3
David
Deidre storms into my room and paces wildly. She picks up clothes from the floor and throws them into a basket with excessive aggression. She sighs.
“David, you guys are nearly eighteen. Old enough to do your own laundry, you know.”
I do know, and I need to get better at it. Having lived with Em and her mom for three years, I should have learned Deidre’s quirks by now. And her triggers.
Emily's father passed away a year ago from cancer, a sickness that destroys the body, unlike my mother's, which ravaged her mind. Both illnesses were ultimately fatal and affected us profoundly.
Em is often in a bad place of her own and struggles over the loss of her dad. She has the nasty habit of talking herself into an unrecognizable mindset that she can’t escape without help. Her inner thoughts become the devil's playground. She has depression so deep, I often worry she’ll give up on herself. And us.
Our friendship helped us to heal, yet some demons reside within us permanently, no matter how hard we try to evict them. Our bond was built on trying to save each other, while at the same time, trying to save ourselves.
Deidre doesn’t have that comfort. She spirals at the sights, smells, and sounds that remind her of her late husband: the rumble of his truck as it roars to life, the scent of the cologne he wore that she spritzes in the mornings, and his sweaters that still find a home in her bed, despite the year since his final breath. Today is the anniversary of his passing, and feelings are still raw.
Deidre sits down on the bed and puts her head in her hands. She sobs as if her emotions have been brewing for hours—as if staying busy had been the only thing keeping her from breaking down. It’s not about the laundry at all. She sits up tall, wipes the tears from her cheeks, and hugs me.
Living with Emily and her mother is the definition of existing in the separated realms of heaven and hell. The latter sometimes takes the form of Deidre's drastic mood changes and breakdowns. They remind me of the terrifying unpredictability of my own mother, who often haunts my dreams. Sometimes we can’t keep up with how quickly her emotions change. All we can do is buckle up and hold on for the duration of the ride. Unlike my mother, Deidre has a tangible reason for her precarious lows. Despite the rollercoaster of emotions, being able to live alongside your best friend and a benevolent mother figure is heaven for someone like me.
I walk into Emily’s bedroom and she is crying. Tears leave trails down her soft, pale cheeks. I sit next to her and try to pull her into me. As usual, she pushes me away with misguided aggression. I use my strength and wrap my arms around her, pulling her tight against me.
“I miss my dad so much, David. This world is empty without him and I’m hollow with him gone. I can’t stop thinking about the day he died.”
I can’t either. I was there when he took his last breath. He was surrounded by his family as they prayed out loud to a god they didn’t believe in. You could almost feel his soul rise and abandon the ailing vessel on the table as he exhaled a final time.
I look at Emily and see her own soul. It’s ill, defeated, and trying to rip from her chest.
“You’re the most important person to me,” I say to her. “I hope you know I can’t take on this world without you.” I pull her onto my lap and hold her while her sobs stifle and become mere sniffles.
“I’m so sorry,” she says.
She’s always apologizing about her feelings or for being herself. There is nothing about Emily that needs to be apologized for.
“I can’t sit on your lap like this. I’m too fat.”
Just as she is always apologizing, she’s also always calling herself fat. I wish she could see herself how I see her. She may not be as slender as she wishes she could be, but she’s not fat. She has healthy curves and enticing full hips. Many girls would kill for her shape, even if it comes with the belly she despises.
“Can I have a pill?” she whispers.
I was prescribed opiates for the injuries from my father. They gave me more than enough and refilled it when I requested. I still have half a bottle leftover, squirreled away for a rainy day. Em—to find relief from her mind—asks for one or two here and there. Sometimes I find some missing from the bottle, and I could only assume she has taken them. How can I deny her that solace? How can I prevent her from escaping the pain in her heart and the suffering within her mind?
I nod, and she follows me into my bedroom. The walls are decorated with Titan’s memorabilia and pictures of fit women in bikinis. She always feels out of place in my room, but especially once her insecurities make her feel bigger than she actually is. If I put her in front of a mirror, she will only see her reflection as a blob—a shapeless and unlovable figure. She tugs at the bottom of her shirt nervously, as if she can’t cover herself enough.
I reach into my dresser and grab the orange bottle. I twist the white cap and try to pour one pill into my hand. They tumble over each other for their turn. I shake all but one back into the bottle and hand her the pill.
Her smile is unsure and wary. She looks around and grabs a DVD case from my nightstand and the orange bottle from my grip. She puts the case on her lap and places the lone pill on top of it. After turning the bottle upside down, she presses it into the case, sandwiching the pill and causing an audible crunch. She grinds the cap against the case until nothing remains but a fine powder. Satisfied, she licks the cap.
“What the fuck is that, Em?”
“Dude, relax. I just want to show you a better way to take your pills. Do you have a credit card?”
I hesitate before pulling my wallet from my pocket. I open it, pull out my bank card, and hand it to her. She separates the powder into lines and rubs the edge of the card between her mesmerizing lips. My apprehension seeps out of me and into the floor.
“Oh! Do you have a bill? Any denomination will do.”
I reach back into my wallet and pull out a twenty-dollar bill. She rolls it methodically, places one end in her nostril, and leans over the case. She inhales and a line disappears, leaving only a haze of dust in its place. She sits upright and breathes sharply through her nose. The pupils in her hazel eyes constrict in an instant. Em hands over the rolled up bill and the case covered in thin lines. I hesitate again before mirroring her actions.
Lightning. It fires up everything in my brain at once. The inescapable pain that constantly lingers becomes a dull throb. We sniff a few more lines and lean back against the wall.
“Wow. Where’d you learn that?” I ask.
“I heard from a girl at school that it hits your brain like fireworks. Pretty much instantaneous. What do you think?” Em turns to look at me and smiles.
My body melts against the wall, arms loose in my lap. I am weightless.
“I don’t know. Is this even safe? You know my dad was… Well, is an addict.”
“It’s not any more dangerous than swallowing them. I know your dad has problems, but you won’t follow in his footsteps. Stop worrying so much.”
* * *
Emily
I shrugtoward David and brush my dark red hair over my shoulder, holding it back with my hand. I lean down to inhale another line of powder into my sinuses so it can light the fire within my brain. To clear the drugs from my nostril, I sit up, sniff, and wipe my nose. White residue clings to my thumb and forefinger.
David and I sit across from each other. The case rests between us like a Ouija board, but the only phantoms we are invoking are our own. I push it out of the way and scoot toward him. My legs are made of lead. I’m heavy and somehow weightless at the same time. I’m floating, but my body descends through whatever it touches.
I sit next to him, sinking into the wall and through the bed. He puts his hand over mine, and our fingers intertwine. I lean my head on his shoulder. He sighs and turns his face until our lips are nearly touching. There’s a thread that draws me closer to him, but it’s always severed just before anything happens. I slip back down to reality.
“This feels good, Emily.”
“I know, doesn’t it?”
I smile up at him and sit back to enjoy the utter blankness within my mind. It is blanketed, dark, and perfect. Despite the darkness, there’s a tiny flicker of light—a sensibility to know that numbing myself is not a good coping mechanism. But even so, what’s the worst that can happen?