There’s always a line when it comes to people. Certain limits of what’s supposed to be, and what isn’t. Groups and rules, lines where you’re supposed to be and what isn’t. But nothing ever fits neatly into boxes, does it? Stay in the lines they say, as your heart yearns for nothing more than the outside of it all. Keep it tight, zipped up and not deviating from the path just doesn’t fit, and any escape works. Even the dark ones that you’re told are dangerous.
So you take it. Break that line, forge your own way despite the warnings and the hands that always seem to try and drag you back. Sometimes you do it in secret, hiding it away from others and shunning the light of the road for other options. If they can’t see you, they can’t hurt you. Other times you face it head on, tackling it as it tries to tackle you.
Only difference is when the pain really kicks in.
If you work on the fringe as a secret, trying to keep to yourself and not alert the world at large to what you’re doing, it’s a recipe for disaster. There’s no secret that isn’t eventually revealed, and the consequences often aren’t worth it. People can charge out at you, fury blazing to life like a fire in a gasoline plant. They’ll seek to reset that safe line of theirs, where they pushed you out, by any means necessary.
Even if that means you’re swingin’ in the breeze.
And that damage lasts. Coiling around you, an anger that can’t ever be satisfied by letting things go. It worms it’s way into your heart, whispering things that push you to clash again and again. Fight more against them, make them feel the pain you did. Push more and more of yourself into that vitriolic hate and burn them all for ever crossing your path.
Before long, there won’t be anything to recognize in the mirror.
Or you can do it like I did. Horns down, clashing outta the gate. Every time you hear those words doubting you, step up to the plate and dish it back to them. Make the dopes rue the day that they thought they could move ya out the gate. It’s the thing about this world: be passive and get rolled over, or fight from the get go.
Each punch, each lead I followed, I fought my way for. I did private cases when the coppers didn’t think a broad could pull their weight. I didn’t just stay out there on the fringes, hoping that the world would leave me alone.
I carved my way out, cut myself loose.
The difference between the two is simple. One leaves you hanging, tangled up in anger and cycles of revenge that’ll render you a husk of yourself. The other leaves you with no strings attached, free in your lane.
And between you and me?
Better to be free and alive than dead and bound.