herlastwords

[herlastwords]

Almost

It started as something pure. Platonically beautiful. I adored you with no expectations. Like the way people admire the moon. Not because they want to own it, but because it makes the night less lonely. It was admiration, reverence… until it wasn’t. Until the lines blurred.

And that’s the thing about human relationships. They rarely stay untouched by want. No matter how innocent they begin, we always hope for something more, even just a little. Sometimes without realizing. Sometimes without meaning to. It’s almost like something in us remembers

what it felt like to be safe once. And when we feel it again, even just a glimpse, we reach for it with both hands. I guess that’s why I went all in so quickly. My nervous system recognized you not as a stranger, but as a home I’d once lost. You felt like something I’d been missing without knowing I’d been looking.

You made me feel seen in a way that was almost frightening. Like being noticed gently and completely. As if someone paused their entire day just to marvel at the way I existed. Not for what I gave. Just… for being.

I saw a future with you after never wanting one my entire life. And that terrified me — not because of what I felt but because I finally let myself believe I could be chosen.

There was a kind of sanctity in that.
No one had ever made me feel like simply being here was enough.
And I adored you for it. Not because I needed to be saved but because I was tired of pretending I didn’t want to be. I looked at you with adoration, not expectation. I never wanted to own you. I just wanted to stay near whatever light you carried.

That’s all.

But even light has its limits. Eventually, the warmth flickered.

There was a strange middle.
Not the fall, not the crash. Just… the shift.
We were still talking. Still sharing memes. Still saying goodnight.
But something about the way you said my name started to change. Like a page still being turned, but the story no longer read out loud.
The space between our replies grew like a fog.
Not thick enough to call it silence, but just enough to lose your outline.

I told myself I was imagining things.

That people get tired. That routines settle. That comfort looks different after a while.
But deep down I knew you weren’t arriving in the same way anymore. You were showing up out of memory, not out of want.

And I started to shrink. Quietly. Strategically.
I stopped texting first. Started laughing a bit less.
Filtered out parts of myself that once made you stay longer. Because I thought maybe if I became easier, you’d come closer again.

But that’s the thing about slow disappearances—they don’t make a sound. They don’t scream. They just echo.

You got busier. Life took you where I couldn't follow. And I—I’ve always struggled with distance. It doesn’t feel like space, it feels like vanishing. Like watching someone walk away and not knowing if they’ll ever turn around again. But I tried. I tried to understand. You were working late, you had a new position, you were chasing something bigger. I was proud of you. But I was also disappearing.

Eventually, I said something soft and ambiguous. Something like “Maybe we’re hoping for different things.” You nodded with tired honesty, the kind that doesn’t argue. You said you were sorry you couldn’t give more right now. That your life was overflowing. That you weren’t sure how to hold someone properly when your hands were already full. You said you’d probably regret not making space for me. And I cried for days. Because that was the most honest thing anyone’s ever said to me while letting me go.

But the funny thing is… I wasn’t asking you to drop the world. I just wanted to be part of it.

There’s something devastating about being told you’re special by someone who won’t choose you.

And still. I wait. In some strange, reluctant corner of myself, I wait. You told me maybe we’ll meet again someday, and that you hope I’m still single if that day comes. Do you realize how much weight lives in that “maybe”?

Ambiguity hurts in a way that heartbreak doesn’t. Because at least heartbreak has an ending—a door that closes, a final word, a silence that makes sense.

But ambiguity? It lingers.

It’s a rope with no knot. It keeps you reaching, waiting, wondering. It makes absence feel like erasure—like they didn’t just leave, but disappeared.

And no amount of logic can quiet the ache

when someone who once felt like safety suddenly becomes a question mark. No amount of logic can calm the ache in your nervous system that screams: you’re being abandoned.

You see, I’m trying to move on. I really am. But then I remember the little things. 
The way we planned ice cream for small wins, how you said you'd make simple rituals feel like celebrations. The way you flirted with your eyes like they carried secrets only I could read. That dream you had about growing old somewhere quiet. Just the two of us, hands wrinkled, hearts restful. I pictured myself beside you, older, softer, holding hands like we earned the quiet together.

And it hurts, knowing someone else might get to live that life with you. Someone else is going to live the life i had been dreaming of with you.

And sure… maybe I’m a hopeless romantic. I know that. I’ve accepted it. I also know I can’t always tell the difference between love and emotional mirroring. I mean, come on, look at you. You're magnetic, articulate, you could probably convince a stone to fall in love. And me? I cry at documentaries, fall in love through text messages, and spiral when someone says “standby.”

