The limelight is barely a few feet away, and the only thing that separates you from it is a large red curtain of a certain grandeur, whose origins can't be traced. Your knees feel heavy, and while you may think that this is not the best time to perspire, your body has other ideas. You can feel the faint accumulation of a tiny bead of sweat that will later roll down your apparently smooth skin until you lose track of it, as the roar of the crowd and paparazzi on the other side of the curtain grows louder, but not louder than the noise that reverberates through your windpipe as your heart thumps against your ribs. But you gotta be calm, and be ready. That's what separates you from the 'normal' people. They just need an excuse to be here, and tonight, you're exactly that. You look in the mirror for the last time, and apart from the monster that is fighting to break free under your iris, everything looks fine. You stand a few yards away from the spot where the curtain will part towards both sides. You smell like all the good things in the world have been emptied out on you. Trust. Faith. Hope. Love. But it does just enough to mask the stench of a stranger, someone who doesn't belong. For once, your mascara speaks more than your eyes, and your make-up hides all the pain it took you to get here. It's only moments away now, and when the big red veil parts, it will be your cue to put on another one exactly like it; Only this time, you'll be the only one who knows it's there. In the dying moments, your thoughts race back to a line from your favourite One Republic number,
Everything that drowns me makes me wanna fly.
It reminds you of how long it took you to get here. All the struggles, the disappointment, the let-down, and the self-crisis. But those days are over. It didn't matter anymore. Nothing did. You were born a stranger, someone who didn't belong. Your days of lurking like a shadow past the corridors of your each breath were over. You've made peace with the fact that you're never going to be one of them, no matter how hard you try. You were always a fad to them, and they watched as spectators. Your every move was monitored, your every fall, mocked. They loved watching you play a game they thought you could never win, but fate had other ideas. They love games, so why not give them what they want? You've found ecstacy within yourself, and you need no other's hand. Stop searching for someone like you. You're alone; you always have been. But it doesn't matter; the winner stands alone. The winner always stands alone. The curtains will open any moment now, and along with the flashes of their cameras and the roars of their voices, you will be greeted with thoughts, emotions, anger and jealousy. They will throw their smiles at you, hoping to asphyxiate yours, but that smile, you've practiced it so goddamn hard. It will never falter, unlike other things. When the curtains part, you have to put the veil on. Give them a reason to talk about. For each breath that a person spends on talking about you, will add to yours when you suffocate of loneliness. It will save you. You have to show them what you're made of. You have to walk out a different person than what you are now. You have to be the air to their breath, the movement of their lips, their train of thought. For this is you, taking back control. Of your thoughts. Of dependence. Of hope. And of life. If you want it, step out there and take it. You deserve it. Put the ever-so-charming smile on, and go out there and conquer what's yours. Life starts now. Don't forget,
the World is yours.
Cheers to that!
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