Inner Demons

There are times I'm scared of the dark. Now that it's the Chinese Seventh month, there's all these horror movie trailers on TV, and all the radio djs keep telling horror stories AT NIGHT... it's even worse.

But, I guess, what's worse than being afraid of the dark is being afraid of loneliness.

Because, even if I DO see scary long-haired women in white standing at a corner of my home... I know that they can do me no harm.

But loneliness... it has a vice-like grip. It tightens on your throat, till you start choking. For some weird reason, your heart starts palpitating. And you get throttled by this loneliness. This fear that your family is slipping away from you.

I used to scoff at my mom for "feeling lonely". I said it was "her fault" for not having friends, for not getting out more, for not getting a job.

But tonight, I realised that I need my family more than I thought I needed them.

I feel my brother slipping further and further. And though we talk more now, although we are both trying our best to work at this relationship, it just feels as though we are delaying its' inevitable death.

My mom and I? I think that relationship died the moment my dad died.

The last thread which is holding my family together has finally started to unravel as well.

Now, I silently call out to God, in the emptiness of the shell of my home.

And cry desperately.