She was gone when I woke up. Violet, and the boxes too. After our conversation, she had seemed to want to stop talking, but we were still stuck together in the middle of a storm. We had positioned a box between us and leaned against the door frame of the building, then stared off at the flying debris. It had seemed to me that the howling wind would never let me rest, but I guess Cece's plan had been keeping me up during most nights.
I had really wished that the distraction from the storm would have kept Violet from hearing my sniffles. The storm was causing so much pain. It was taking me a lot to keep from straight out bawling, but her presence was silently commanding me to keep my noise to a minimum. She looked over at me every once in a while, then shook her head and stared resolutely away without saying a word. I could tell that she was not the type of person to pity me or sympathize with me. There are a few reactions to my excessive emotion. Most people treat me really nicely for the first couple of times I cry, then the options really start to diverge. People start ignoring it, start treating me like I'm glass, or start treating me like a baby. I hate all of the options. However, there is the rare person who is disdainful. They tell me to be stronger. I hate that, too, because they never understand that I'm different, that I can feel more than they. Yet, at the same time, they treat me like I can do better and that I'm not just something to be pitied, like a chipmunk with a broken leg. I could tell that Violet Cortez was this type of person. She didn't even say a word to me after our conversation.
Now, staring at the destruction all around me, I felt awful inside. Everyone, all over town, must have had their homes wrecked. Cars were upside-down, and signposts were horizontal. This... this was chaos. I looked over at my car. It had been fine just some hours ago. Now, there was a trash can which lay halfway in, halfway out of the windshield. Yet surprisingly, while looking at the demolished city all around me, I felt ok. It was as if Violet's presence had cast a spell on me. She had been hardened by her profession. I needed to toughen up. She had told me not to cry. I needed to listen to her. I could tell, just by looking at the ruins of my town, that the future would be as rough as the past few days had been, if not worse. I had to calm down and stop showing so much emotion. I knew that I'll always be able to feel it, but I needed to find a way to keep it to myself. And that's what I did, staring out at my ruined hometown without dampness in either eye.
I had really wished that the distraction from the storm would have kept Violet from hearing my sniffles. The storm was causing so much pain. It was taking me a lot to keep from straight out bawling, but her presence was silently commanding me to keep my noise to a minimum. She looked over at me every once in a while, then shook her head and stared resolutely away without saying a word. I could tell that she was not the type of person to pity me or sympathize with me. There are a few reactions to my excessive emotion. Most people treat me really nicely for the first couple of times I cry, then the options really start to diverge. People start ignoring it, start treating me like I'm glass, or start treating me like a baby. I hate all of the options. However, there is the rare person who is disdainful. They tell me to be stronger. I hate that, too, because they never understand that I'm different, that I can feel more than they. Yet, at the same time, they treat me like I can do better and that I'm not just something to be pitied, like a chipmunk with a broken leg. I could tell that Violet Cortez was this type of person. She didn't even say a word to me after our conversation.
Now, staring at the destruction all around me, I felt awful inside. Everyone, all over town, must have had their homes wrecked. Cars were upside-down, and signposts were horizontal. This... this was chaos. I looked over at my car. It had been fine just some hours ago. Now, there was a trash can which lay halfway in, halfway out of the windshield. Yet surprisingly, while looking at the demolished city all around me, I felt ok. It was as if Violet's presence had cast a spell on me. She had been hardened by her profession. I needed to toughen up. She had told me not to cry. I needed to listen to her. I could tell, just by looking at the ruins of my town, that the future would be as rough as the past few days had been, if not worse. I had to calm down and stop showing so much emotion. I knew that I'll always be able to feel it, but I needed to find a way to keep it to myself. And that's what I did, staring out at my ruined hometown without dampness in either eye.
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