I get it if you were just… testing your charm. Running a little experiment on the emotionally literate girl with just enough softness to spark a reaction.
I’d like to understand.
Truly. Just… next time, maybe include a label:
“Warning: This connection expires in five days. No refunds, no closure.”

But jokes aside.
This longing is real. This ache is real. And even now, I find myself checking my messages, wondering if you’ll say something. Anything. You left me on “standby” like I was a delayed flight waiting for clearance to land.

And I stayed. In the gate. Waiting.

That’s the thing. I don’t hate you. Not even close. I keep covering my heart’s ears so it won’t start blaming you. I know you didn’t mean to become a wound. You were just passing through. But you don’t walk through someone like that and expect them to remain whole.

I don’t know how to end this… chapter? Or probably you’re the whole book.
Maybe because there’s nothing to end.
Maybe because what we had existed in a space too fragile to be called a beginning, and too beautiful to be dismissed as nothing.

Still, if I could live three lives, I think I’d spend this one writing.
With all this ache, all this almost-love, all this longing pressed between the lines trying to make peace with a story that never got fully written.

And maybe, in the other two, you’ll arrive as an answer instead of a lesson.
Maybe you’ll stay.
Maybe I won’t have to wonder if I was too much or not enough.
Maybe I won’t have to write letters that never get sent.

But for now, I’ll stay in this version of life. The one where I write instead of hold, where I find meaning in metaphors because that’s all I get to keep.


Most nights, I comfort myself through imaginary conversations with you.

Not the real you — the one who got too busy, too far, too quiet. But the version that still answered with warmth. The one who still stayed.

In my mind, you always reply gently.

You ask if I’m okay, and I pretend I am.

But even in my imagination, you never stay for long. And that’s the difference.

I still visit us. You don’t.

You get to move on, and I get to romanticize.
Fair trade? Not really. But I’ll take it.

Sometimes, I wonder if it wasn’t the timing. Or the distance. But me. Maybe you left because I was too fragile. Too open.

Too full of wounds I didn’t know how to hide.
Maybe I scared you with the way I unfolded every bruise like a page hoping you’d read it gently.
But I never asked you to heal me, I just wanted someone to sit beside me while I tried to heal myself.

I didn’t need rescue. I just needed company

This is my timeline, I guess.
The one where I keep trying to be a little happier,
where I learn to be grateful for what stayed instead of grieving what didn’t.
The one where I still think of you sometimes,
and maybe you don’t think of me at all. And that’s okay.
You were real for a moment. That’s more than most people get.

I’m probably broken. Probably wrecked.
And probably this is what we do when we love deeply and lose quietly.
We create.

I might be the writer, but you’ll always be the words. Every metaphor I reach for still sounds like you. I may hold the pen, but you’re still the story.

So here I am—
a writer in this life hoping the next two are kinder.
To me.
To you.
To us.


E.

[herlastwords]

“What if I write it and it’s bad-”

WHAT IF YOU WRITE IT AND ITS GOOD? WHAT IF YOU WRITE IT AND ITS EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANTED? WHAT THEN????

[herlastwords]

If You Could See Inside My Head, pt. 2
(the quiet after the storm)

They don’t tell you how terrifying peace can be when your nervous system was forged in fire.
The storm is gone. There’s no thunder. No spiral. Just a kind of quiet that feels like an unfamiliar room with no windows.


I call it calm. But it’s not peace. It’s a pause with no script. They say calm is the goal, but never explain how that calm can feel like a void. Wide enough to swallow you whole.
They never told me that after self-awareness comes this: the soft, eerie silence that follows emotional hurricanes. Like my nervous system is asking “Are we safe now?”
And I don’t have an answer.

They say there’s this thing called post-crisis-dysphoria. That empty quiet after the storm. Your body is no longer in survival mode, no more adrenaline. But your mind? Still flinching, still waiting for impact.

It’s the drop. That moment after days of bracing, when you suddenly don’t know what to do with yourself.

Your hands shake. Your chest feels sore. You crave sugar for no reason.

They call it dysregulation hangover too. And sometimes…you don’t even feel better when the stress is gone. You just feel hollow. Because even pain, when familiar, can feel like home.

I know this isn’t a relapse. This is my system deflating.
My body has stopped fighting, but my thoughts haven’t caught up.
The battlefield goes silent, and yet I’m still wearing armor checking for wounds that aren’t there.

So I try to fill it.

