Caitlin Smith

Caitlin was the competition winner of Laura Dockrill's masterclass 'Finding Your Inner Voice' with 'A Quiet Child'

Caitlin Smith is a biological sciences student at the University of Exeter who spends much of her free time writing short form fiction and poetry, which she often shares online. She finds herself inspired by listening to trees, talking to the moon, and a general fascination about why people act the way they do. 

The What If YOU Spoke workshops encouraged her to use all her senses in her writing, allowing exploration of more affective description in amongst the narrative she is used to. 

Currently Caitlin is writing a podcast following an aromantic-asexual protagonist navigating her complex feelings for her nonbinary best friend (@DearAlliePod), which she hopes to begin recording soon.

-----

A Quiet Child

I know what I want to say. Well, I feel what I want to say. Maybe I could write it down if you gave me time, and space, and a promise you wouldn’t show my parents. But I can’t just say it.

Why don’t we start with how I’m feeling? That’s what will make you empathise with me, right? Help you to understand. Well, I am feeling bad.

That’s not very descriptive, is it? Like I said, or at least like I’m thinking, I’m not very good with putting all this into words. Let me try again.

I feel like I want to be small, so small that you don’t see me or notice me or ask me to do anything. Not anything bad, not anything too difficult, just anything. Like talk.

I feel like every movement and sound I make is amplified a thousand times and while you’re looking at me it only gets worse. If I hid in a nook somewhere and shut out the light and dampened the sound with blankets piled on top of me and you were behind a closed door with your back turned and your eyes shut and your hands over your ears then moving would be okay. Maybe even an ‘mhm’ would be possible. But as we are, with you standing in front of me, I’m like a wall.

That’s how you described it. You said it was like there was a wall that I built between us and you were trying to break through but I just kept building it back up. I suppose that’s fair. This is my fault, my choice, my wall. I’m the one making this difficult.

But I can’t stop it. I can’t just “say what’s on my mind”. I’ve never been able to and maybe I never will. People say it’s childish. That I’m not a little kid anymore so refusing to talk isn’t going to get me anywhere. I should be able to order what I want in a cafe or speak to a receptionist or ask where the toilet is but, I can’t. The words are sometimes there but they won’t come out. I won’t let them. So here we are, in a standoff. I won’t speak so you can’t help because you don’t know what the problem is.

Maybe that’s what I can put to words next: my problem, the reason behind the shutdown. My problem is that I’m no good. I’m good at some things, like singing and writing and science. But, I’m not good at the violin or drawing or dance. And I don’t know how to be bad at things. I’d much rather do nothing at all than do something badly, especially when you’re here looking at me. You won’t tell me I’m bad outright. I’m old enough to know teachers don’t say that. But you will say that I could ‘put in more effort’ or ‘practice a bit harder’. But to practice means to do the things badly before I do them well and like I said, I really can’t bear to do them badly so I just won’t do them at all. I’ll just stand in front of you and stare at you and you’ll get frustrated.

And what if I finally do find the words and think them out properly? I still won’t be able to say them. Because saying ‘I’m no good at this and it upsets me to the point where I won’t even try.” would only make me more upset.

Saying “Looking at myself like this hurts me more than it does you. I know I’m not communicating but you don’t want to hear all the things I think about myself right now. I am bad, I am weak, and for that I am less worthy” would probably upset you too. Grown-ups always get upset when I have something to say about how I feel.

And, the last thing I need when I’m trying to be small and unnoticed, is for us all to start crying. Everyone notices a crying little girl. You can’t ignore that. So, I keep it inside, try to ignore the prickling in my eyes, and push those words back down where they came from.

Instead, I just stare at you. Decide that looking apathetic is better than vulnerable. Until you get mad or give up and send me back to my lesson so we can repeat this all again next week.

I’m sorry. I don’t want to be like this. But it’s the only way I know how to be. Maybe everyone’s right. I’m 11 now, I should just grow up.

© Caitlin Smith, 2021