finding your way in the gloom

This is a story about Amethyst's struggle with the Gloom.
It came to us at work today as we were feeling like we were slipping away - there was a death last week and we were not feeling too great at all.
We'd like to share it as our expressiveness
xx
Harri, lexy, amethyst
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Finding your way in the Gloom

The Gloom is not a very nice place to be. Amethyst first came across it a very long time ago, and decided that it was a place she didn't want to go to again.
She was looking for somebody she had lost. Nobody would tell her where to look for him. Her parents had been so distant, her friends were in their own little worlds. And she retreated back into hers for a while.
The Gloom found her there though. Through a crack in the side of her world, the grey clouds of the Gloom came through. She saw them. She went towards them.
Intrigued, she slipped through into the strange new world inbetween, the strange dimension beckoning her. She walked on in the mist, trying to see more clearly, although it was terribly, terribly hard.
All around she could hear the whispers of little sprites, each one trying to make her stop and listen. Her parents had told her not to talk to strangers, so she kept on walking and tried to ignore them.
One sprite in particular was determined to make her stop. It danced around her like a fairy until finally, she stopped and asked it what it wanted.
It told her.
'You do not belong here, little girl. Go back the way you came. You do not belong here with the dead.'
Amethyst stopped, her amethyst heart beating fast. She looked around and saw the faces of dead people behind the mist.
'What am I doing here?' She said, her voice trembling and worried. The spirits of the dead surged up against her, and she felt something terrible - pain and suffering and misery. It was not the same as the pain she felt when she grazed her knee at play - this was an eternity of suffering, something entirely different. In amongst the faces of the dead she saw that person she had been looking for, and she saw that he was one of them. She saw that her parents and friends had denied her the truth, and it was probably because they did not want to feel the Gloom creep upon them; they wanted to forget about it.
The feeling was immense, and she stumbled. She did not want to be there any more, but the Gloom was bottomless, and all she could do was float, weightless and scared.

She could not remember how she returned, only that it took a long, long time. When she was back in the world, she felt grey. Usually full of colour, now all she felt was grey.
Outside her brothers and sisters were playing. She stayed in all day, drawing the same pictures over and over again, lying on her bed with her cushions and fluffy toy pandas for comfort. The comfort of these seemingly-mundane things stopped her from going completely grey, although the Gloom would keep seeping out from the crack in the sides of her little world.

As time went by the wounds healed, and she found ways to stop the Gloom from seeping out again. She would burn incense, find support in the healing words of songs, make new friends and play new music, create beautiful beautiful pictures and all these things helped block the cracks in her little world.
But still the Gloom lay beyond it. As she got older she realised just how easy it was to allow the Gloom access again. Sometimes all it took was a mean word from somebody, or a sad chain of events, and she would find herself turning grey once more, as the Gloom escaped and seeped into her bones.

No matter how many pictures Amethyst painted, or people she invented, or songs she played, no matter how many times she used these things to tape over and seal the cracked doorway into the Gloom, it could still break through every time something went wrong. But sometimes, sometimes it was all she could do.

Sorry to hear someone closed to you died, glad you can still express yourself so creatively though

We really love the story and the way you write, it gives us inspiration too! We're sorry you were feeling so awful and that Amethyst struggles like this, but we're glad you have this outlet ..

*hugs* for you