(essay)

“I think you’re the only one I can talk to.”
After these words, I seem to want to feel how they pass through his entire body, so I cling to him even more. I don’t care if he understands my hugs. But I need those hugs. I need to remember that I’m alive.

I notice that after such a confession, his heart begins to beat faster. Or I want his heart to beat faster. This gives an understanding that everything that happens is a reality. I want to shudder to the rhythm of his rapid pulse. I want to be warmed by the warmth of his faltering breath. I want to know that he is also alive.

This is our first meeting after the explosion. For the first time, I whisper everything that screamed inside. I didn’t want to add a spark of drama to my monotonous speech. So I hold back so as not to cry. My sickly scratched perception extorts a calm quiet dialogue under the modest symphony of a normal evening.

“Normal” means with beams running through the walls from cars that pass outside the window. “Normal” means with a phone that takes a break from the day’s news feed, and squeals only from the message of friends who call to the bar. “Normal” means thinking about how much I don’t want to get up at 5 am for classes at university.

He realizes what I’m trying to say with my touches. These touches are filled with so many emotions that I can feel them pierce his skin and goosebumps on his hands. They are modified in the laboratory of my thoughts, which, through everyday experiments, intended to create an insensible shell. Without pain. Pity. Disappointment. Nostalgia. Fear. He silently accepts these emotional mutations in my touch and continues to listen intently.

“You are the only one I can talk to because you won’t understand me. Yes, you won’t understand. You don’t know all this horror that we are surrounded by because you are not here. You are not here…”

You’re not here… YOU’RE NOT HERE. YOU’RE. NOT. HERE.

I keep screaming. Finally, I start to cry and the whole world blurs, covered with bright and loud spots.

YOU’RE NOT HERE. YOU’RE. NOT. HERE.

MOM, HE’S NOT HERE. MOM.

***

What? Did I scream? I don’t remember… I’m sorry, mom. Yes, I’ll take my pills.