I pick up a book. I fill the quiet with books. Always books.
Literary fiction, poetic prose, highlighting every sentence that screams of fracture.
Every underlined phrase feels like home: “unmoored,” “dissociated,” “aching quiet,” “she smiled but wanted to disappear.”


I highlight characters who fall apart with elegance as if by identifying with them, I can make sense of my own unraveling. Like every protagonist with a bleeding soul feels like a version of me. Sometimes I forget I’m not in the story. Sometimes I wish I was.

Because stillness is unbearable. The silence between anxiety attacks echoes louder than the panic itself.

So I curate pain in ink and paper to give my ghosts a name. Because names feel like control and control feels like safety.

And still, I get dressed. I drink water. I walk out the door.
I pass people on the street with practiced ease, smiling just enough to look alive.
I look calm. I look functional.

But what they don’t see is how I sometimes pray for a car to miss the red light.
How I fantasize about exits that don’t require decision.
Not because I want to die but because I don’t want to keep living like this.
Because disappearing feels easier than trying to justify my presence again and again…to a world that doesn’t ask but always expects.

And I hate that part. I hate that no one can tell. That I can walk through a mall or a quiet evening
looking composed while quietly hoping something…anything…will make the void go away.

I’ve read the textbooks. I know this is called passive suicidal ideation.
It’s not a plan. It’s a wish.


A tired kind of yearning for the universe to choose for me.

They say this too shall pass but no one tells you how many times it returns.
How healing isn’t linear. How sometimes “progress” means just sitting through the silence without self-destructing.

I confuse absence of chaos for purposelessness.
I confuse quiet with abandonment.
And deep down, I’m terrified that this version of me—the one without overthinking, overgiving, overcompensating—has no value.

What if the only way I knew how to be was through fixing, performing, surviving?

I’m learning that healing isn’t fireworks or revelations. It’s weird-quite moment like:
Not texting back right away and surviving the silence.

Not people-pleasing and not vomiting afterward.

Crying and not analyzing.

Resting without guilt.

Saying “I’m tired” and not explaining why.

I thought healing would feel like joy. But sometimes it just feels like less panic.

Like surviving a storm and hearing birds again, but being too scared to believe they’re real.

So I try. To sit. To breathe. To say: “This emptiness is not failure. It’s unfamiliar safety.”

Even when the quiet feels like drowning.

Even when my highlight pen seeks pain just to feel understood.

Even when I walk outside and silently hope the universe spares me the responsibility of staying.

Even when my body is still here but my heart is asking: “For what?”

But here’s the kicker:
Sometimes, the scariest part of getting better is realizing you’ve never met this version of yourself before. The version that doesn’t spiral. That doesn't perform.
That just... is.


And that’s okay. It’s okay to be scared of peace when all you’ve known is war.

Still—I try.
I whisper to the void, “This is not the end.
This is the space where the next part begins.”

Even if I don’t believe it yet.

Even if all I can do is survive the silence
without erasing myself.
Even if healing looks more like confusion than clarity. 
Even if you still romanticize fictional trauma.
Even if your brain keeps asking “What now?”
Especially then.

[herlastwords]

If You Could See Inside My Head, You’d Understand

Sometimes I wonder if healing is just a long-term exposure therapy to my own unmet needs.

They say self-awareness is the first step, but no one tells you how loud it gets afterward.

I know the theory. I know the DSM labels. I can map out my attachment style, it starts whispering “You’re not safe”,

I trace the hyperactivation of my nervous system with the precision of a trauma-informed clinician. I can explain my triggers better than any therapist because I’ve lived inside them.

Because this is my mind, and it never shuts up.

But awareness doesn’t fix it. I’m still spiraling. Still anxious.Still stuck in the same behavioral loop like a glitchy simulation run by outdated coping mechanisms.

People say I’m smart. Insightful. Deep. Self-reflective.

But most days, all I can do is look in the mirror and whisper: “You’re broken.”

I write essays disguised as journal entries, hoping that if I name the monster in academic terms… it will behave.

Hoping the longer the sentences, the lighter the weight.

I say things like “dysregulated affect” instead of “I cry too much at things that shouldn’t hurt this bad.”
I say “repetition compulsion” instead of “I keep falling for people who can’t choose me back.”
I say “maladaptive schema” when what I mean is I believe I’m only worthy when I’m useful.

I know what “earned secure attachment” is supposed to look like. I could give a TED Talk about it.

