Easy to say, hard to do

“Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than fear.”

Courage and cowardice, two sides of the same coin. Nobody is only coward or brave, all of us are mixtures of both. Some people are braver, some are more coward, and I had always thought I was in the second group until I realized: you can't be brave if you are not scared.

I'm one of those people who have this terrible fear of being or doing anything wrong. It is really hard for me to accept failure, so the easiest thing is to just not do a thing. There could be no wrongs or rights if I didn't try, but there would be nothing brave about it –nor funny.

A big part of life is about taking risks, and being brave is the best thing that has ever happened to me. It has given me cats, it has taken away the fear of running into animals (dogs more likely) to let me appreciate how beautiful and cute this little friends are. It has taught me that great jokes can come from ignorance. And all that is almost nothing compared to this last thing: being brave has made me realize how much people can like me, even if I'm weird or awkward or clumsy sometimes.

Being brave has given me confidence. And that's why I highly recommend facing your fears.

Some sad thoughts, some snowy mornings

   It was a snowy day, which meant a bed day. I kept my eyes closed, thanking God it was Saturday; thereby, I wouldn't have to face five hours of class with a broken heart.

What seemed like a funny and inoffensive day for most of the students didn't feel the same way for me. How odd was it?, the fact that I used to love building snowmen and organizing snowball's fights until that day.

   The sound of someone gently knocking at the door made me open my eyes drowsily. I popped my head out of the mattres just enough for me to see my visitor, a mass of curls and two blue eyes sneaking behind the door.

   “Hey, grumpy. Still asleep?”, Jay asked mischievously.

   “Yeah, trying to. When are you gonna stop calling me that?”

   “When you stop being grumpy, so get the hell out of there! It's snowing!”

   He entered the room and –to my horror– opened the window, so a cold breeze invaded the room in a few seconds. I hid again under the blankets, to what he sighed.

   “I know it's chill outside, you just have to bundle up a bit.”

   “It's not that”, I wispered hoarsely.

   We both realized I was on the edge. One more word and I'd cry my eyes out, but none of us wanted to face that. In fact, I expected him to leave as soon as he knew there were deep feelings involved, some "girly stuff" he wanted nothing to do with. I was so sure he'd flee… and yet he quietly sat on my bed, next to me.

   Jay carefully drew off part of the mattress to glance at me with what could only be tenderness. I accidentally shed a tear when my eyes avoided his, which made me feel tinier and more vulnerable than ever.

   “What's it, then?”, he asked with a soft voice.

   I bit my lip, not wanting to tell him because I knew I'd crumble if I did. As a response, he took his coat off and got his huge body –it was, at least compared to mine– under the mattress. When he offered me a hug, I had no strength left to reject it as I would've done if it were a normal day.

   Being there with him, just lying, felt definitely better. Eventually he'd kiss my forehead or just caress my back, so the tears began to fade as well as my sadness. There was still something, though.      Some weight on my chest that refused to go away. I understood it was time for me to talk about it out loud, to someone other than myself.

   “She left a snowy day”, I said. His hand stopped caressing my back for one second, and then it started again as a sign he was listening. “My dad was crying and holding onto a note she left, his sobs were what woke me up that day. She abandoned us because she didn't really love us… My mum never loved me. Snowy days remind me of that.”

   I had accepted that ugly truth a while ago, but apparently it wasn't enough for me to not fall apart. Jay's hug got tighter when my tears became countless, although I could sense a new beginning. Those tears were redemption, were forgiveness, were freedom. I finally released that weight I had never got rid of before, I felt the overwhelming pain of being a motherless child one last time and then… just then, I was able to get over it.

   I had no idea of how much time had passed since Jay came to my room. I didn't really care, neither did he. We were just there, holding each other, and I had to admit it was the best thing that had happened to me in a while. A pretty long while.

   “Hay”, he whispered. I moved a bit to catch a glimpse of his eyes before he continued talking. “Are you feeling better?” I nodded, to what Jay grinned. He pinched my nose with that cute smile only he possessed and suddenly I became aware of the fact that he was rushing out of the bed. Not only that, he also intended to take me with him.

   “What are you doing, James?”

   “I'm taking you outside! You need to get over your fears, and I'm gonna help you. Here, you'll need it”, he said, offering me his coat. I numbly stared at it, slowly assimilating that he wanted me to go out on a snowy day. Had he listened to any of my words those previous minutes? There was no way I was following him outside.

   “You know I don't wanna leave, Jay. You know what happened that day…”

   “I know 'cause you just told me, Hayley. Does that mean I'm gonna let you hide here instead of facing your fears?” He smiled encouragingly when he saw in my eyes I was honestly terrified. His hand grabbed mine and squeezed it kindly. “Hey, I'm going to be with you all along. What's the worst that could happen?”

