Slowtown

9

He is right, I guess. The anxiety I had this morning, I knew something bad was going to happen. But he waltzed in and announced that I'm no longer where I was– but I am- it's the same but it's not.

Continuing on the way home, Josh is rambling about something, but I don't hear him, I'm too busy searching up and down my sleeves in disbelief. My rubber band is gone. The only tether between my mind and body. My feet stop moving for a second, but the next, they pick back up again. Yeah, it feels like the world has paused, but it keeps turning. I marvel at how it goes on in spite of us. People can't do that. We get stuck to the past and the ongoing present, wedging our feet into the mud and making the ill choice to stay there.

And here we are. I dive into my room and shut the door in his face.

Ah shit. Sometimes I don't see how I'm being an asshole until the immediate regret hits me. I unlock the door, feeling that my hands have remained heavy, weighted, dead. I let him in, but make no attempts to talk, preferring to lay on my bed. Just really sink into that depression. Ah, yes. Feels awful, just as always. Josh sits himself on the floor next to my bed.

"How do you feel?" he asks.

Fed up? But I don't think it's quite that. "You're not a therapist, Josh."

"I know, I'm just trying to be a friend," he says, unaffected by my dismissiveness towards him. "Do you feel anything?"

"Tired." I'll give him that. "Exhausted. Dead." I'll give him those too. "Have you ever felt dead inside?"

"A little." He pauses, thinking I guess. "I was real lonely when I got here. But three years ago– nah, I'll take you there later, to meet her."

You lost me again.

I take shallow breaths. The air smells stale, like my room has been locked for ages. I lie here, musty air filling my lungs. This place is the ultimate dysphoria, the most convoluted edge to go over. I begin to think again; perhaps my rubber band will deteriorate into the soil, just as it started. Likely I will too.

"You can go to sleep if you want to. I won't leave."

I'll hardly care if you do.

I get the most sure feeling, suddenly. I'm nearly positive. If I close my eyes, I might die in my sleep.