I Will Gain Control

"I never would've guessed that you were a mother." I said to Gleam.

"Well, you're the only one that knows about this," Gleam said. "Not even the gods themselves know about this."

Something like seems a little risky even for Gleam, but something tells me that she has this under control. Besides, it's not really my place to judge. Not that I really had a right to anyway.

"Do you mind if I sit outside for a minute?" I asked Gleam.

"Of course not, take your time." she said.

"Thank you."

I walked out of the cabin and into the too perfect weather of the outside. The gentle warm breeze, the beautiful multi-colored trees and flowers, the unique insects buzzing around. It was the peak definition of paradise.

But the beauty of the outside can never heal my heart on the inside. I came outside because I wanted to think, but instead all I could ever do was cry. I cried as the memories I had of Leonna flooded my head once again. The first time we met. The first time we trained. The way she comforted me. The way she kissed me. The cut and embarrassed face that she would make. Her impenetrable courage and strength.

All of those memories gave me more and more motivation to just keep crying. I didn't even notice Shana hugging my back until I stopped sobbing. The tears, however, never stopped.

I turned to Shana and wrapped my arms around her, not even caring that my face was buried into her chest. I just wanted to hide my face.

"How bad does this hurt you?" Shana asked.

"It hurts...so much... So much...that...I can't take it."

"That's a good thing. That means that you cared so much about this person. Please don't let anyone tell you otherwise. What you think, say, and feel is all controlled by you. Don't think that other people can control you, because the only one that can control you...is you."

Looking back, I've always let people control my life. I let my parents decide what I was going to do for my future life, I let my classmates control me me into doing them favors, and I even let that girl, Karen, control me into getting her whatever she wanted.

I ignored people in high school because didn't want to be betrayed, but I never felt like I had control of myself. I even let that crazy blond girl control me into watching her do vulgar acts in front of me. I felt like all I was able to control was my anger and rage towards myself, but even then it felt like the anger was controlling me instead.

I never once had any sort of stable control of myself, and I need to change that. Leonna died because I had no control, but I will never let that happen again. I need to learn how to control this anger inside of me. I can't rely on anyone else to help me. I have to do this all on my own.

I let go of Shana and stood up and walked back inside the cabin. I marched straight over to Gleam and made my declaration.

"If I'm going to fight the Army of Darkness as well as the Devil, then I'm going to need to gain control of myself," I said to her. "I'm going to train until I learn how to control my own emotions. I'm going to train until I learn how to turn this anger into a controllable weapon. I'm going to train...until I learn to stop letting other people control my life and learn to control it myself."

Gleam stared at me for a little bit, then smiled.

"Very well then," she said. "Let's see how well you can control the black fire within you."