I am a beautiful girl. I am a smart girl. I know there's a more popular phrase for this, a phrase that, according to many, should be a compliment to girls like me. But I hate it. I think only fools say that and wearing this stupid compliment is itself a disgrace to its literal meaning (if it even has one).
And no, this isn't a cheap attempt to drive sympathy towards me in any way. Give your sympathy to the real ugly. They need it more. Go and say that the inside is what matters. That beauty is in the eyes of the beholder. There could be a grand total of zero beholder for their beauty, but beauty of course is always in the eyes of the beholder. Never anywhere else.
I am confused these days. Not that this is my first time discovering beauty doesn’t always promise peace. These days I don’t care. I don’t feel my qualities. I still have this face though, a face with symmetry of the twilight, hair as soft and flowing as underwater algae, eyes of a leopard, and body as prosperous as some fluffy clouds. These perfections are just here in me, but I am not them. I am more, something else, apart from these features.
I know what you are thinking. Pretty lady discovers consciousness and is shocked. I am familiar with the stereotype. People think I don’t possess any personality, am a picky natural villain, an if-else monotonic robot with intelligence of a potato.
Two weeks ago, one boy from my class died in a terrible accident. I was on the spot, about 10 steps in front of him on the zebra crossing. A car from the right didn’t stop. It skidded over the black-top as the driver furiously rotated the wheels. Within seconds, the boy’s body lay like an inflated jelly on the road and his head started to leak. I stood still and took a few steps when people started running towards him. The police arrived soon. I looked at his closed eyes from behind a woman's shoulder. I had known him for two years, but we never spoke. They dragged his body into the ambulance and then drove away. Crowds back to their work, their faces hung down, but all in possession of a new tale to tell.
The next day our college gave us a holiday. Then the next day we lit candles in his memory. I lighted one too. Then from the next day, some talked about him sometimes, but I didn’t, and anyone who engaged with me in conversation didn't bring him there.
I know he loved me. Okay, it wasn’t “love” as some claim it to be an act of watering a flower instead of plucking it, but he loved me in a sense people love their classmates. He was too afraid to talk but I knew about it. I could read his body language, his behavior, his mannerism whenever I was around. He probably thought I would never consider him as my equal in attractiveness and so I would not love him back, and he would only make a fool of himself if he ever confessed to me. He was right. I showed no interest in him because, I won’t lie, he was ugly. Unattractive. Unpleasant to look at. That was all the fault there was, I guess. No matter how much I wanted to look at his inner beauty, his personality, or whatever I should have looked at, I couldn’t see anything past his ugly appearance. Maybe I didn’t even look in the first place, because I always tried to avoid his presence. Hideous. Just plain ugly. His eyes were uneven, his nose was weird. He had no facial symmetry, his body was weak, and his hair was a disaster. In the consoling language, I was not a beholder at all for his beauty.
But what gives me the right to call this boy ugly? Who even am I? You do not need answers to these questions. Think. This is the birthright of the human race. Maybe even of some animals. This was the birthright of that boy as well. Why did he love me when there were other girls in the class who were equally accessible to him in theory? Why did he love someone whom he didn’t know, didn’t ever talk with? It was all because of my face and my body. A hypocrite cancels a hypocrite. I am sorry he died. He didn’t deserve that at all, but that doesn’t make him a victim in this grand game. He wanted me to fulfill him, to prove whether to himself or others, that he could pull this 10/10, that he was enough and worthy.
I know it’s bad, but I can’t see past his ugliness. And I don’t even wish I could. I enjoy being this way. I don’t even try. His death is not supposed to change me. Nothing is supposed to change me. Because I want better, I want the best, and I have got only one life. He was ugly, and I am not. There’s no reason for me to compromise.
He surely had an interest in knowing me. Perhaps if I had given him some obvious hints, he would have made some moves. He would have dedicated his time to getting to know me and figure out what kind of person I am. And as time went on, he could have given me all the love I wanted. Well, he could have killed me also. Why do I only have to be positive? Just because he had an ugly appearance, I have to consider he had a beautiful and kind heart? If we consider human psychology, then there were more chances of him being a devil from inside. He was an ugly boy who had always been neglected, rejected, who always had reasons to envy his friends. Wouldn’t this boy want revenge? Wouldn’t this boy want to burn the world more than being kind? So I am not wrong to seek the same love from someone better-looking. It’s scientifically safer.
But none of this over-analyzing is important now. He won’t come back to life, and he probably was a kind boy. But should I change? If yes, then how can I? How can I learn to see in a way that looks physically and biologically impossible? And what do I get in return? Why should I compromise? How can I stand with an ugly man and look in the mirror and meet my eyes and be proud? I know there are people who claim to see everyone equal, but why do I have to be like them? And are they really not pretending? How is it possible?
We all are what we are and where and with whom we grow up, but we can also imagine an ideal version of a good human, and if we keep thinking we can even see the differences, and maybe improve. I already have everything. I have the looks and the brain. If I only train myself to find beauty in ugly faces, I will be unstoppable. I don’t have to live inside these narrow walls. I can break them, stand proud and can stare at the Sun directly. Perhaps his death is supposed to change me. His death might be my turning point. Doesn’t justify his death as a good thing, and if I could trade my willingness to improve for his life, I would do that in a heartbeat. I still can acknowledge his death, make it count, though I will probably forget all of this in the future when I am caught up with things of life, but now, this is enough.
So, would I have given him a chance if he had only suffered a scratch and came back to college after a few days? Of course not. I would have kept ignoring him like I ignore others like him. This is the truth. He must stay dead. But now that I have thought of all this, he can be brought back to live. Yes, I made it all up. I am staring at the “hi” he messaged me an hour ago and thinking whether to see it.
