office and reminding myself that this is what I do best: change to suit the people around me.

People are not mirrors—they don’t see you how you see yourself.

My eyes do that sometimes: focus on a person’s imperfections, momentarily forgetting that they can see me seeing the things they’d rather I didn’t.

Although I am frightened, some primal instinct tells me that I will get through this. I will be okay, because I have to be. And because I always am.

My new form teacher seems nice. When Mum meets her, I bet she’ll say, “Mrs. MacDonald likes her food, doesn’t she?” Mum says that sort of thing a lot, it’s her way of saying someone is overweight. Mum says it is important to look your best, because even if people shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, they still do.

I’m picking the skin off my lip again. I stop, irritated by my lack of self-control, and rub my lipstick-stained fingers on the cloth of my dress. Red on red. I must try harder not to be myself.

Phone. Wallet. Keys.

She just like me fr

Something inside me is broken, I’m quite sure of it—my punishment for something that happened a long time ago.

For such carefully chosen words, they sounded all wrong. Empty and false. I suppose it was because I’d been caught off guard. When it comes to difficult conversations, I like to be prepared. I like to play them out in my head beforehand, consider all the possible lines that might be spoken and rehearse the answers I will give, until they are polished and learned by heart. Practice doesn’t make me perfect, but people are more likely to believe me when I have.

Claire is the kind of person who sees what she wants to instead of what’s actually there.