His & Hers

by Alice Feeney

There is a difference between being and feeling alone, and it is possible to miss someone and be with them at the same time.

We rarely deserve the lives we lead. We pay for them however we can, be it with money, guilt, or regret.

what good is trying to tell the truth about the world when I can’t bear to be honest about my own story: who I am, where I came from, what I’ve done.

Patience is the answer to so many of life’s questions.

Silence is my favorite symphony; I can’t think clearly when life gets too loud.

There are some things we only hold on to because of who gave them to us: names, beliefs, scarves.

I was with her last night.

Sometimes I think I am the unreliable narrator of my own life. Sometimes I think we all are.

Anxiety often screams louder than logic, and when you spend too long imagining the worst, you can make it come true.

Clothes don’t make the woman, but they can help disguise the cloth we are cut from.

Sometimes I find the only way to ease the worst forms of pain is to damage myself in a different way. Distract my attention from the things that can and will break me. A little hurt to help me heal.

We are a species capable of horrific acts, and incapable of learning from the lessons our own history tries to teach us.

When you witness the horror and inhumanity of human beings close up, every single day, it permanently changes your perspective.

person’s voice is like a wave—some just wash right over you, while others have the power to knock you down and drag you into an ocean of self-doubt. The sound of her speaking makes me feel like I’m drowning.

I think when we finally get what we think we want, it loses its value. It’s the secret nobody ever shares, because if they did, we would all stop trying.

Loneliness can shrink a person in more ways than one.

grief is always sharpest at the point of impact.

Angry, fat drops of water relentlessly slap the windshield before crying down the glass like tears.

She’s learned to hide her anxiety from others, but I know worry makes her world go round.

Home is not always where the heart is. For people like me, home is where the hurt lives that made us into who we are.

There are things children choose not to see in their parents; sometimes it is best to walk past a mirror without stopping to look at your reflection.

but it was what they both wanted: to give me the start in life that neither of them had. For me, it was the start of a lifetime of not fitting in.

She let out a breath, as though the silence were a note she’d been made to hold too long.

I’ve learned over the years that whether those decisions are right or wrong, is often secondary to the ability to make them in the first place. Besides, “right” and “wrong” are highly subjective.

People don’t know what real love is until they lose it. Most never find it in the first place, but when you do, you’ll do anything for that person.

You can’t help someone find their way if they won’t admit they’re lost.

dropping a child off to spend a night with their grandmother should have been a safe thing to do.

Sometimes we hold on too tight to the wrong people, until it hurts so much we have to let go.

Sometimes I think people change their expressions just to give their faces something to do. A smile doesn’t mean someone is happy, just like tears don’t always mean someone is sad. Our faces lie just as often as our words do.

Not all broken moral compasses are beyond repair. Some can start to work again with an ethical shake from another person. We all travel alone inside our own heads, but it is possible to navigate someone’s intentions north of bad and south of wrong. People can change, they just tend to choose not to.

The sting of loneliness is only ever temporary, like that of a nettle. If you don’t scratch at the solitude, it starts to feel normal again soon enough.

Losing someone you truly love always feels like losing a part of yourself.

I was screaming for help in the dream, and now my throat hurts, as though I might have been screaming in real life.

I was sure I had sat on the bed eating snacks and drinking alone last night, but that must also have been a dream.

I always remember the sound it made when Rachel took a photo of me. Clickety-click. Clickety-click. Clickety-click.

When I come back out into the bedroom, the photo catches my eye again. It is faceup, even though I could have sworn I turned it over. And that isn’t all. Someone has used a pen to mark a black cross over Rachel’s face.