15 oral reprimands. 2 calls to the Prefect’s office. 6 poor people who cried their eyes out. 4 shattered lives.

The venom that was Dana Valencia. The venom that was me.

I don’t exactly call myself a bully. Hell, I didn’t have any reason to hate. I didn’t have any “scars” or whatever shit “damaged” people have gone through in their distinct morbid pasts. Hell, I am not weak. I am sure I wouldn’t end up like one of those wretched people who cut their wrists, smoke like a fucking human chimney, and wrap themselves in black faking the slurring talk.

They say that things happen for a reason. Dark things happen for just as a dark reason. People hurt themselves for a dark reason, take drugs for a dark reason, drink until their livers give up for a dark reason, and make other people feel like shit for a dark reason.

I don’t really have a dark reason. At least, that is what I believe.

But I admit that I might be mad for being callous to other people’s pain. I might be mad for being a tad too interested in other people’s weaknesses.

“You are a very dangerous one, Dana Valencia,” a friend once told me. If it weren’t for her chuckling three seconds after, my heart would have stopped beating and I’d die right then and there for the bluntness of her words. There was a noticeable tinge of bitterness in her voice that she resiliently tried to suppress and the bitter taste crept along my spine up to my deadened brain. Flashbacks then plunged into my mind like spiteful daggers thrown mercilessly. It’s true; I had been a ruthless bitch. Many, many times before.

And as much as I try to hide guilt from everything and everyone I’ve fucked up, and as much as I would love to move on and breathe in an untroubled life as a harmless, nontoxic human being, the thought that I am indeed a “living venom” crashes upon me like an unforgiving reality.

The venom that was is Dana Valencia. The venom that was is me.

For some stupid and unexpected reason, I am held responsible for other people’s lives. So that entitles me of causing them enough pain, even shattering them to pieces, and this is what frightens me the most. If I started to care, if I started to hold onto them, if I started to share my life with them, I have also begun to contaminate them that might also possibly destroy them in the end. I don’t know what people should call me. A Patron tequila shot? A conspirator? A parasite? A vampire, perhaps? I haven’t got any idea but I’m akin to all of those treacherous things. Once I’ve discovered your weak spot, I will go pacing around that and if I fancy attacking you, I would use it shamelessly against you. It’s alarming, even for me. And this is exactly why I refuse to be in a fucking intense linkage with any breathing creature. I might as well sleep with a pillow or talk to a brick wall. That way, there’s no “hurting the other one” involved.

The venom that was is will always be Dana Valencia. The venom that was is will always be me.

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You have been warned.