Ace's Useless Journal, Take Three

[[Underneath Ace's pillow sits a purple 1-subject notebook (procured from the general store). It's covered in cutesy stickers (also from the general store.) Inside the front cover: Ace Finn's Useless Journal, Take Three (Takes One and Two are probably in a dump somewhere.) The back cover, inside and out, is filled with colored pencil doodles.]]

I've been here for a while. Never mind where here is, and never mind how long a while is. I am in a new place, though it's still the looney bin, but I'm alive, and I suppose I'm probably well. Though, they might say differently. That 'well' and 'Ace' shouldn't be used in the same sentence unless 'well' is modified by 'not,' or 'well' is a noun and not an adjective. I am well, though; she told me so. I'm alive, so I'm well.

Before I was well, we came here on a plane. I started to panic and cry and pull at my hair. I wished they wouldn't do this to me. When I heard the turbines kick on, I had to bite back a scream and I hoped for one of three things: to be let off, to die like I should have originally, or for one of those needles. I knew they weren't going to let me off, and death was for only God to decide, so I begged to be sedated so that I wouldn't have to endure that rush of painful memories. And that's all I remember. I'm guessing someone felt bad for me and actually did it. Or maybe I cried myself to sleep and imagined that I was sedated, though that's not as likely. Anyway. When I awoke, we were already landed and coming here. I felt really groggy, but calm.

After being given a room, I started unpacking all my things, like I guess everyone else was doing. As I picked up everything, I was making notes in my old journal about who whatever certain thing should go to if I ended up crossing over. My pretty dresses would go to Emmy, some of the more flowy things would go to Hope. All the keepsakes I'd gotten from my mother's room before I went to foster care, I listed those and wrote my grandparents' address to send them back to. Except the engagement ring; that would go to Emmy. I suppose it still will, one day. Accessories would go to whoever wanted them. Any evidence that I was ever alive, I wanted to go toward making someone smile, because I couldn't anymore.

But now I can. And now I do, fairly often, actually. For a while, it hurt. But now I'm getting used to it again. I doubt that I'll ever be as smiley and happy-go-lucky as I used to be, but even if this is as good as it will ever get, it's still good. I can feel again, and some of it is sadness and rage and regret, but most of it is hope and love and some semblance of normality.

I think that visiting Lux was probably one of the best things I've done in the past two years. I wonder, had I gone to someone before, would they have been able to give me Ma's message? Or was it situational, and only Lux could have done it because she was the one who was there at the time Ma wanted to say it?

I'm just glad that she didn't try to tell me that I had to forget her and be happy. I'd be like... well, how could you tell your son who was your world and your best friend to forget you? There were people who have tried to tell me that I had to forget her. Forgetting her would be like denying a part of myself. It would be an embodiment of the thing that I was convinced was sending me to Hell in the first place.

I've learned never to refuse or take for granted anything given freely and selflessly.

Also, I am not the world. I'm not sure if I ever really thought I was, but sometimes I did some extremely selfish things and didn't think about how many people it would hurt. Or more importantly, how important that the people it would hurt really were to me. They allowed me to lean on them for a while, and I blew them off.

Never again.

Anyway.

Now, I'm just so worried about Emmy. She's okay, I guess. She'll heal, but she's upset, and I don't know what to do about it. I think this goes back to me falling into whatever dark place I came from. When I was upset, I didn't want to talk to anyone. So should I give her space? I take her presents now and then, like when I can go out in town I grab some candy for her, stuff like that. But the thing is I'm kind of afraid to approach her about it. I don't know, does she want me to talk to her, or does she want to talk to me more when she's ready?

And I'd probably just do something dumb like tell her to be glad that it wasn't any worse. Even though that's true. But I guess for now I won't volunteer my stupid, useless advice.

There's another Japanese guy on the island. Well, he's older than me. He's a teacher. But he went to the beach in a dinosaur costume, and we spent the day chasing seagulls, screaming at them. He's pretty cool. I call him Kyouryuu, because I don't know his real name. Oh well.

And that's me caught up, really.

Oh. Yeah, and I'm irked. Ick. A lot of my cranes got smooshed and torn and otherwise rendered unworthy in the move. Crane count is back to 489. Fuck. I had over 600!!

Then again, I have fourteen months here. I can make the rest in that time, easy.