"i'm a hostage to my own humanity, self-detained and forced to live in this mess i've made"

-be my escape, relient k

Emotions, I found, were like tornadoes.

There was always a way of predicting what would come next, simply because there was always a cycle. Hurt. Despondence. Apathy. Anger. It was like being drawn into the eye of the tornado, where everything culminated into a one-track clarity and stillness that screamed for me to hurt.

It was a sort of anger that was difficult to name or describe, because it was so much and yet nothing at the same time. In the eye of the tornado, I wanted nothing but to take out everyone around me - consequences be damned. It was a lust to hurt others as I had hurt, all the while loathing both myself and the wretched world I had been born into.

The voices of those I hurt in the process screamed around me, howling in my ears in a desperate plea for me to stop, please stop, but I couldn't. I was suspended in the eye of the tornado, fuelled by the thirst for blood, until eventually I was yanked back into reality and my actions came crashing back down to me.

That was when my voice chimed as one with everyone else, pleading, howling, screaming, crying for me to stop, please stop, because this wasn't who I was.

I hated it so much, yet I always found myself dancing to the music of the doomed, twirling and jumping headfirst into what could only spell disaster. But then again, I had condemned myself from day one, when I lost myself to the judgement of others.

So, really, the only person I could blame was myself.

===

"Rather drastic, don't you think?" Katrina drawled, raising an eyebrow and gesturing to the board. "As far as I know, no one's crossed us as of late."

I shrugged, eyes empty as I surveyed the classroom.

There was a tense air of mistrust, and most people were huddled away from people they usually considered their closest friends. Of course, all that could be attributed to me, considering the pages I had put on everyone's desks.

Pages that exposed the darkest secrets and betrayals of the people they considered to be as good as family.

The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb, but who was to say that people of the same blood couldn't turn on each other?

It was, after all, our human nature and what we had done for years.

"I'm a drastic person," I said. "And this is what drastic people do."

Katrina laughed, shaking her head.

"I see." She cocked her head, eyes cool, and didn't say anything more.

===

"I warned you not to hurt Asher."

I looked up, meeting Georgia's furious glare with indifference.

"No, actually, you didn't," I said. "It's none of your business what happens between us. As far as I know, I didn't hurt him."

It was probably a bad idea to antagonise Georgia, considering what she knew about me. But rage blinded me, and all I wanted to do was one-up Georgia. I often forgot that I was the one in control, and not her.

"Do I look like I give a rat's ass?" She laughed, a shrill noise that grated on my nerves. "Don't forget what I know, Felicity. When I say stay away from Asher, I mean it."

"Do excuse me for what I'm about to do next," I smiled sweetly. "Actually, wait, don't excuse me. As you said, I don't give a rat's ass what you think."

"You-"

"Ah, ah, don't say a thing," I cut her off. "I don't think you have the right to say anything, considering you and Chase fucked yesterday. Rather conniving of you, taking advantage of him while he was piss-drunk. I do applaud you for your scheming."

There was a moment of shocked, tense silence among the five of us.

Then, everything burst into a flurry of motion.

Georgia began trying to explain herself and apologise, while Eugenia rebutted each of her sentences with cold rejection. Katrina was laughing so hard she looked as if she was about to fall to pieces, while Irene simply watched in amusement.

I win.

I stood up and walked out of the cafeteria. I wouldn't be missed anyway.

===

I groaned, letting my face fall forward onto the pages of the textbook. It had been over an hour, and I was still stuck on the same chapter. The pages were littered with notes in red, blue, black and just about every colour conceivable, but everything I had learnt seemed to fly out of my head the moment I quizzed myself.

"Have you not progressed at all?"

I whipped around, rubbing at my face self-consciously in case some ink had come off onto my skin.

"No," I replied, the lie slipping from my mouth easily. "I'm just going through this chapter again, because it's a bit more content-heavy."

"Right," Daniella looked disbelieving. "Anyway, your father is coming home tonight. I have to go out for a while, but I expect the house to be cleaned by the time I'm back. You're preparing dinner as well."

I couldn't help the groan that slipped past my lips, and from the way Daniella's eyes narrowed, she had heard too.

"What are you moaning about?" She snarled. "Am I asking you to scale Mount Everest? No. This is nothing compared to the work I usually do, so stop giving me attitude. Do something useful instead of sitting around and being good-for-nothing."

Something inside me snapped.

"I'm trying my best!" I yelled. "I try my best every single day, but all you do is rail at me and make me feel even worse than I already do! I get tired too, you know? Stop making it out like I'm indebted to you or something!"

"Well, you are indebted to me!" She shrieked. "I brought you into this world, I spent hours in that accursed room trying to give birth to you, I put up with your whinging day-in and day-out! You're obligated to listen to me!"

"You never wanted me anyway!" I screamed. "You've never shown me that you love me, you've never even loved me in the first place! I'm just a burden, a hindrance to you! I am in no way indebted to you, because you don't give a damn about me!"

Daniella's eyes widened in horror.

"How did you find out?" She whispered, aghast. There was no apology, no denial, nothing. Just disbelief, as if I wasn't worthy of anything more than you shouldn't have found out, you should've been too stupid to figure it out.

"The walls have ears," I shook my head, a bitter smile forming on my face. "Just leave. I don't want to talk to you anymore."

"If-"

"I know, okay?" I interrupted, ignoring the painful twinge in my heart. "I know. You don't have to keep reminding me of how I messed up. I know. I know, I know, I know."

"Why did you turn out this way?" Daniella looked defeated. "I didn't raise you to be this way. I didn't raise you to hate me."

"No, you didn't," I smiled ruefully. "I changed, as everyone does. And even though I changed, I can't hate you. I will always forgive you, I will always come back to you, and I will be here, even though you don't want me to. Is that not the duty of a daughter?"

My duty. It was always back to my duty. As a daughter, as a ruler, as people I didn't know how to be and couldn't be. They were right. I was just a little girl playing dress-up, trying to be someone I wasn't and do things I didn't have the capability to do.

There was no smoke without fire, after all.