Ever since I can remember I have always been afraid. Afraid of the dark. Afraid of the monsters under my bed. Afraid I am nothing but a waste of space... And over the years it never really went away. Life went on as life does but I got stuck in one place. Some would say I got caught up in a pit and forgot how to climb out again. I became all I had and everyone else was pushed out of my small place of safety so nobody could see anything. I suppose in a way I was paralyzed. I didn't want anyone there for me, I told myself I didn't need anyone, I was enough for me. I was strong enough to face the monsters under the bed on my own. I never knew how wrong I was until the fateful day everything I thought I knew changed. What I had deemed to be solid was shaken to the ground and collapsed when the first stepped into my life. The first was a creature unlike any other I had ever met. They were quiet but their words drove like a nail through my fear though emotions they knew not, and for a time I climbed out of the pit and walked on solid ground with them by my side. Stability can only last so long though before it collapses upon itself again and I crumbled into dust with it. The first stayed by my side but no longer did they have the power they had in the beginning and their words were forgotten and brushed to the side. Then came the second. The second was unlike the first, loud and bubbling with feelings that spilled over with every moment of their existence, but they were gentle, and as I did the first, I let them into my broken bubble of existence and let them speak to my fearful heart and I escaped again. But all good things come to an end and even with two there I no longer could stand and I crumpled to the ground harder then ever before. They remained by my side every moment though nothing they said could break the bonds that bound me tight and as I did before in the past I pushed them away, the lie I could do this alone spilling over me once again. Helpless, they watched as I sank, drowning in a place where the monsters came for me from every side. No longer could I breathe. No longer could I stay afloat. No longer did the light but brush upon my face. I slipped soundlessly to the bottom, no longer fighting to breathe, no longer fighting for anything. My life was as hopeless to me as I once had thought... I was ready to surrender the fight, I had lost... But then came the third... He looked me in the eye and smiled. Then he spoke, and such was the love in his voice it overwhelmed me. "This is not where you belong child." He snapped the chains holding me and held me in his arms in the middle of the darkness that consumed me... and I cried. Broken, I cried until I had drifted off in the safety I felt in the thirds arms. I awoke again to find the darkness gone and no longer at the bottom of my pit. The hollowness inside me was gone, replaced by a fullness and a warmth unlike any I had ever known, and his voice whispered into my my mind, "...remember...you are loved...and because you are loved- you have every reason to fight..." I will not say since then I haven't sank. For nobody can walk through life without stumbling. I will not say it never hurts nor will I say I always believe I will make it through. I still lean on the first and the second sometimes, as they do when they need me as well, for that is our friendship at its heart. But I have changed. The things that used to make me fall I have grown stronger against and some I have learned to overcome. Not only now do I listen to the words from those that hurt to, but I let the words of the third speak through me when I feel at the cusp of end. Those words are the ones that give me strength to keep going. Those words are why I can still speak my story to you today. END (I'd love to know your guys's opinions on this bit of writing I did- (don't ask which character of mine these are because these are basically just unnamed characters like I had in 'Set Free' and the story is more for the emotional and metaphorical/symbolism pieces as I like to play with all three (yes I normally project such into poetry but I like writing short stories to heh))