But in the real world, I still text five times in a row when silence lasts too long. I said I have anxious attachment.
I still over-function in relationships like a nervous system trying to prove its own value. I said I want a healthy love.
I still mistake anxiety for intuition. I still chase emotional inaccessibility. They call it ‘breadcrumbs’ but I call it “familiar.” Potential love. What a joke.

I say I want reciprocity, but I perform emotional labor like a martyr.
I say I crave stability, but my trauma bond checklist says otherwise.

Cool.

What’s happening under the surface isn’t mystery—it’s neural wiring.
It’s early attachment disruption. It’s internalized shame coded into behavioral patterns so ancient they feel like fate.

I confuse self-awareness for healing.

I over-explain instead of setting boundaries.
I’m scared of being “too much,” yet I keep being “not enough” for myself.
I use emotional insight as armor, trying to earn love instead of just receiving it.

I confuse insight for integration.

I over-intellectualize pain to avoid feeling it.
I manage the emotional temperature of the room like a thermostat set on survival.

I manage relationships instead of being in them.
I apologize more than I express what I actually feel.
I carry blame just to keep the peace while my gut screams, “This isn’t yours.” Self-sacrifice myself for love.
I shrink my needs so small, hoping they won’t scare anyone away.
I call it self-awareness, but I’m stuck in a loop of over-functioning and under-being.

Yes, I perform secure. But deep down, I’m terrified that having needs makes me a burden that even love can’t carry.

And sure, people say:
“You’re so emotionally aware.”
“You’re so self-reflective and mature.”
“You’re such a catch.”

Then why do I always feel like I’m auditioning for love that never quite calls me back?

Then why do I feel abandoned?

Why do I feel unchosen?

Here’s the core wound, in plain language:
Somewhere along the line, I learned that if I could understand everything, if I could predict, analyze, explain—then maybe I could finally be safe.
Maybe I could earn permanence.

But healing isn’t just about insight.

It isn’t about being understood.


It’s about re-patterning.

It’s about nervous system safety.

It’s about tolerating the unfamiliar calm after a lifetime of chaos.

And yes—I’m trying.
Even if trying looks like collapsing into bed at 3 a.m. diagnosing myself mid-spiral and whispering “You’re not broken. Just dysregulated.”.

Even if some days trying just looks like crying into the void and hoping no one calls it weakness.

But God, I’m trying.

[herlastwords]

Rin-du You Still Miss Me?

There’s a peculiar kind of emotional torture reserved only for the emotionally literate.

You sense things. Tiny shifts. A half-second delay in a reply. A sentence that feels like it was rewritten three times before being sent. You don't have proof. Just pattern recognition.

I’ve noticed you’ve changed slightly. Not drastically, just enough to make my intuition start clearing its throat.

And while most people would gaslight themselves back into silence, I’ve learned to listen. Not to accuse but to understand.

See, I believe in honesty. Not just the polite, socially digestible kind that says, “I like your haircut,” when in fact it resembles a lawnmower accident. No I mean radical honesty. The kind that says:

“This is what I feel. This is what I fear. This is what I hope you’ll tell me, even if it hurts.”

Because I’ve discovered and here psychology agrees that we don’t suffer from too much truth.

We suffer from the absence of it.

Emotional confusion is not caused by pain, but by uncertainty. We can survive heartbreak. We can’t survive ambiguity.

And so, while we’re not speaking while the air between us remains untexted I wonder:

Do you think of me?

Not in a tragic, violin-playing kind of way. But in that quiet moment between a sip of coffee and the next notification does my name pass through you like a shadow?

Because you pass through me like a hymn I keep forgetting the words to.

I hear Roosevelt’s Elliot playing in the background. And I can’t help but hear the line:

“Tell me you know nothing was meant for you.”

It’s brutal. It’s honest. It’s a voice trying to shake someone awake before it’s too late.

Maybe it’s me...

And here’s the part that stings maybe you’ve met someone else.

A man with better jokes.

A better job.

A bigger... bookshelf...

And I get it. You’re beautiful. You’re young. You’re the kind of woman people don’t just like they want to consume.

But that’s the difference, isn’t it?

Most people don’t want to love you. They want to taste you.

And I...

I wanted to grow with you.

We were never about performance. We were about presence.

And so, I wait not for a grand gesture, or a message sent at 3am. I wait for the moment when your "segan" that quiet wall of hesitation crumbles just enough for a simple:

“How are you?"

Not as a test. Not as a trap. But as a measurement.

Because if I mean something l anything it will show. Even in silence, affection leaks through the cracks.

