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Without her, I’m fragile, unprotected from myself. I think too much, overthink too much, and do too little. I see Styx’s face everywhere, like a haunting. But it doesn’t stop there. It’s like that night, the blood, the fear, the death... Set my progress inreverse.
Every time I move, my failures fill the vacancies in my hollow bones, my lungs work only to inhale regret and exhale strength, and I’m so tired of running on empty.
These last few days... between not sleeping, feeling guilty as all hell, being terrified, and not eating, I’m either always ready to puke or ready to cry. It’s an awful cycle that makes me think thrice about my existence. All those negative thoughts that Mama Rosa helped me work through, they ping up in my brain like a game show.
This wasn’t my dream.
This is not supposed to be my life.My ten-year plan never included living above a sex shop, serving at a strip club, wearing shoes that should be banned from existence.
I squat down to remove said shoes and walk barefoot the rest of the hill. Soles against chilled cobblestone refresh my steps. Ground me to the journey I’m still on—twenty-six and still finding my way.
Just have to avoid stepping on glass,I tell myself as I hook the heels of the shoes through my belt loops.Just like the rest of my life.
The one comment spurs another negativity loop. One thought after another, connected by randomness or plain insanity, emerges until I get to the culprit—to the one that gnaws at me and twists my resilience into a mental temper tantrum.
They made me feel like I was never enough.
They... has many faces. But I’m talking about the welcoming committee at school. Or should I say, firing squad, who intentionally or not, shot rubber bullets at my mental health.
Plop. Plop. Plop. Plop. Plop. Plop.Until the onslaught of ammo was so much, it knocked me down.
I wasn’t strong enough to withstand years of it. The term bullying comes to mind, but the professors called it weaning out the weak. It didn’t matter that I had worked my ass off, fought my demons, furrowed a path for myself against all reason and all sensibility. Four years of undergrad—of torture—and on my first year in my specialty, I let them get to me.
Theyoverrode my intelligence, my focus, my drive—my courage. Turned me into an imposter within my own skin.
Mama Rosa said I gave them too much power.
I think I gave them too much of me... and I didn’t even realize it.
Truthfully, the only good thing about seeing that asshole doctor in the place where I belonged is that it makes me angry. Angry enough to fight back even though it destroys me.
It gives me a reason to be the change.
To be the difference in my life.
I’ve been living the last few years avoiding the shattered glass of a broken dream. Existing in the present because the past has a tendency to fester. But now, I have a way out of this. It’s not the easy road, but it’s the only way. Sketchy, illegal, or morally grey — it does not matter when it comes to survival.
I just have to find a buyer, and I know exactly who, but first I have to visit Mama Rosa.
The institution smells like bleach and urine, a combination that’s becoming all too familiar. The woman in the white scrubs peers up from her monitor and hands me a sign-in board while juggling the phone, the computer, and the slew of visitors single-handedly. After I jot down my identification number, name, and visitor name, I hand the papers back with my expired school ID.
She slides the glasses down the bridge of her nose and reads the screen, then bounces her gaze between me and the clipboard. “Doutora Cassidy.”
It’s taken me awhile to get used to the fact that anyone in this country with a bachelor’s degree is called Doctor. “Yes. I mean,sim.”
The woman proceeds to tell me in her native tongue how Mama Rosa is doing, no empathetic tone in the air. The worker isn’t rude, she’s actually always a pleasant person to deal with, but when this entire conversation revolves around the status of the patient, the interaction lacks a little human compassion. Something I guess the low pay and the excessive strain has forced out of her.
“She fell?” I stop her the second my brain translates her last statement. She hadn’t even given me time before she was already onto the ambulance costs and equipment. “Stop, reverse back to when you said she fell. When did this happen?”
The fact that I’m speaking in English queues her to switch over to a language she’s not too familiar with. “Yesterday.”
My brows arch in surprise as I glance behind me at the long line. When I turn back around, the lady is typing away on her computer as if she didn’t just tell me they were incompetent. “Excuse me,” I tap on the Plexi-glass window and bring my lips close to the silver speaker, so she can understand me. “Why didn’t you call me?”
“We only notify next of kin.”
This bitch.“I’m the emergency contact, the one who pays your damn bills, and you don’t think it’s prudent to call me and tell me she fell?”
“The checks come in the shop’s name, ma’am.”
