The Box: A Short Story

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a rejection of my mind in it's entirety.

an assertion that my brain is incorrect and does not belong.

I do not belong here 

because my mind is wrong, 

I am made wrong.

 

I do not belong because I am different. I am slow. I cannot speak. I cannot take what's in my head and put it on paper. 

 

I'm disorganized and unprepared, and I'm okay with that. I will own that part of myself. I am disorganized because my mind exists in a certain way that doesn't fit into this system. 

 

This system of inflexiblity and asserted correctness. My mind is incorrect in this system. Outside of it my mind works fine, and I like having my mind and body and soul. But inside of it, all of that is invalid. It should not exist. It should not exist because it does not adhere. 

 

It is being crushed into a space which was built around it, and it was born into the cage. I am crushed by the walls I cannot see. My limbs crack and I am immobilized. I cannot live in here, my body does not fit. I do not fit correctly into this container, therefore I must be incorrect. 

 

I must change because the box refuses to change, even though it is fully capable of change. It is fully capable of change because the box has only existed for a short while. It is constantly being shaped and restructured, but you cannot see that from inside the box. You cannot see the walls tighten around you. You are pressed inward and begin to twist. The box is consuming you. 

 

You have served the purpose of the box, and it has been feed and perpetuated. The box is built from bones, bones of the people like you. The people who fell in, and could not escape because the box is made to only hold certain people. The certain people who think of the box as a home. The box allows them through, into it's core. Inside the core, the box people sit and talk to themselves, about how to make the box hold more people. About how to keep the box open at the top and closed at the bottom. About how to make the walls high enough so you can't climb out. About why it's okay to crush the boxless people who can't fit into the core, because they can't. They are unable to. They do not want to drown. 

 

They want to exist outside of it, and exist in their own way. Exist in their own shapes, which they can fit into, shapes which allow others to enter and thrive even if they are not used to the new shape. They are not consumed by it. They are not crushed by it. They are embraced by it and it allows them to exist. it helps them to exist and teaches them to show others that there is a world outside of the box, and they are welcome to enter it. 

 

They will not be forced to drown in the box. 

 

The box makes them sink. Outside of the box, they can float, but inside the box, they sink. Everyone sinks in the box, but some people are okay with sinking and they are taken beyond to where they make more boxes. To the land of the sunken, where they want everyone else to join them in the boxes. All that they want is to make everyone try out the box. "See if you can float in it", they say. "Just hold your breath and you will float". But you do not float. You sink. You sink down to the bottom where they consume you and build your skin and bones into more boxes. This is why I do not want to go into the box. Because I know if I go all the way in, I will drown. And I do not want to drown.

 

I want to make my own shapes. I want to make my own shapes with others, others who don't want to drown. Others who don't want to drown and know what happens when they sink into the box. They know that they die there, and that their skin and bones are made into more boxes, and they don't want this to happen. So they decide to build their own shapes. Shapes which float on the surface of the box, above it. Things that the box can't see. That people inside of the box cannot see because they can't see the whole shape from inside the box. They only see part of it, and they hate it. They hate to see it above them, floating because it is outside of the box. 

 

But they don't have to hate it. They can climb it. They can climb it out of the box. We make ladders and ropes for them to climb. They can escape the box. We can stop feeding the box. When we stop feeding the box, it cannot create more boxes. Without us, the boxes slowly fall apart. They melt. The skin and bones peel and drip apart. It all pours open and the liquid flows free. 

 

Everyone who was inside, they now realize they are outside of the box. They are scared to be. They have only known the box. But now they know that life exists outside the box. They remember their lives before the box. The box made them forget everything before they entered, but now they remember it all. 

 

All the other shapes embrace the people who were trapped in the box. They all come together and embrace. They are safe. They are alive. They are outside the box and they are okay. We love them all. They can live outside the box. We can live outside the box. Now the box is gone. We are free.