A date? Us? Sure, but we probably can’t go anywhere with too many people, that’s too loud, too busy, too quiet. I might have to get up every ten minutes to walk outside and round the corner, probably pretend to take a call but actually just breathe like I’m psyching myself up for nothing, even though I seemed to be breathing just fine at the table; aside from the white knuckles, tapping finger on the glass, tapping foot on the table leg, and the utterly irrational, unexplainable chaos inside me that’s ticking, ticking, ticking with the foreboding brag of my heart as it sits there at the back my throat to catch my words before they escape. I think I’m dying. No – death wouldn’t feel this bad. Regular scanning of the room for people who are definitely definitely – definitely looking at me, maybe they know. I’m sure they’re talking about me. Where’s the door? What’s that pain in my chest? Let’s breathe, why is it so loud in here? I can’t breathe here I can’t hear you I can’t concentrate on your voice I just see your lips moving and your eyes looking straight through me but I’m hearing nothing and all I can feel is impending doom as my bones shake and I want nothing more than to wake up to reality because nothing in this world could possibly feel like this.
You’re not going to understand when I don’t talk for days then at times talk endlessly about things that don’t make sense, that don’t add up, that came from nowhere, that I don’t understand; that I’m broken but proud – that you can’t help me that it’s something you can’t fix so why try, I can’t keep you here with me it’s not fair. I’ll want to see you but I don’t want you to know that I just want to sit alone in my room with myself and my pill bottle and leave you out of it because I can’t make this your mess too. You won’t understand how I can’t get on that bus, call a cab, can’t sit on that train, ignore that minor physiological change, can’t walk the quickest route; can’t go there it’s too busy, it’s the wrong time, can’t sit here, can’t walk there, drive too far, stay too late, let you too close or wake up in the morning because I was laying awake all night; because I won’t tell you, even if I want to. In time maybe, but time is terrifying too. I might tell you I’m mental and laugh about it, try to normalize, rationalize, that works right? Of course a relationship is out of the question, I’m still struggling to piece together my broken mind, learning to befriend my neurotic, understand my psychotic & love myself for all of my beautiful madness & chaos.
Hey, I’m sorry; Maybe next time.
– Anonymous.