Growth by Kat Coffin
Murmurs again and again and again:
What do you think you are doing? You aren’t good enough. You are not smart enough. Why can’t I do anything right? I am never going to be better than that girl. Why am I not prettier, smarter….
Suddenly a fever washed over her body. She fell through shadow until falling felt as like floating. Then as if walking on clouds and still the voices continued their roaring. Then she was running on glass, her steps echoed louder and louder. A flash of heat rushed through her limbs and hurried her steps down a glass corridor to a courtyard lit by sunlight and covered in earth. A cold filled the air, hushed the ground and compelled her to forget this place.
Peeking through the soil the leaves of a sprout just opened, with a stem lined in thorns. She stared at the growth while the voices echoed louder, a horrid ringing in her ears.
The fever came again, this time willing her toward the weed. She knelt, the cold grasping her knees, but the fire came swiftly rushing through her hands commanding her to dig. She clawed at the soil and the earth forced its way under her nails spreading a dampness to subdue the fever. She could not stop. The need to unearth the sprout called her beyond reason. She would not stop even if Death came for her now.
The thunderous murmurs were unrelenting as her nails gave to a firmness in the earth. She dug and cleared a path to the weed, to its roots reaching deep to escape her. The understanding coming: the leaves, a façade to its roots, where its strength and will and might lie. And so, she stood, her hands on the stem, the thorns taking hold and drawing blood but she continued to cling to it. She threw herself into upheaving this infection from her soil. Her insides ached and heat spread through her body and limbs. She let out a piercing cry and her vision blurred. Throwing her body back with all her weight, she pulled again. The sound of ripping cloth boomed as the roots breaking — released and she fell.
Quiet settled around her and her fever broke.
She looked down at the growth, this weed, in her hand and watched it shrivel.
