An identity is not a name spoken in faith.
It isn't a lifelong goal, nor an expectation placed on yourself.
An identity is what you resonate with when you think about who you are.
A quiet hum to a song without words.
Others can dance to it, but they can't sing it with you.
It can live in a job, a family, or even in the clothes hanging in your closet.
No one can truly define identity. But they will tell you this-
it can change.
Like clouds shifting in the sky.
Like seconds slipping through a day.
It never disappears. It only reshapes itself to survive your desire.
The world had already decided who he was.
A weirdo.
Someone you shouldn't let your loved ones associate with.
When he was younger, it hurt. He didn't understand why they treated him the way they did. But with each passing incident, clarity crept in.
They just didn't like him.
He was different, they said.
He remembered the first time a boy shoved him into a ditch and scraped his arm raw. He cried that day- not from the pain, but from the look on the boy's face.
Pure disgust.
His father had lifted him into his arms and told him something he called the unwritten rules of survival:
If you want to be safe in this world, you must be loved, respected, or feared.
The boy saw no choice in any of them.
They didn't love him.
He wasn't extraordinary enough to be respected.
And he wasn't cruel enough to be feared.
He felt doomed.
His mother, however, had no patience for philosophy.
She marched to the houses of anyone who bullied him and tore into them without restraint.
Once, she even cornered the priest at church- scolding her publicly while her husband tried to pull her away and the children watched in stunned silence.
He was twenty-four now.
Too old to cry to his parents.
But the pain hadn't aged. It still felt the same as when he was small and helpless.
Only the bullies had changed.
Now strangers could wound him with a single comment online. And foolishly- desperately- he never stopped looking for friendship.
That was the only explanation he could give himself as he lay abandoned in a narrow alley.
His body screamed in protest. Vision blurred. Blood trailed down his neck. His lip was split, his jaw displaced. Bruises bloomed dark along his ribs and back, skin torn open in places that burned with every breath.
You'd think there would be a limit to cruelty.
There wasn't.
They left him broken, violated, emptied of dignity. The world reduced him to pain, to silence, to a body that no longer felt like his own.
He could only smell blood.
Through the haze, he saw her-
the woman in dark attire, descending quietly from above.
He managed a bitter smile.
The woman looked at the man in front of her for a second, "You really persevered"
The man wanted to laugh, "Persevered? For what?" He spattered blood, "Only to die like a secret shameful love affair?"
The woman paused. "I can wait for you-"
The man interrupted, desperate. "Don't." He continued, "There's nothing else for me to do here"
The woman looked at his soul and yes, they all agreed that it was time.
"Are you ready, Mathew?" she asked gently and he nodded.
At that exact moment, fireworks cracked open the sky- color and noise spilling above the city.
And finally, finally people turned and noticed that there was someone in the alley.
Even if he was just a body and a story to tell.
His restless soul was finally at peace.