I am not hoping. I am not begging. I am simply… loving.

Which, contrary to how movies portray it, isn’t always loud.

Sometimes, it’s just sitting with the ache. The questions. The tenderness.

"My love for you grows, quietly, every day. And you deserve to know that, even if you no longer want to hold it"

[herlastwords]

— Nikita Gill

[herlastwords]

“just sit with me because i am, too, fluent in silence.”

Soal Emotional Avaliability

Secara sederhana, emotional availability dapat dipahami sebagai kapasitas seseorang untuk hadir secara emosional dalam sebuah hubungan untuk merasakan, memproses, dan mengekspresikan emosi, serta membuka diri terhadap kerentanan dan koneksi yang autentik. Namun di balik definisi ini, tersembunyi arsitektur psikis yang kompleks: sebuah jaringan pertahanan bawah sadar, pola ikatan masa kecil, hingga konflik diri/batin antara keinginan untuk dicintai dan ketakutan akan kehilangan kendali atas diri sendiri.

Dalam pendekatan psikologi, seseorang emotionally unavailable bisa saja menunjukkan tanda-tanda seperti alexithymia yaitu ketidakmampuan untuk mengenali dan mengungkapkan emosi diri sendiri secara verbal. Di sisi lain, bisa juga muncul insecure attachment style, yakni pola hubungan yang dibentuk dari pengalaman masa kecil yang penuh ketidakpastian emosional, serta cognitive-emotional decoupling, yaitu kecenderungan untuk memisahkan pikiran dari emosi agar tidak terlalu terlibat atau 'terluka' Istilah-istilah ini memang terdengar keren, tetapi pada kenyataannya, kita semua mengenalnya dalam bentuk yang lebih membumi: ghosting, kebingungan mau serius atau main-main, atau ketakutan akut terhadap "chat balasan yang terlalu cepat atau terlalu lama."

Fenomena ini juga dibahas oleh Dr. K dari HealthyGamerGG salah satu pisikolog yang aku ikuti podcast maupun kajiannya di spotify, ia menyebut bahwa banyak individu saat ini mengalami emotional dysregulation karena tidak pernah diajarkan bagaimana menghadapi emosi mereka sendiri, apalagi emosi orang lain. Mereka tumbuh dengan narasi bahwa emosi adalah sesuatu yang harus diatur, ditekan, atau dikompensasi melalui produktivitas dan pencapaian. Maka ketika menghadapi hubungan, respons default-nya adalah avoidant: mundur, menjauh, atau bermain aman melalui persona online yang disusun rapi. Seperti kata Dr. K, “You can’t love someone properly if you’re scared of your own feelings.” Dan sayangnya, banyak dari kita justru takut bukan pada orang lain, tapi pada kemungkinan diri kita sendiri merasa terlalu dalam.

Dalam filsafat cinta modern, seperti yang dikupas dengan jenaka dan jujur oleh Alain de Botton (cari tau sendiri noh wkwk), menggarisbawahi hal ini dengan sangat manusiawi. Kita memasuki hubungan bukan karena kita sudah sembuh, tetapi justru karena kita sedang mencari tempat untuk menyembuhkan. Namun alih-alih saling menyembuhkan, kita justru sering bertemu dalam kondisi belum selesai. Dua orang yang saling tidak tersedia secara emosional akan terlibat dalam pseudo-intimacy: kedekatan palsu yang terasa manis di awal, penuh cerita masa lalu, luka batin, dan janji bahwa “kita beda dari yang lain.” Namun di balik semua itu, tidak ada komitmen terhadap pertumbuhan bersama. Yang ada hanyalah dua luka yang saling mencari plester sementara.

Dalam konteks sosial Indonesia yang masih sangat dipengaruhi nilai-nilai kolektif dan ekspektasi kultural seperti menikah di usia tertentu, menjaga nama keluarga, dan romantisme akan stabilitas emosi sering kali menjadi tamu tak diundang dalam relasi. Seseorang bisa terlihat sempurna di atas kertas mapan, sopan, menarik namun tetap gagal membangun hubungan yang bermakna karena tidak siap membuka dirinya secara emosional. Ketersediaan emosional tidak bisa diwariskan, tidak bisa dipelajari lewat seminar, dan tidak bisa dipalsukan lewat story Instagram. Ia tumbuh dari keberanian menghadapi konflik internal: konflik antara ingin menjadi diri sendiri dan takut tidak diterima.

