“Oh, come on, Soph!” Allison complains, pouting dramatically. “You never go out with us on a Saturday night!”
Because I need the time to mentally prepare myself for the next day,I think to myself scornfully, but plaster a smile on my face, because my coworkers are not to blame for how I feel about life in general.
“Well, Jess’s stuff won’t fit me,” I point out as I gesture to my body. Allison rolls her eyes, and Jess chuckles.
“As if we’re gonna believe that you’re insecure!” Jess chides, and I stifle my embarrassment.
Don’t get me wrong, I know I shouldn’t be insecure, but it’s hard not to be when growing up wasn’t exactly easy. Sure, I’ve found my place among kind people who accept me for who I am, but still, there’s doubt that lingers, and insecurity that rears its ugly head, especially when my mind drifts to him.
Those thoughts are unwelcome, but they’re there, demanding to be faced when I’ve abandoned them for two years. But the heartbreak I felt back then has festered into insecurity that makes me worry too much about my weight and being seen in public.
Or maybe it’s just an excuse, because I can’t direct my hatred at the man who hurt me, so I’m internalizing it, hating myself, hating everything that signals joy and hope, and sticking to routine like it’s a lifeline.
“I’m not insecure,” I sigh, the words a half-truth only. “It’s an excuse, okay? I need every second of rest I can get. Double shifts tomorrow, remember?”
Jess rolls her eyes as Allison joins her at the door. “Well, all work and no play makes Jill a dull girl.”
“Well, good thing my name’s Sophie!” I giggle, and Jess and Alison join me.
“See you on Monday, Soph!” Allison bids goodbye before they both leave the staffroom.
I sigh when I’m alone, turning back to the window and lifting my eyes to the sky, where the stars shine brighter than the streetlights, and the full moon’s silver glow is the star of the nighttime show.
Only a small part of me still appreciates the natural beauty that lies out there. If there is a divine being, a god, it sure did take the time to handcraft the precious creations all around. It’s a pity that it crafted humans, too—supposedly “perfectly imperfect,” with something like free will.
Free will is a curse when it’s used to hurt another heart. Damian Hans exercised his free will when he pursued me, only to pull the rug out from under me when he broke up with me, and that wasn’t fair.
I tried to make logical sense of what happened by detaching from my personal feelings and looking at the heartbreak as an observer. It’s not the first time in history that someone decided that their partner of a few months wasn’t the one for them, and decided that it was time to walk away. But even then, understanding it logically can’t fix what broke when it happened.
My heart. My poor, naive, unsuspecting heart had filled with love for him in such a short time, and all it took was one moment of hesitation from him for me to lose my mind.
I take a deep breath when I feel those emotions I’d been suppressing coming to the surface, crawling beneath my skin and threatening the sanity I’ve built for myself these past two years. I’m sane when I’m detached. Numb. It’s best this way.
Work. Home. Rinse. Repeat.
That’s all I need to focus on, and that’s why I purposely tunnel my vision as I walk down the street once I’ve left the hospital for the night. I don’t get to stargaze, I don’t get to appreciate the full moon in the sky. Not without my mind drifting to him, so I should remain unfazed by the world around me.
Hugging my arms across my chest, I slow down as I near the traffic light, lifting my head to check if it’s green for me to cross the road. The light burns bright red, but suddenly flashes as if it’s glitching. My brows knit into a frown as I find myself suddenly intrigued by the flashing red light, my vision tunnelling for a different reason as I stare ahead.
The fine hairs on the back of my neck prickle at attention, and a gasp leaves my lips, but it’s not audible. Instead, there’s an eerie silence that spreads above me, around me, and a distant ringing sound enters my left eardrum.
The ringing isn’t a screeching sound, but it escalates into something natural, something primal, like an animal in the wild crying out for help. The sound of the howl wraps its fingers around my heart and squeezes, and I keel over, pain ripping through me like lethal talons scraping my insides. I feel movement up my throat, but I can’t hear myself screaming. Pressing my eyelids shut, I will myself out of whatever strange thing is happening to me.
The howling stops, and so does the squeezing of my heart, releasing me with a gasp that returns the sound of my surroundings. Owls hooting in the treetops, the subtle, faint flow of the river, machines and lights humming, and the earth breathing again.
Groaning—audibly now—a newfound sense of resentment sets in as I hug myself tighter, my face hardening with an expression I can only imagine looks fierce from the outside.
I’m crawling toward the one day of the week I hate the most, in the peak of summer, and now I’m entering some paralyzing psychosis in which I’m hearing animal sounds…
Gosh! I must be reaching burnout, working all these double shifts just to keep my head above the water. Irritated that my body and mind can’t handle the one thing that my heart desperately needs, I finally cross the street and round the corner toward my apartment building.
Another chill slithers down my spine when I get to my door, but I ignore it, dismissing what I’m feeling to a lack of rest—not sleep, rest. Mental rest. The kind in which I can shut off my mind and feel relaxation flowing through my body. It feels like ages since I had that, so instead of crashing on the sofa like I usually would, I run a hot bath, pour myself a glass of wine, and indulge in some much-needed “me time.”
It seems to work, with every sip of wine as my body is immersed in warm water that lifts the fragrance of the essential oils into my airways, bringing me relaxation, easing the tension knotted in my shoulders. Exhaling a sigh of relief, I climb out of the bathtub and get ready to go to bed.
My eyes close before my head even hits the pillow, arms stretched out beside me, palms facing up like I’m about to meditate. I don’t change positions, feeling comfortable this way, feelingright,and a few breaths in, and I’m drifting off into a soothing place where rest feels as plush as clouds.
***
