But since I held the ultimate chance of not walking through those doors, or running away once I was already in, Choice banned me from any self-pity or self-loathing, making of me the ultimate responsible of all.
When I regained consciousness, I recall the tears were no longer just on my heart, but now also ran down my face. The crime could never be undone. I had committed the worst case of theft a human being could ever accomplish, and the knowledge that I hadn't been the only one, made no difference to dress the wound forever opened, not in my body, but in my soul.
For theft, you see, is the worst crime of all.
When you steal a candy, you impede a shop owner of a profit he could otherwise put towards the up keep of his family.
But theft is not just the appropriation of something not entitled to the one performing or profiting from the action.
Theft has many forms, thus making it the most vile human crime.
A lie, for an instance, is the theft of knowledge, for it robs someone their right to the truth.
An assault robs someone the right of choice, and that's just on the surface. In many cases it can steal someone's identity, removing from them the sense of belonging, of placement, of self-love and of their will to live or even from the simple will to do anything at all.
A murder not only takes away someone's life, but also takes away the many human interactions both friends and enemies could hold with the now deceased one.
Abandonment is a deceitful theft, for it steals both from the victim and from the wrong-doer. The victim, restrained to never knowing the feeling of love and belonging, the wrong-doer not only robbing himself the chance of love and belonging, but also the chance of learning the surprising things one may achieve through commitment,. Both robbed of a future for no reason other than fear.
So as you see, theft is the most vile of all crimes, for at its essence, it encompasses them all.
And I am forever a criminal. But label is not of any importance. It's the full awareness that gnals my soul, killing me inside out without ever rendering me dead, for death in this case would be nothing but a show of compassion -- something I haven't earned at all.
I've known love and overcoming all of my life. More so, I've known overcoming through love my entire life. From being rigged to die, countless times, from birth, to being kept alive by a mother's devotion even when the odds were not in favour. Becoming trapped in a body that failed basic functions, and yet overcoming that by the love of the same mother who, despite all other never-light life's challenges, never gave me up and, most importantly, never let me gave up on myself. From surviving poverty, starvation and the imminent prospect of lack of alphabefization and education, solely because that one parent, alone in all her actions, refused to give up even when the darkest of times tried to take the best of her.
So if anything, my brave, persistent and loving mother showed to me, my entire life, that overcoming is nothing but a choice you make every day, despite any fear or unfortunate events life throws on our way. I became living proof that the sun shines after the storm, and that the wreckage can be dealt with, sometimes even reused for better days.
Despite it all, t'was in lieu of fear, that I walked in that room and consented that my own only true creation be removed from me.
Out of fear of exposing my creation to a hopeless, monstrous and decaying life, I became a monster myself, decaying through a hopeless guilt and everlasting awareness about the life I robbed, an echo hurting from a wound I crafted myself in my own soul, the price for the most unforgiving choice of all.
