invisibility

I hate the waiting room at my therapist's office.

The office sprawls across an entire floor of a tall, fancy building. The kind of building that has four glass elevators and real plants growing up up up towards the far away skylights. Business suits and the clicking of high heels echoing down the halls.

It is easy to spot us. The ones who don't belong.

For such a large facility, the waiting room is like a terrible joke. As soon as I step inside, I feel that squirmy knot of panic in the pit of my stomach. I'm third in line to check in which puts me too close to the door. The next person to come in has to awkwardly squeeze in sideways, barely avoiding the knees of the three people unlucky enough to get chairs by the door. There are never enough chairs. It is a horrible box. Too small, too full of people, too loud.

The woman in front of me finishes checking in. She walks three steps, stops, and painstakingly adjusts the plaques hanging on the wall. I check in, mumbling my name as quietly as I can get away with.

Paranoia.

I find a chair in the corner. The woman who adjusted the plaques sits heavily next to me. I notice that she fills the entire chair. I do not. A tiny prick of satisfaction.

The water cooler is in the middle of the chairs. The people on either side of it are having a conversation as though we are all just waiting for a bus or a museum tour to start. Anyone who wants and small, waxy cup of water is forced to wedge themselves between the talkers. I stare at the wall and breathe through my nose. I can hear everything. Noise bounces off these walls like shrapnel. I can feel people staring at me, and I wish I was invisible.

But my hair is blue.

Invisibility is not an option.

...

Not everything looks better in the light of day.

There are bad days that lead into bad nights. There is snow. The wind blows bitterly cold. It seems almost cruel that winter has already arrived.

Bad days. Bad nights.

It would be easy, I suppose, to see that and think, Oh, maybe she was late to a meeting. Maybe she spilled coffee on herself. Maybe she got stuck in traffic.

At work, I struggle. I struggle to focus. I struggle to smile at customers. I struggle to listen to my coworker. I struggle to keep standing when my boss jabs accusations in my direction. I have recently found myself to be the scapegoat, the problem child. By the time I leave work, I am a hollow, beaten down shell. I drive home in silence.

You're so stupid. Fucking idiot. This is how it's always going to be. It's never going to change. You're such a stupid, stupid bitch. Worthless. This is your life. This will always be your life.

At home I curl into a small ball on the couch. The Mr. brings me a whiskey ginger with a bendy straw and strokes my hair. He coaxes me to watch one of our favorite shows, and I try, but I am slipping further away.

It's almost nice here, down the rabbit hole. There are no more screaming insults in my head. There is quiet. I am lightly buzzed on whiskey. I stare blankly at the tv and for a few moments, I feel nothing.

The evening continues on around me. The Mr. is moving about the house. The kitties sniff at my hair and play with the bendy straw in my empty glass. The puppy licks my elbow and follows the Mr. upstairs.

That's when all the nothing and all the quiet become deafening, a tsunami that destroys my desperate illusion. It is too much. There have been too many bad days and bad nights and I am drowning.

It's easier this time. Quick swipes. No emotion. No panic. The pain is like waking up from a nightmare. A jolt. A reminder. Something like calm.

But the lines turn red too quickly. Little red beads forming across my ankle. I pull up my sock and the red slowly stains through. Too much to hide and I am too tired.

I climb up the stairs and crawl into bed. I can feel my pulse burning through each slice on my ankle. It is barely 8:00 pm, but I am asleep before my head hits the pillow.

Sometime in the night, I am awoken by the Mr.'s hoarsely whispered questions. I am half awake, lost in the fog. I drowsily try to say the right things, but he's frightened because there have been so many bad days and bad nights and he doesn't know about my ankle, but he knows. He knows because of the last time.

...

It is several days later that I tell him. We are huddled together on the couch and I tell him. 

I tell him.

I tell him because I can feel myself slipping again, and for the first time in my life it scares me. I have never been afraid of myself because I had nothing left to fear. But I am not invisible anymore. Not to him. Because of the last time. And I am scared.

So I tell him.