The Way the World Was Spun

Pandora found herself wrapped up in the news, day in, day out. She would wake when the sun was still low and let her face be illuminated as a finger lazily scrolled through article after article. It was the most subtle form of self-harm a person could perhaps perform on themselves, idly warping reality to reflect the headlines. This was how the weather began to turn.

When the sun got higher, Pandora would roll over, turning her back on the violent, turbulent world depicted on the screen. Here, she could hide away and pretend a quiet existence was worth the price of security.

At work – her desk set up haphazardly in the corner of the living room – she would find her finger straying to different tabs, where strangers would shout out their theories and truths and doctrine. If the headlines were the first drops of rain, poisoned with modern living, social media was surely a torrent. A storm was not far behind.

Sometimes, of course, she would find her way to the eye of that storm – a beautiful piece of prose, a show of support from a friend willing to wave a placard in protest, a picture of a cat set among flowers – only for the halcyon moment to pass, and the wind to pick up again.

Eventually, the day came where the storm painted the sky a dark grey, and the drizzle on the window seemed all the more poetic given the tears she'd cried over the news. Death, plagues, loneliness, rebellion, politics; roots were set deep in her mind, and these were all Pandora could consider.

She had, if she was being honest with herself, become blinded by the way the world was spun, each tale a reflection of somebody else's truth – somebody else’s pessimism. Pandora blinked away another tear and turned the screen away so that she could be alone for a moment.

The Way the World Was Spun

How could she participate in a world so dangerous? So unkind? So viciously cruel? The storm thickened, suffocating Pandora. The only act of rebellion left to her – to this broken, despairing woman – was to switch the screen off and roll away.

"It might be enough," she whispered into the bunched-up duvet, closing her eyes and dreaming of the days of ignorance just out of reach. How colourful they were; what a colourful lie was spun to keep her younger self happy.

There was, however, no way back. This was the way the world was spun now, and each day seem more blinded than the last.