#WritingWonders 3.13 —Interview question 3.
After the question about my parents ended with two sobbing idiots being recorded for all of Home to see, I gathered the interview script from the floor and thumbed through it crosslegged. I would not let the Director of Home render me relatable to her citizens by making her sharp tool into some pathetic blithering fool.
I handed over the page, tapping the line. I resumed my chair.
"N-name the three most important things in your life."
I'd picked the question, but I had to think about it. I had to admit, to myself at least, revenge had been and still was up there. I now understood that Rainy Days only thought of the well-being of Home and humanity, and no individual—not my parents, not me—would ever stand in her way. But she was the keystone that kept it all running, so making her pay was beyond me at the moment. I wasn't going to blurt that because no person would then let me execute the power given me to save the world from onrushing disaster. I'd taught Rainy Days a lesson when I surprised her by fighting back, throwing her to the pavement and hitting her with her crown. The broadsheets had published the images. I'd have to settle for that.
Eventually, I answered, "Until a few weeks ago, I'd have said magic, solitude, and being left alone. Recent events have changed me, though."
"Like nearly dying?" Clifftown helpfully asked.
"I knew I was really sick." Sepsis. "I had to save him, though." I had to stop prioritizing others. Was this the fourth or fifth time I'd almost died? We both laughed nervously.
I continued, "I've only recently learned I have friends, though I can't always see why people trust me, or why I deserve them, but I accept I have friends now. I've realized they are very valuable to me. So that's number one."
I steepled my hands in front of my mouth, allowing my subconscious to battle it out before saying through my fingers, "I can perform miracles. I will never be chattel because of that, and I am very grateful even to the man who tried to murder me and inadvertently taught me that lesson."
My interviewer paled. After the last two questions, no doubt she'd begun to expect a third explosion that would surely ruin her reputation for life, if not merely her career.
"Third," I said, "Most importantly, I learned in the last two weeks that I can love, am capable of it, and capable of being loved. I can open my heart. I have a definition of it in my head, and I know what it feels like, and that it is beyond friendship—and while often physical, it is so much more. And. When people share it, it not only changes your world, it changes the world."
[ In away, this MC is a lot like me, and likely more on the spectrum than I am. I really did have to learn what love was and define it in my head, and that I could open my heart. —RS ]
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