Chapter from a book that doesn't exist

The late morning light streams in through the blinds and stripes the bed. It looks like jail bars standing between me and the golden glow of freedom. I’m amused by the ironic shadow in the same way you laugh at your boss’ jokes out of obligation. The sun has tried to jostle me awake with a sense of humour, but this play on "mental prison" is some stale material. I lay there, blinking slowly, considering my options. I decide to close my eyes again and mash my face deeper into the pillow. My senses are muffled as my head plunges into a dark and quiet universe. This only lasts a minute until I start to suffocate. I crane my neck back to the side, sucking in cool air and adjusting to the light. There is a piece of fluff on the pillow next to me that I twirl in my fingers. I’m putting off getting up. Twirling this fluff is the most interesting thing I will do all day. What’s the rush?

After some deliberation, I emerge from the comfort of my cocoon. It’s amazing how uncomfortable a bed becomes when you’re not supposed to be in it. Once the cycle of sleep has completed itself, it becomes a hostile environment. The sheets rub you the wrong way and your body can’t relax into a position. Silently, you are being asked to leave and come back when it is appropriate. The motivation I can’t find in any other aspect of my life comes flooding into this moment—to find a way around this. I will be in this bed whenever I please, and I will like it. I should still have goals, and this seems like an achievable one.

I change out of my pyjamas and into a loose pair of sweats. By definition, this is “getting dressed”, there’s no stipulation about buttons or denim needing to be involved. Some people would try to convince me otherwise. Thankfully, I will not be seeing any of these people today. So there, I have done it. We’re starting off the day on an unexpected high note.

I go downstairs, moving consciously onto each step in my sock feet. Involuntary thoughts of slipping and falling, then injuring or killing myself violently in a split second, cross my mind, as they often do. I shoot them back like Buckley’s—rough going down but at least it’s over quickly. My mom is snipping the stems of flowers into the sink. One of her antique vases sits on the counter, waiting to be filled and brought to life. I envy my mother in this way. The simplicity of an antique vase and fresh flowers is joy-inducing. She is entirely satisfied by subtle instances of beauty and nature. She makes room for this joy to last. Not me, who disrupts the peace like a dog that barks at the birds and shits on the garden. She fluffs her arrangement, making it just so, and turns as she hears me slump into the kitchen.

“Morning, sweetheart. There’s something to start your day, eh?” She sets it in the middle of the counter, beaming.

“Pretty.” I say, and make my way over to the toaster.

“Can I make you anything?” She stands there, attentive, and I wish she would ignore me.

I open a bag of bread without looking at her, ready to deflect anything that comes my way and radiating tension that I’m hoping she picks up on.

"Nope.”

She takes the note, and starts wiping down the counter, noticeably dimmer. The tightness I just held in my body goes limp. I was a wet towel wrung over her head, rendering myself mustier with guilt by the minute. I ask and answer the usual questions: Why can’t you be nice? Is it because you feel like shit? Great, now she does too, and that’s because of you. I slam the lever down on the toaster.

I’m suddenly struck by how much time has passed, but how little has changed. I’m back here, in this house, and I’m the same bitchy, moody teenager who was impossible to live with. It’s hard to convince your parents that you’re not the same kid they used to know when you’re crying and yelling it at them from the same doorway you used to cry and yell other things at them. I didn’t believe the regressive depictions in “coming home for Christmas” movies when I was younger, at least not their universality. I rolled my eyes at the exaggeration of a grown-ass adult behaving immaturely and completely out of character just because they fly back to Minneapolis and sleep in their old bed. I'm issuing a retroactive apology to those writers for the realism I claimed to have been cheated. They really only heightened things one small hop above the ground with those brotherly chokeholds underneath fully-set tables that sent decorations flying. Like most uncomfortable truths, one can only really grasp it through firsthand experience. I now understand that I could be a leading scientist at NASA who handles the pressures of intergalactic threats to humankind on a daily basis and immediately lose my emotional independence when I hear the squeak of the kitchen cabinet that never got fixed. A shrill, cuckoo clock, alerting me to sensory memories that will send me into a tailspin of past fears, anger, resentment, and annoyance.

