1 Melancholia

In a large room, on a large King size bed, a woman lay, contemplating her life. The room she was in was furnished in a bohemian style and had royal blue, silver and beige as base colors. It was a wonder of a room, fit for royalty.

The woman lay in bed, face down with her feet dandling off to the side. She was covered in an alpaca wool blanket and was lazing on the fully made bed. The bed had about eight pillows, most of which were ornamental. The barely seen sheets were made from Egyptian cotton while the bed cover was made of silk, hand embroidered with white gold threads and different crystals.

While the silk felt nice to the touch, the gold thread and crystals, did not. Since Daphne did not want to mess up the bed, she had loosely placed the blanket over the bed before crashing in it.

In one week, Daphne would turn thirty. This was a major life event for her. Daphne would no longer be 'in her twenties,' but 'in her thirties.' Even now, she still did not truly feel like a proper adult, but her age said otherwise.

The past few years had been 'lived', she could not say she hadn't lived. She kept herself busy. She had quite the portfolio and the reputation in the higher circles at this point. After getting married, she kept herself busy with investments, charities and parties.

As the day she became thirty-years-old got closer, she was forced to realize, she had not been happy for a long time.

She knew she had not been happy, it was not much of a secret, and she had mostly had the mindset of 'fake it till you make it' ever since her teenage years. She had ran away from the fact that she was unhappy by keeping herself busy. She wore fake smiles daily, was cordial, was occupied with many events and had endless accomplishments, but all the faking did not bring any happiness unlike the saying promised; if anything, she felt like she had lost a piece of herself and that she was no longer in-tune with her emotions.

Daphne had become depressive, unenthusiastic and extraordinarily sarcastic and depreciative of everything. Being like this felt foreign to her, as if she was not herself, and this sentiment had created a seed of self-hate.

Daphne used to hate hypocrites, she used to hate disingenuous people. The fact that she became what she hated had not escaped her.

After a certain point, all events, all trials and errors seemed the same. Different people wore the same faces.

Was realizing this what it meant to grow up and see the world? Her world had lost its luster slowly, but surely. Things that used to surprise or amaze her now seemed mundane.

After much reading and contemplating, she finally accepted that she was depressed, sexually frustrated and simply frustrated in general.

Daphne barely saw her husband. As she lay in bed questioning her level of attractiveness, she wondered if it was true, after all, that her husband only married her for her social standing.