   “I could have a good time with you, and then I'd have to admit you're actually funny. Isn't that enough reason?”, I tentatively asked. His answer was a laugh that, against all odds, got a smile from my grumpy lips. It was so easy to be happy around him…!

   “You went through a lot, but you're also brave and stubborn. Plus, I won't let anything bad happen to you, so can you just trust me?”

   I looked at my feet, knowing deep inside that he was right and that I was terrified for no reason. If I was going to let go, I needed to do it well –not some ten-minute talk and nothing else. I couldn't really say I trusted myself. However, I did trust Jay and his words wouldn't let me sleep if I refused to get out with him: what's the worst that could happen?

Game of Souls

  

  “There's no such thing as soul-breaking. You can kill someone and keep your soul untouched, because we weren't meant to be good. We were meant to survive, no matter how. The only people capable of murder just to enjoy themselves… well, they have no soul at all.”

  He somehow looked hurt, as if those words brought a bad memory back. One he wished he could forget. I still had some questions tormenting me though, so I decided to pop them out in an attempt to both find answers and remove those upseting thoughts off of him.

  “Hoy do they… move, then? How do they exist?”

  “I don't know yet”, he admitted, walking around the room with a more relaxed look. “As far as I could get, some sort of shadow runs the body of a psychopath. Maybe they're actual demons.”

  “If demons exist, angels might too”, I pointed out. He nodded while trying to hide the hope I had myself. If there were angels, there might be a God… we might not be alone.

  “They might. I'm probably staring at one right now.”

The windows are open

Only cat-owners living in high buildings know that feeling of seeing an open window: anxiety and fear, as if their beloved cat was about to jump through it, never to return again. It's not something you can teach them, they aren't kids who can understand the danger and avoid it. A kitty sees a bird flying outside and chases it no matter what, not realizing the 30 meters' height from there to the ground until it's too late.

This is why I am sad.

My windows are open all over the house, this is no longer a place for a cat to live in. It is not because we don't want to, but because –for medical reasons– I can't. I love cats but having them around hurts me, which is really hard to accept… though I have to say goodbye now.

Cookie's gone. And I miss her.

That possessive feeling we can't usually get rid of

Break-ups are hard. While you're love birds kissing and squeezing each other, both parts involved on the relationship develop this feeling of possession over their couple, so seeing them with someone else –romantically speaking, obviously– becomes painful and heart-breaking.

Everyone knows it is not nice to see your beloved one hooking up with not you. What no one seems to realize is that this possessive feeling exists in every –relatively– long lasting relationship, even in the ones where the involved people are not really in love.

The thing with books like Twilight or romantic comedies like Awkward is that they make you believe Bella and Jenna are madly in love with two guys at the same time, when actually it's all about that possessive feeling along with the attraction these guys radiate.

That being said, I'm not sure if a person can actually be in love with two or more people at the same time or it's just a confussion between the real feeling of love and the sexual attraction anyone can feel towards anyone, so… what are your thoughts?

Love?

Love. L-O-V-E. Amor. What's that?

Constantly saying how much we love this or that, not actually realizing… love, such a powerful and yet underrated word.

I hate the way we are used to it, as if it weren't a big deal. We waste words all the time, but one of the worst things we could possibly do is to throw away the daily "I love you"s. Open your eyes, world, someone is telling you they feel love towards you and you don't even care? And on the other hand, you just go and tell a person you love him/her as if you talked to them about the weather, motionless?

I must confess I'm one of those crazy, romantic girls who loves the idea of being in love. However, I am a bit scared of not recognizing my soulmate when I meet him –or her, though it'd surprise me. In fact, I'm scared that I might not have a soulmate at all. How do you know these things? Does everyone else have the instructions' book of life I'm missing or what?

Oh, whatever. Just take me to Pandora.

Remembering my true essence

These times I've been way too far from my beloved ones. The love of my life, that miracle I can always rely my happiness on: reading.

First, I got over a very strong prejudice about anime. I didn't understand it, hence I hated it for no reason. One day I just forced myself to watch Death Note, and today I've cried my eyes out while discovering Code Geass' ending. Plus, anime has helped me meet amazing people that love it too.

Then, I got trapped into hundreds of movies and series I wanted to watch, so the inspiration always appeared during my few free minutes – which I used to write until my nails fell from my fingers (not literally, though).

If that's not enough, I also made new friends thanks to college, so my spare time is now non-existent. I seriously need a week or two to disconnect, write, read, swim on a lake and listen to nature. Zen stuff.

I must say, though, that I might not be as relaxed as I'd like but I don't really care because I have never been happier. And the fact that today I ran out of anime, movies and series I wanted to see got me in a negative way at first: I was bored. But then…

Suddenly, a tiny, shy voice whispered: “…what about reading?”

My eyes went to slowmotion and glanced over at the book that was standing on the table at my right. A little smile popped out as I took World War Z and started reading on the point I left it months ago.

Finally the passion's back.