There it is again. Like a bad silver coin that bodes the worst of luck but seems to be the only thing keeping me from complete desolation. I think it has been my problem all along, in fact, I know it has and ever will it be.

I won't give it up and I won't let it go. I can't. It is my last bastion of defense. It walls me in as sure as it walls everything else out, but it will be the last thing I allow to be conquered. After everything else falls, everything else crumbles and withers and is stripped away layer by layer, it stands defiant still. It is a curse, a veil and a champion all in one. It is my salvation and my inevitable downfall. The tightrope I walk in order to survive.

What are you so afraid of? How do I answer that question without sounding a fool? Everything. I am afraid of everything. I am afraid of myself. Fear has shaped the stones of my wall. I have layered them high with it, bolstered their cracks and crevices a little at a time and polished them to such an impenetrable shine that not even I can see what truly lies behind it anymore.

Does that make me foolish? Yes. Does it make me alone? Eventually it always will. Do I loathe it? Oh, with an unabated passion. But I will keep my wall of pride, for it saves me.