Now that I'm transported to the teenage state of mind, I wish I had been better at hiding things. Then, my family could have wondered why I was being such a crabby cunt. But they all knew it’s because I was sad and lonely and hurting, and that just makes people pity you and tolerate it. I remember mornings in this kitchen, mentally preparing for the day. Each day would renew itself, coming again and again. Waves lapping over my head. Relentlessly, they demanded my participation. I still held onto hope that at one point, time would freeze, and I would be off the hook. I would exist somewhere in between this day and the next. I wouldn’t have to go to school, and I wouldn’t even have to decide not to go to school. Time wouldn’t require anything of me if it stopped. I could just rest, and nothing would change because of it. But that never happened, and each day I went.

When I was little, lunch was my favourite part of the day. Forty whole minutes to play with my friends, run around outside, and not have to do work. Then I grew into an overachieving nerd who pounded homework assignments like I was studying my way out of a bet. The bet turned out to be with a fear of failure that is still keeping pace with me. Even so, that midday break was an enjoyable respite from problem solving and information swallowing. I ate and talked and stretched and gabbed and gossiped and joked. It was as easy as breathing. Here, in this new hell that doubled as an institution for lower learning, the lunch break felt like getting the wind knocked out of me. A sharp, abrupt shift in the air that sent my body into panic. The bell rang and my stomach sank, awaiting the meal I would eat alone and in silence. I never sunk so far as to eat in the bathroom stall. If it wasn’t disgusting—scratch that—if no one found out, I would have strongly considered it. It certainly would have offered the most privacy, being hidden from sight and unapproachable. Instead, I opted for the library. It was at the front of the school, where the building was shaped like a semicircle. There was a large space with work tables in the centre, and bookshelves protruded perpendicular to the curved wall every few feet. In between the shelves were little work cubbies, with enough room for one desk and a chair for quiet studying or, in my case, private dining. Every day I would breeze past the librarian and select a cubby where I’d arrange my work materials on the desk in front of me. When I didn’t actually have homework to do, my books, binders, and highlighters would sit there as props while I scrolled the depths of social media and snuck bits of food from my lap to my mouth. Food was not permitted in the library so I had to be very sly, making sure to grab my pencil when anyone walked by, or clear my throat as I opened something wrapped in tin foil. I got better and better at it every day, like I was training for a high-stakes heist. The risk? My dignity. The reward? Basic physiological needs.

The strange part is that I swear Ms. Park knew. She wasn’t scary like some teachers, but she kept everyone in line who entered her domain. Librarians are like dads—they may not need your attention, but if you're under their roof they'll damn well get your respect. She'd throw you out if you were rambunctious, loitering, or consuming anything other than water. Yet there she was, stationed at the entrance of my cafeteria, clocking my arrival and departure during the hour that most kids spent outside or in the halls or the actual cafeteria. Whether she allowed my transgression in earnest or thought I was foregoing meals to cram for History, I don’t know which is worse. I remember one day, I was leaving and gave my obligatory parting nod which she returned with something between a pout and a smile that said, “Is it hard being you?” For a second, I entertained the idea of having a heart-to-heart with her, keeping it real. But the only thing sadder than the librarian knowing you don’t have any friends, is having the librarian become your only friend. I shut down her offering of kindness, as I did with so many others, preferring to remain closed-off and impenetrable. (I would go on to find out that this had earned me the nickname "Brick Wall". Not super catchy, but also not offensive? The mere acknowledgment of a wall's presence could be construed as affectionate.) Ms. Park grew impatient of my squatting, and made more frequent checks that the library space was being used properly. Maybe this woman was going through a similarly isolating chapter in her life; in need of platonic companionship and a non-judgemental environment to process raw emotions. Maybe she saw something in me that she felt capable of nurturing; a protege she could bestow wisdom upon or a test subject for a cult philosophy in its infancy. Maybe she would have given me a key to her office to eat, feel safe, and less alone. Maybe Ms. Park was my sliding door.

Instead, I was scared away. Frightened of being made a bigger fool for breaking the rules, and rules were my only semblance of control. Without them, what would anchor me in the dark? I could only float for so long, lunch in tow, before I landed somewhere else. I didn't land so much as fall down a rabbit hole of colourful madness, proving I had no interest in prolonging the listless daydream of my existence. The cost of admission to this place was the invisibility I clung to for comfort—what I thought was survival. The covers were ripped off me, the curtains were drawn, and that uncomfortable feeling arose in my throat. It was time to get out of bed.