Jen threw her covers off, crawled out of bed, and sat in her desk chair. She stared at her bed, unable to blink. It was dark and cold. She pulled her knees into chest and breathed deeply.
“You win, bed. Tonight you win—again.”
She glanced at the clock which flashed 2:41 am. It had been almost a year since the accident, an entire year, and still she folded under the enemy almost every night.
“I guess I might as well try and be productive” she sighed.
After an entire year she had at least learned the one thing that helped calm her down—making cookies. She headed to the kitchen, opened the fridge, and pulled out a dozen eggs but she didn’t last long. Silence filled her mind and she stared at the ceiling and slowly dropped to the floor. Shapes began to form. First circles, then stars. Then faces took over, dark and cruel looking.
She reached out and opened the cupboard door behind her. A few pipes stared back at her. A bottle of soap. A box of detergent. And there it was…the small little orange bottle with a white label. She twisted the bottle around in her boney, lifeless hand.
“Can you end this misery?”
She poured out the contents of the bottle into her left hand. She let the tiny pills spill out until they covered her whole palm, then she tightened her fingers around them for safety.
She reached her right hand up behind her head and felt the cold marble counter. She let her hand search for the glass of water she knew she had set down earlier. It had to be up… there… somewhere… WHACK.
Jen had to remind herself to breathe so she could try to understand what just happened. Her left hand clenched the pills harder, fearful of losing the life she had gripped so tightly. But her right hand moved slowly to the top of her head. She pushed down on her hair and felt the slimy ooze of egg gush between her fingers. When she pulled her hand away, covered in goo yet again, a sudden fit of anger boiled up from the depths of her soul. Jen reached for the carton of eggs beside her, grabbed the first one she could find that wasn’t completely disintegrated and threw it as hard as she could across the kitchen. Her anger released a small amount, and once again her left hand loosened. As the tension left her body she looked back up at the ceiling. The faces were gone.
“Is that what it takes to defeat you?” She yelled.
She was slowly starting to stand now, still covered in crusted egg and still gripping her pills, but she was starting to stand.
Suddenly an idea flashed its way across Jen’s mind. Left hand still closed tight, she ran to the closet of the master bedroom where she used to sleep. She threw open the closet door and reached for the only shirt hanging there. Grey and black plaid—pearl snap buttons—one square pocket on the right side. She ripped it off the hanger and ran back to the kitchen. She opened the fridge again and reached for the second untouched carton of eggs she had sitting on the bottom shelf.
“Lucky for you,” she turned to glare at the shirt, “I always keep two dozen eggs in the house.”
With her right hand she grabbed the eggs and headed for the sliding glass door that led to the backyard.
She thrust the old shirt on top of the fence and spread it out just enough to make a target. She made her way back to the patio and opened the carton of eggs. Her hands glided over each one, smooth and cold, until she finally plucked one from the middle of the carton, and then threw the egg with all the power her body could muster.
“That!” Jen yelled, “is for every time you said you loved me! If you meant it…” she was crying again now, harder than before, ”you would have turned around.”
She reached for another egg and, through compulsion sobs, she threw it—harder this time.
“That!” she cried this time, “is because you wouldn’t turn around. You had a choice…”
She grabbed another egg and threw it hard and fast before collapsing to her knees. Her head fell and the sobs continued.
She closed her eyes again and let the memory of his funeral take over. She saw the white roses—the same as the ones they had at their wedding. She saw the hate in his mother’s eyes every time she looked her way.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t know the train was… Why didn’t you stop?”
A cold, lifeless tear dropped to the cement and landed next to one of the blue pills that had spilled from her hands. Jen stared at the wet spot. For the first time, she realized, she had shed a tear and the enemy did not come to take over. She was still breathing, still thinking, still moving. She put her hand on her chest and let herself feel her heart beat. She looked up one final time at the stars, inhaled a big, deep breath, and soaked in the smell of freedom.
What’s Been Said…