Pushed away: Maple Sugar

It moves toward company and dreads the closed door, watching for the invitation that does not arrive and carrying a low melancholy about it that persists even when the room is full. Love was issued conditionally in early childhood, particularly by the mother, so being included never settled into a fact and has to be re-established continuously, and each exclusion reads as the standing verdict being confirmed. What it asks for is to be the one who initiates the gathering, rather than the one who waits to be counted in.

Tell me there was a gathering I wasn't asked to and I'll think about it for days.

It echoes Echo, who could no longer begin anything and could only answer what was said to her, following at a distance and hoping to be addressed first. The form implies a task: to speak first, in one's own words, once.