My Smile [Short Fiction]

Anger- is always considered as a negative emotion. It probably is. But I find it incredibly powerful unlike the common belief that the one that gets angry loses the battle. There is immense strength in knowing in a second you couldn’t care enough to rip a person apart either in words or otherwise and you are holding back yourself because of a thin line of thought which tells you not to. There is immense strength when that line is stretched, tested time and again and you are pushed against it almost making way through it but bouncing back to safety region way below its limit of elasticity. There is immense power in that tolerance in that control you have while maintaining a clam exterior while you are molten and burning inside. There is remarkable amount of pleasure to smile at a person you almost have the urge to engage in a once for all battle with. Smile and built that tension. That has an effect of sharpening one’s knife before a ghastly battle.  Just that empowering feeling in knowing the damage you can but will never cause.

I held it all close. Not letting a drop of emotion spill. For fourteen years. I just smiled. Smiled at that one person-irrespective of what he did, irrespective of the unjustified emotional wounds that have left my soul in tatters. There was just one day when he felt his words and actions wouldn’t suffice- he decided to leave an imprint of his hand on my cheek- unjustified again. I gripped his hand right in the middle of the air. I looked at him and I smiled. It gave a satisfaction that people who fight back don’t know. He got the message. I wouldn't let him win. He kept poking words, abuses beautifully wrapped in sarcastic comments and public embarrassments over years in front of people from all walks of life and people of all kinds. But I just smiled.

Today he is reduced to manic trying all sorts of tactics to undo what cannot be undone. He has failed his innumerable attempts to prove it was all in my mind.  He has failed at fooling himself and me that life was always normal. And he failed to understand that the darkest walls I built around myself will never break. He has failed. And Me? I smile. My smile has undergone a million alterations has undergone various shades of expressions- suppressed anger, happiness of being invincible and lot more that cannot be explained but can only be felt. Today my smile emerges from the confusion and desire I have managed to create in his head and that new definition of being powerless that is visible in his eyes. From that words that leave his lips as abuses but fall on my ears like a purrs of a lost injured cat. It emerges from being able to look right into his eyes and see him breaking. It emerges from the indomitable strength I have found in resistance. It emerges from still being able to be myself around other people.

I have been complimented enough about my smile from people who do not have a clue about the deep dark emotional labyrinths I walked through. People figure it out in their own ways and assign attributes to my personality. They tell me my smile is charming. And what can I say? I just smile. And this smile breaks into a chuckle and now a laugh!