Just then, the waiter appears at our table and Atlas places the order. And for some reason, my nervousness increases. Like ordering the food has made all this even more real.
I’m having dinner with Atlas.
Dinner that he wanted to have. With me.
And of course, when I get nervous, my fingers start fidgeting with my anxiety ring.
“What’s that?”
I look away from my ring to find him staring at it like yesterday. And like yesterday, I bring my hand down on my lap, hiding it from his gorgeous eyes. “Nothing.”
His jaw clenches at my motion, my lie, and for a second, I think he’s hurt by my actions. That I chose to hide from him.
But why would he care?
In any case, I still amend, “Well, it’s…” I sigh, my fingers working double time on flicking the tiny beads. “It’s an anxiety ring.”
His expression goes alert. “An anxiety ring.”
I swallow. I’m not sure if I want to share this with him. The purpose behind it. I mean, it’s self-explanatory, but still.
My illness is not a secret, of course. And definitely not from him. But do I really want to go there with him?
Then it occurs to me that maybe I should.
Maybe I should stop pretending that we don’t have a history and just get everything out there.
Maybe if I spell everything out, describe my illness to him, all of this will end.
He will be so disgusted that he’ll leave, and this foolish hope that I’m harboring will come to an end.
Because really, how can it not?
I mean, look at me. I can’t even talk to him without the help of my anxiety ring. I can’t even figure out if this thing is a date or not.
I’m so out of my league here. It’s better to save myself and my sanity, and simply focus on my grades.
So I look up with a renewed determination and bring my hand up. I flick the beads with my fingers as I say, “It’s supposed to help distract you. From your anxiety. Break your constant and non-stop thought patterns. So I don’t… So my thoughts don’t overwhelm me. And I don’t have another meltdown. Like I did before.”
I wait for him to show some reaction to it.
To my meltdown.
But he doesn’t. He keeps watching me, as if waiting for me to say more, so I do. “Which, as everyone knows, sent me to Heartstone. A psych ward in New Jersey. I didn’t want to go, of course. It came out of nowhere, you see. My meltdown. I’ve had severe anxiety before, but who doesn’t? We always hear people talking about it, right? Oh, I’m anxious about this and I’m worried about that and so that’s normal, right?”
I shake my head. “No, it’s not. It’s not normal. Not for me. Because at Heartstone, they diagnosed me with anxiety disorder. It’s worse than it sounds. It explains everything that I’ve been feeling all these years, all my life even. It explains my feelings of inadequacy, why sometimes I feel so down, so low. Why I take everything so seriously. Why I can’t stop taking everything so seriously. Why I think everything is the end of the world. And even though I try my best, I do everything right, I’m doing something wrong. Because there’s something wrong with me. Because I lack something. Something fundamental. That other people have but I don’t.
“It also explains why I ate that book.” I widen my eyes at him. “I ate a book, remember? How crazy is that? And for what? Because I got an F. But still. So what? It’s only a grade. Granted, no one in my family has ever gotten a C in anything. They’ve all been so successful at everything that they’ve done. And I always struggled and so they always looked at me like I was an outsider. And now they look at me like I’m an alien. That I’m not altogether of this world. Oh, they never say anything. They don’t verbally express it. They even smile at me and ask about my day and whatnot. But they look at me like they don’t know what to do with me. They’ve always looked at me that way. Now, they know the reason. It’s because I’m crazy. I’m touched in the head. But it’s okay because now they know. Now the mystery is solved and they can rest easy. Their scientific curiosity is appeased. So in case you didn’t know — which is impossible because you were there that day — you’re having dinner with a crazy girl. And I don’t even know why. I don’t understand why anyone would want that.”
Especially after you saw me that day.
The day when I had my first panic attack.
The professor gave us back our grades and I knew that I hadn’t done well. But the big F on the paper was still a big shock. I’ve had my struggles, but I’d never failed a subject before. Not even biochemistry. And suddenly, something was sitting on my chest.