I do not tell him

I am sitting in a microbus and the man next to me is getting a little too comfortable. I take a breath, and shrink myself in my seat, it's okay, we do this every day. Just 45 more minutes and we'll be home. He keeps touching my arm and I keep shrinking further. Another breath. I politely ask him if he can move a little bit to the right, he looks at me with appalled eyes, like I just accused him of something. Did I? I bite my tongue. I do not tell him. After all, you do not tell a random stranger these things, right? So I do not tell him. I do not tell him about the man who touched my thigh when I was a kid of no more than 13, then smirked at me, daring me to say something. I do not tell him about the man who threatened to slap me because I stood up for myself, or the man who spit at me for no reason at all. I do not tell him about the man who yelled "يا خول!" at me in the midst of a crowded street, I do not tell him how I felt then. I do not tell him about the boy who threw a stone at me and snickered with his friends. I do not tell him about how I dodge men in the street like my life depends on it, I do not tell him about how I'd rather walk through a thousand blazing suns than walk by a group of men. I do not tell him anything, after all, you do not tell a random stranger these things, right? Another Breath. He touches my thigh. Stomach drop. I pray. Even though God hasn't been exactly present. I wonder if the rules of physics would allow me to become one with the window next to me. I ask him again. He looks at me dumb and I envy him. I envy him because he is completely unaware of anything that does not revolve around his existence. I shrink and he stretches, like it was an invitation for him to take what presence I had and make it his own. He touches my arm, again. Fists clenched and jaw tightened. I can already feel my neck aching under the strain. How do you tell someone he's taking all the air you're supposed to be breathing for himself?
I am tired, of shrinking my whole being for men. I am tired of folding myself into bits, and bits, and bits so I can fit in whatever tiny space they allow me. I am tired of shrinking my anger so I wouldn't be taken for a (God forbid!) man-hater. I am tired of shrinking my niceness so it wouldn't be taken for an invitation to something I never asked for. I am tired of feeling like I do not deserve to occupy a place in this world.

To someone

Everything is piling up on me and I am crumbling down under the weight. I've been having more anxiety attacks lately, it's painful, and it's more anxiety inducing to go out of the house wondering if I am going to have one in the next couple of hours, to wonder whom I am going to be with, and whether I'd like them to see me this way, to wonder if I can keep it on the low, wait it out without anyone noticing. I haven't been kind to myself and it's not making anything easier. I drink coffee when I don't need to, I smoke too much, and I barely eat anything at all and when I do, it's mostly nothing my body can thank me for. The sadness is cornering and smothering me; and it seems like the more I try to look for the light at the end of the tunnel, the more the tunnel closes down on me that I don't know if I can make it out. I was looking at old pictures yesterday, and I saw my mom and dad. They were smiling, holding hands, eyes lit up, they were happy, and they had the looks of people who didn't know what was coming for them. Before that I had come home to my mom looking like she just made it out of a storm. Bags under her eyes, her face paler than I've ever seen it, she looked fragile, ready to be broken at any moment now. Her voice broke with every sentence she spoke to me and I had no words to comfort her with. You see, whenever I opened my mouth the words turned into air. Do you think that this is what life will do to us eventually? Maybe that's what it's doing already. Dimming us down, breaking us apart, piece by piece until all the light goes out altogether? I hope not. I hope The Smiths were right when they said that there's a light that never goes out, and I hope to all that's holy and sacred in the world that if there is, we know how to hang on to it before it's too late.
Anyway, I am still always trying to embrace all those who need embracing, and I am trying to weather the storm.
Love always,