Heart Pain

It's like watching someone you love die. But without the reassurance that their pain will be over. That they have gone on to a better place and are at peace.
Instead, I watch the slow withering death of a mother who has lost her children due to extraordinarily bizarre and disgusting circumstances.
A part of me dies with her. It's impossible to be so close to someone else's soul being eaten by a parasite, and not respond with visceral ferocity.
There are times I feel hate in my heart these days. It feels wrong there, it doesn't belong and it goes against my grain. I am a warm, fuzzy person. (Mostly. Just don't mess with my fur kids.)  I have never really, genuinely, wished someone ill.
Except this bitch in high school. She was an awful human being. She literally made friends with me but when boys liked me better than her she would get crazy jealous and angry. Perhaps it didn't occur to her that the near-constant sheen of oil on her forehead combined with an awkward, lanky frame was what kept throwing them off the scent.
(Hah! Burn! 15 years later and I still got it!) (Apologies. That was immature. But I'm leaving it in. Ha!)
At one point, she literally got so jealous of me she stole my boyfriend by offering to bang him. So she banged my boyfriend. You'd think that would be enough "revenge" right? Alas, she never changed her ways. It has to be said that her finest moment of all time was writing "Fuck Off Erin" on my locker.
Classy right?
(I'm trying to swear less but...editing would have weakened the depth of my teenage pain.)

I completely dissolved into tears by the way. In the middle of the busiest hallway in the school during passing time first thing in the morning. I confronted her and her minions, but couldn't even get the words out I was so upset. This girl had been nice to me. I literally could not wrap my head around why she would be nice to me if she hated me so much? Why go to the trouble? That kind of bullshit girl aggression had never occurred to me. She just stood there, looking down at the floor by the way. Then I went to my vice principal and he immediately had my locker painted. (Thank you Mr. Maccarone!)

It had happened to me on more than one occasion - girl aggression that is. But I never really fought back or sought revenge. It just wasn't in me. When girls said I was "fake" because I smiled a lot and was really nice to people (like, actual nice - quite possibly a foreign concept to some people) it actually genuinely hurt. So harsh people! Jeez!

Anyway, even with all that crap, which, when you're 17 is a really, really big deal I never wished any one those girls harm. Not even Skanky McBoyfriend-Banger. I just didn't see the point.

Regarding my earlier situation, however, the stakes are a million times higher. No one here gets to graduate and move on. High school is fleeting. The effects can last forever. But this train wreck of a situation? This has burned its way into my heart and left marks. I won't be shaking this off any time soon and you can damn well believe neither will those involved in this debacle.
I have never held hate in my heart but lately I have felt it surge a few times and I can't believe how angry I am capable of being.

I know, I know...Sigh.

Heh.