Dalam ruang dating digital, emotional withholding strategi menahan emosi demi menjaga kontrol telah menjadi semacam norma tak tertulis. Tidak balas chat demi menjaga "misteri", pura-pura tidak tertarik agar terlihat "dingin", atau bahkan memulai hubungan hanya untuk menguji validasi. Semua ini pada dasarnya adalah manifestasi dari ketakutan akan cinta yang tidak bisa dikendalikan. Ironisnya, kita menghindari kedalaman karena takut tenggelam, padahal tanpa menyelam, kita hanya akan mengambang di permukaan relasi yang hampa.

Dari perspektif psiko-filosofis, ketersediaan emosional bukan sekadar keterampilan sosial, tetapi bentuk keberanian eksistensial. Ia menuntut kesediaan untuk introspectively confront the self menghadapi bagian terdalam dan tergelap dari diri kita, bukan untuk menghakimi, tetapi untuk mengerti. Kita tidak benar-benar bisa hadir untuk orang lain jika kita sendiri tidak tahu siapa yang sedang hadir dalam diri kita.

Lucunya? Kita butuh akun alter untuk menjadi "diri kita sediri" atau bahakan terknologi bernama AI untuk jujur pada diri sendiri, memang bercerita dengan topeng diri yang berbeda menajadi lebih terasa aman atau soal AI, mereka jauh lebih empati terhadap diri kita, ironi haha.

Kesimpulannya, dalam dunia percintaan modern yang penuh ekspektasi dan tekanan sosial, emotional availability adalah oase yang langka namun esensial. Ia adalah syarat dasar bagi hubungan yang bukan hanya berlangsung, tapi bertumbuh. Mencintai tidak selalu berarti tahu harus berkata apa atau memberikan solusi. Kadang, itu hanya berarti berani duduk dalam diam, dalam keheningan yang tidak nyaman, sambil berkata dalam hati: “Aku disini, dan aku tetap dengan kamu, beri tau aku apa yang bisa aku lakukan untuk membantu mu, ceritakan semua yang kamu rasakan saat ini, apa yang jadi beban pikiran mu/ dan lainnya.”

Dan dalam dunia yang dipenuhi pelarian, mungkin itulah bentuk cinta paling radikal sekaligus paling sehat dan berdasar a.k.a based.

[herlastwords]

depression or whatever is sooooo embarrassing like oopss i ruined a large chunk of my future and messing up all the plans because i just didn’t feel like doing anything for a while.

Epic cringe babe

[herlastwords]

mother, i have pasts inside me that i did not burry properly.

some nights, your daughter tears herself apart yet still heals in the morning

ijeoma umebinyuo, questions for ada

[herlastwords]

“is it worth it for us to be happy just to be broken in the future?”

“i will choose to be a little bit happy because every pain is worthy when i’m happy with you”

“for what reason?”

“for whatever reason”

[herlastwords]

Last Night I Heard Noises.

Rumahku adalah rumah ditepi persawahan dan sungai kecil dengan air bersih. Rumahku ada di depan area perkuburan keluarga yang sudah mulai banyak terisi. Disini aku hidup hampir seperempat abad. Apa itu mengganggu? Apa itu menakutkan? Apa keheningan yang sudah mulai muncul setiap jam 8 malam itu memunculkan kedamaian? Atau malah menimbulkan kekhawatiran?

Semalam aku takut. Aku mendengar suara raungan yang menyakitkan. Seperti seseorang yang menjerit meminta pertolongan. Semalam aku takut. Aku mendengar suara cakaran kuku yang menyilukan. Seperti sesuatu yang mencoba untuk merangkak keluar. Aku juga mendengar suara berisik. Seperti ramai sekali orang sedang berbicara bersamaan. Sangat tidak nyaman.

Tidak. Ini bukan kisah horor. Atau barangkali iya. Semua keributan dan ocehan yang aku dengar itu nyata. Hanya saja, semuanya terjadi di dalam kepalaku. Itu aku. Aku adalah orang yang menjerit itu. Aku adalah sumber suara cakaran itu. Aku dan aku yang lain sedang bercerita dikepalaku.

Pagi hari, aku sadar bahwa ternyata aku tidak takut tinggal dirumah. Aku tidak takut dengan kuburan dan suara jangkrik. Aku takut dengan diriku. Sesuatu di dalam kepalaku lebih menakutkan. Seperti mereka akan menarikku jauh ke dalam kegelapan. Pagi hari, aku menyadari ketakutan terbesarku adalah kehilangan.

Kehilangan diri sendiri.