Closed Circuit
Mom’s eyes are stretched wide, intense, chameleonesque. Her lips are stitched tight and cinched by a fragile thread. Dad’s eyebrows are pressing in toward his nose, head angled down to face me. They are pitying me in the most unsettling way. “You sure you’ll be alright, sweety? Last time we left you alone-”
“It’s fine!” I cut Dad off. He will continue to linger by the door, coat slung over his shoulder, until I put on a convincing enough show.
“Remember, we’ll only be gone for an hour or so.” Mom draws out the words as if speaking to a toddler. This is pathetic. I’m 16 years old, and they’re thinking about hiring a babysitter. I shove down a burning wave of shame until I can push them out the door. I clench my fists, holding every muscle still until the Subaru's headlights vanish behind the bend.
BOUGhhhhhhh. My lungs empty as I slide my back down the wall. How long have I been holding my breath? In the looming silence, I watch myself a year ago, before the world ended, dancing around the kitchen in celebration of the freedom of an empty house. You would think, after so long spending every day stuck with Mom and Dad, I would be relieved to be alone. Except- I don’t know how to do that anymore. I grab my own hand, but it’s not like holding Mom’s. I’m a closed circuit. There’s no way to get this buzzing electricity out.
I stare up at the ceiling. It’s so far away. The yellow kitchen light beats down in a throbbing assault. It doesn’t stop. It won’t stop WHY WON’T YOU STOP? I scream it, or I think it. That’s all the same when you’re alone- when your electric flow swirls inside of you ad infinitum, trapped within your fingertips. Either way, somehow I am on my feet standing in the dark clutching the lightswitch.
The ceiling is still so far away. Everything is too big. I reach my electric fingertips as high as they will go, balancing on my toes, straining my fatigued calves on a ballerina’s point. The ceiling floats higher, taunting my reach. I scramble onto the granite countertop to catch it before it can jump out of the way.
BOUGhhhhhh. I catch my breath again as my hands finally press into the gritty spackle ceiling, pushing my everything upward through my palms. I’ve got you. After an indiscernible amount of time, because time is the movement between people, and I am just one person, alone forever all at once, I crawl back down to lay on the cold floor. My cheek presses firmly into the hardwood as I splay out. Around other people, I use this floor for my feet, but because I am alone, this floor is no more a floor than it is a ceiling. Because no one else is here to be a person for, I am not a person. I am a collection of trillions of microbes writhing in a lump. Or maybe I am a ceiling. Maybe I’m nothing because I am a tree falling in a forest, but no one is around to hear me make a sound. No one will hear me cry for help, or even say goodbye. I take a sharp inhale, only to realize I am a fallen tree who actually breathes carbon dioxide. I exhale into my hands and try to breath my tree air back up over and over until I forget how to breathe all together. HOW THE FUCK DO I BREATHE? I gag and choke, pushing up from the floor. Wh- wha What do I do I DON”T know what to AGYhgjhhhhh hmmmmmh whhoooooo hmmmmmh whhooooo ok slow down sloooooowwww down. I n, a n d o u t. In, and out. In and out. In-and-out. in-and-out-inandoutinanoutiaoutinandoutinandoutinandoutinandout I am on my feet and I am tearing through my bedroom. No one knows what I am looking for because no one is here in this forest to hear me fall. I am ripping off my clothes -because why should trillions of microbes wear clothes- and I find the paint and I find the canvas and red and blue and orange and spread and glop and smear. I am painting the canvas and I am painting this skin because they are one in the same. Bolts of lightning explode from my hands as I spreadglopsmear-spread -glop-smear spread glop smear spread and glop and smear. Spread, and glop, and smear.
I spread, and glop, and smear the paint. I am red and blue and orange. I remember how to breathe because trees can breathe without even thinking about it. I watch my panic pour out before me, on, around, and near the canvas. The chaos is striking. It’s an explosion of a mind all alone in all of its untainted beauty. When the pitcher is empty and the panic runs dry, I scrub the red and blue and orange from under my fingernails. The cool water runs between my fingers, reminding me what is real.
As the world comes back into focus, a face appears in the mirror. It’s carved with exhaustion. Streaks of paint crease in the folds of scream lines, smeared into stripes in the wake of tears. I scan the face before me, searching for any resemblance of myself. I wonder how I could have imploded and reformed in a matter of an hour, but sure enough, my eyes are my own again. I tell my hands to trace the paint on my cheeks, and they do. I sigh, welcoming in familiarity. I really am me.
I find my clothes scattered down the hall and accept that trillions of microbes are supposed to wear clothes for some stupid reason. Flicking on the TV, I allow actors who do not know me to keep me company. I can live in their world for a little while, until Mom and Dad return with their dinner’s leftovers.
When they walk through the door, Mom with her tipsy giggle, the house is a house and the ceiling is the ceiling. The paint is put away in its perfect rainbow order, and I am a human daughter instead of a fallen tree. When I speak, they hear me, and they are none the wiser that I am a writhing lump of trillions of microbes wearing clothes. All is as they left it, except for a new painting on the wall.