The orphanage director had handed her a one-way bus ticket to the capital the way one might hand over a funeral flower. It had been their way of saying goodbye, as if saying, "You're on your own now," without needing further words that might have shown kindness or warmth. After all, they had known that they weren't capable of such things. After eighteen years of almost, not-quite, not being enough, and being too much, Elowen Valentina had walked out of the place she had always known with her whole life folded in a piece of paper she had tightly gripped in her hand, as though it was the last straw that holds her together, and maybe it was.
"Thank you," she said, though not knowing what the orphanage director and the staff had deserved her gratitude for. Maybe, for at least keeping her alive all those years, or maybe, she had been grateful for all the bruises they inflicted on her skin, all the scars that stayed within her, and all the nights she pleaded with the stars to just take her with them. Maybe, she was grateful for all the sufferings the orphanage brought upon her because, at the very least, she was something worth wasting their cruelty on.
She walked away without looking back, one step heavier than the last. She didn't know at the time whether the bus ticket she was holding was a brand new hell or finally the escape she had longed for. But how does one even fathom a fresh start while still buried under the past and all of what she could have been? Does a bird that forgets how to fly from being caged far too long remember how to flap its wings once the gates open? Or do they fear the sky because they've been accustomed to suffering?
Her fate was sealed from the very moment she took her first breath. She almost had the luxury of living a normal life—if only her parents were normal. Not a drunkard of a father who, maybe drowned every sense of responsibility to cheap liquor. Not a mother too young to know that sometimes, mercy means not bringing a child into this warzone and calling it a home.
So she grew up into a fine young lady, almost.
If only her parents hadn't chosen to abandon her—if they had seen her as something worth changing for, risking for, and living for. It's funny how she doesn't get to make a choice. She neither asked them to bring her into all these sufferings nor did she want them to leave her. Yet at that point, she didn't know whether it was better to suffer with them or to suffer alone.
She spent all eighteen years of her life in the orphanage where they left her to agonize even before she learned how to speak, and maybe learn to ask for them to stay. Eighteen years of thinking about what was wrong with her, because not only did her biological parents abandon her, no one wanted to adopt her either, and the orphanage itself had found pleasure in ridiculing her.
When they told her she was too quiet, she'd go out of her way to be bubbly and happy. But then she was viewed as someone too loud. So she'd crawl back to her shell. When they told her she was too odd, she'd try her best to be as lovable as much as she knew how. But then they'd say, "She's a trying-hard fake.". What's worse is that she couldn't even bring herself to deny them because after all she did to be wanted, even she, grew wary that what was in her might not be true anymore.
And so, she waited, like what she had always done.
At a rusted little bus stop at the edge of nowhere, where the wind howled like it, too, was abandoned. The sky was the kind of gray that threatened rain but never followed through like it couldn't even commit to falling. She sat on a crooked bench with its paint peeling off, her suitcase by her feet, and that one-way ticket in her hand already soft from being gripped too tightly by her sweaty palm.
She didn't know how long she'd been there. Maybe, minutes. Hours. Maybe, a lifetime.
The world around her moved the same. Cars passing, a dog barking, a child laughing somewhere in the distance, as if her life hadn't just ended and started in the same cruel breath. She traced the rim of the ticket with her thumb, wondering if it would vanish if she let go. Wondering if she would. She wasn't only waiting for the bus. She was waiting for a sign that she hadn't made a mistake. That leaving meant something as much as it had meant staying.
The loud honking of a bus startled her. She looked up and saw the kind of green she hated painted all over the bus she was supposed to board. "Is this the sign?", she had thought as she glanced up at the sky. The bus honked again as if to signal her to make haste, so she carried her suitcase inside like she had been carrying everything up her shoulders all this time.
The bus was eerily empty. She had thought at first, that maybe the driver was in a hurry because of how many passengers she supposed he had to drop off somewhere. Ironically, she was the only passenger. The driver was quiet too, didn't even bother to give her a look or a nod. And yet, she greeted him anyway, "Good morning, sir.", and proceeded to sit in the middle of the bus.
She leaned over the window and closed her eyes. What is she expecting to see in the capital? A new life? New people that might abandon her once again? A new place she'll grow cold as time passes by? Elowen doesn't really wanna know. All her life, she had spent quite possibly every minute overthinking things. She wanted to change, even just that one insignificant thing.
She shrugged her shoulders and sat properly. "Hi, I'm Elowen Valentina…not too formal." Yes, we know. We just witnessed her make a clownery out of herself when she clearly thought of changing her bad habits just seconds ago, yet mindlessly rehearsed a possible introduction in her head for when she meets someone at the capital.
"Hey, I'm Elowen. I, uh… just got here." Great. Now she sounded like someone who forgot how to be human.
"I'm Elowen. I was born in an orphanage. It wasn't great. I don't know what I'm doing." Too much.
"I'm Elowen. I'm here to become someone." Too desperate.
She sighed and rested her head on her palms. What am I even doing? She thought.
She cracked one eye open and looked around the empty bus like it might offer an answer. But the driver was still silent, the road still endless, and her seat still mildly uncomfortable. She was still Elowen Valentina, still trying to figure out who that even was. She pulled her coat tighter around herself as if that could shield her from the weight of her own uncertainty.
"Hi." She whispered, practicing to no one.
"I'm Elowen. I'm… trying." She leaned on the window once again and closed her eyes, hoping that when she opened her eyes, she'd arrive somewhere nice. Somewhere, anywhere that could give her answers to questions she didn't even know if they were worth asking.