Who Can Save Charlie Rose? [hiatus]

Emmy Jay

Why did you run?

Just face me.

Look me in the eye so I can tell her how fucked you are.

Emmy grabbed my chin and forced my head upward. Fury billowed red from her eyes, smoke dancing in the air. She looked so familiar, like her mother— she looked like her mother— Nora— I'm sorry.

I was ripped out of my slumber, ejected into the consciousness of the real world. My eyes were assaulted by the sun leaking through the blinds. Heart palpitations, a new normal, skipped away in my chest and made me light-headed.

Sleep used to be an escape. A way to leave everything behind and enter a new world, a world that had no correlation to the living one. Now, with the twisted influence of bouncing between benzos and amphetamines, my dreams were sickening. Not one night of sleep went by that I wasn't haunted— sober, down, or up. It didn't matter.

"Good morning," I muttered to myself.

Carson grunted beside me, yanking the covers over his head. I didn't recall him coming in the previous night. I searched my memory banks for anything, a hint of a reminder. Nothing.

Oh well.

I stood up and wobbled momentarily, head swimming. It constantly felt like my brain was suspended in a large amount of liquid, sloshing around inside my skull. Gingerly stepping towards the closet, I attempted to gain a sense of my condition.

Exhausted. That was a given. Anxious about stepping foot on campus. I was destined to run into my past three days a week— who's to say I would be free from her the other two?

My ability to think disappeared and I got dressed to the sound of an internal buzzing noise. One arm in one hole, then the other. One foot down the pants leg, then the other. Step by step.

"I'm so tired," I whispered to the person in the mirror, a stranger who looked like she was wasting away. Her blue eyes were lifeless.

I shook my head and walked out of my bedroom. The house didn't smell of fresh made breakfast or coffee— it smelled stale, like beer and smoke. I skipped the kitchen and went out the front door, barely shutting it behind me.

Tuesday. A new set of classes, with new professors— all the same, but different.

My first class of the morning had me excited. Intermediate ASL II.

Spanish, French, German— Mandarin, even, were offered to us as freshmen. A wide array of cultures, each one unlocking the possibilities of understanding another population of the world.

If you passed.

I noticed how Ollie never had anyone to talk to. They could read lips, but often had to write out their responses— not efficient in a fast-moving conversation. So, I dropped my Spanish 101 and switched to American Sign Language.

Ollie had to take a foreign language, just like the rest of us. It was one of the stupidest things I had ever heard. We protested on their behalf for weeks with no success. The ASL professor happened to be efficiently fluent in BSL, so Ollie was able to sit in our classes and be the TA while also learning from Mr. Roche.

I parked Okami and jumped out. A humming buzz vibrated under my skin, and I focused on my breathing as I walked to the Humanities building. My eyes flickered across the expanse of what I could see, hunting for the unwelcome visitor that infiltrated my life once again.

My paranoia was all-encompassing. Any brunette with long hair caught my attention— even if it wasn't the right shade. My mouth was dry and my jaw ached from my clenched teeth.