Happiness
By Dana Quell

	I sit in this lonely darkness, totally alone.  Their voices float up to me from the
 downstairs, laughing, loving.  The few occasions that they have talked to me, their voices 
have never had that quality, that caring, warm tone.  It was always with the utmost 
gruffness and the distinct manner of forced kindness that they approached me, and they 
always kept their distance.  
	They talk amidst themselves, and sound truly happy.  But what is happiness, if not 
what you make of it?  My situation may not bring others joy, but it does not bring me 
regret.  I am the forgotten one, and I am completely happy being so.  My free time is 
alone, and though others may not be kind to me, they are never rude.  Rudeness might 
actually grab my attention and turn my rage against them, and that is something they 
don't want.  That is why I am the forgotten one, because of my temper.  
	My temper is not a thing I like to boast about, but sometimes it is necessary to
 'warn' people before they choose to anger me.  And then there are those people who 
ignore my warnings, and anger me anyway.  They become examples, ones that other 
people like to forget.  In forgetting the examples, they forget me.
	Now I sit, forgotten.  Alone and happy being so, I can't help but wonder.  There are 
so many things to wonder about, and I wonder what everyone else must wonder at least 
once in their lives.  I wonder 'what if'.  What if I had kept my temper in check for those 
examples, what if I had been more amiable, less churlish.  Would I not be alone right now, 
in the darkness, forgotten?  Would I be happy?
	Then I realize that no one is ever truly happy, and that whatever they think, they 
are restless on the inside.  I am as happy as I can be.  And that's all that truly matters.