Anorex-a-Gogo
A Little Game
Every six hours, I take my pills to stop the pain.
Every four hours, I take my pills to stop the pain.
Every two hours, I take my pills to stop the pain.
At the end of the day I feel nothing at all.
Oh well.
At least I've stopped the pain.
* * *
I have become a creature of habit. I wake up in the mornings to the same frozen sun. It just sits there in the sky that's pink and blue and grey, and it reminds me of just how dark my world's become. When Gerard left, he stole the sun. Breakfast comes next, and then Mom leaves for work because life goes on for some. I have no distractions because school does not start for another week and a half. Wash my hair with Gerard's shampoo that he left in my shower. The smell of jasmine should make me feel nauseous, but it doesn't.
I want to feel bitter. I want to be pessimistic, sarcastic, a bitch. I want to be angry. I want to explode. But I'm not, and I do not. I'm not any of those things. I just feel sad. Just weak and sad.
The answering machine blinks red with messages and missed calls. The first few days after Christmas, I sat religiously by the telephone, waiting and hoping and demanding that his slightly scratchy voice be on the other end of the line. When the phone would ring, I would jump on it before the first ring would even end. I soon learned that it would always be Mikey or my mother, or some poor salesman or telemarketer, who then had to suffer through my vicious moodswings. Poor bastards. They call you up hoping to sell you their New Age Bible or a magazine subscription to Vogue, and what they get is me bitching them out for clogging up the phone lines.
And that's just if they're lucky. The unlucky ones get the long, uncomfortable minutes where they're not sure what to say because they called to sell me shit, and what they get is my life story. "Hey, buddy, it's okay." "Please, calm down, sir." "I...I'm sure it will be all right."
Oh, and my all-time favorite? "Hey, kid, you're not gonna go off yourself or anything, right?"
No. No, I'm not that desperate.
I am that desperate.
Sometimes they hang on the line long enough for me to pour out my entire sob-story. Times like those I either get, "Burn in Hell, faggot. He probably left you for being a whiny-ass bitch," or, on a slightly more sympathetic note, "If he loves you, he'll come back. Just please stop crying."
Like I said, poor bastards.
But that was in the first week. Now, I watch the telephone as it rings, and I just let it blare. Willing my fingers not to itch to pick it up. I sit on my hands and try to focus on the same television shit that's been program-spamming for the last few decades or so.
Think happy thoughts think happy thoughts think happy thoughts.
The ringer silences, but the high-pitched whine still echoes through the empty halls of the house. At one time it was tainted by the shame of Owen's night visits. Now it is tainted with memories.
That was the chair where Gerard sat and sang to me while I pretended to sleep. He slept beside me in that bed. His hair is still on that pillow. There is the doorstep he stood on and became my Destiny, the stars forming a crooked halo for his head. That was the shower in which he kissed me softly and threw my world into chaotic turmoil.
This was the house where I fell in love. Now it is the house in which I lost it.
How did I lose it?
I still do not know.
And the little red light blinks, flashing in my peripheral vision. I will ignore it like the other twenty-three messages left on the machine. It has become habit not to hope.
And I am a creature of habit.
* * *
I write him long letters. They talk about my mother. My day. Mikey. The song I'm listening to. The words etched into my brain.
They do not talk about how I'm feeling. Never how I'm feeling.
I lick the envelope and I place the stamp in the corner. There is never any type of address, sender or return. He will never get them, and I don't want them back.
They are postcards from no man's land.
But at the end of the day, when all the letters are stamped and sent, I still have more to tell him.
There is always more to say.
~ ~ ~
"Sweetheart, I...I'm worried about you," Mom says.
I want to tell her I'm not worried about me at all, because I just don't care about me at all. The pain medication has stolen my emotion, Gerard as stolen my heart. There is nothing left in me to care.
"You're not dealing with this in the way you're supposed to." She knows this because she's a shrink. "I'm afraid you just won't heal."
The hole in my chest rots a little more. A slow death.
I give her a blank stare. Sometimes, that's all I can seem to muster. I'm just not healing.
* * *
I play a little game. It's called Be Invisible. I'm sure you've heard of it.
It's where you hide out in your room all day, not eating, not sleeping, not existing. It's where you lock the door and ignore your mother pounding on it and yelling and then finally giving up because she babysits social rejects all day, and she's too tired to deal with another one. It's where you take too many of your pain pills so that you can just sit in everlasting stupor until your brain just clicks off and you fall asleep. It's where you touch yourself and pretend it's Gerard's hand on your heated skin, and then you cry because you open your eyes and realize it's just you and your own fucking hand.
Be Invisible.
I'm sure you've heard of it.
Every four hours, I take my pills to stop the pain.
Every two hours, I take my pills to stop the pain.
At the end of the day I feel nothing at all.
Oh well.
At least I've stopped the pain.
* * *
I have become a creature of habit. I wake up in the mornings to the same frozen sun. It just sits there in the sky that's pink and blue and grey, and it reminds me of just how dark my world's become. When Gerard left, he stole the sun. Breakfast comes next, and then Mom leaves for work because life goes on for some. I have no distractions because school does not start for another week and a half. Wash my hair with Gerard's shampoo that he left in my shower. The smell of jasmine should make me feel nauseous, but it doesn't.
I want to feel bitter. I want to be pessimistic, sarcastic, a bitch. I want to be angry. I want to explode. But I'm not, and I do not. I'm not any of those things. I just feel sad. Just weak and sad.
The answering machine blinks red with messages and missed calls. The first few days after Christmas, I sat religiously by the telephone, waiting and hoping and demanding that his slightly scratchy voice be on the other end of the line. When the phone would ring, I would jump on it before the first ring would even end. I soon learned that it would always be Mikey or my mother, or some poor salesman or telemarketer, who then had to suffer through my vicious moodswings. Poor bastards. They call you up hoping to sell you their New Age Bible or a magazine subscription to Vogue, and what they get is me bitching them out for clogging up the phone lines.
And that's just if they're lucky. The unlucky ones get the long, uncomfortable minutes where they're not sure what to say because they called to sell me shit, and what they get is my life story. "Hey, buddy, it's okay." "Please, calm down, sir." "I...I'm sure it will be all right."
Oh, and my all-time favorite? "Hey, kid, you're not gonna go off yourself or anything, right?"
No. No, I'm not that desperate.
I am that desperate.
Sometimes they hang on the line long enough for me to pour out my entire sob-story. Times like those I either get, "Burn in Hell, faggot. He probably left you for being a whiny-ass bitch," or, on a slightly more sympathetic note, "If he loves you, he'll come back. Just please stop crying."
Like I said, poor bastards.
But that was in the first week. Now, I watch the telephone as it rings, and I just let it blare. Willing my fingers not to itch to pick it up. I sit on my hands and try to focus on the same television shit that's been program-spamming for the last few decades or so.
Think happy thoughts think happy thoughts think happy thoughts.
The ringer silences, but the high-pitched whine still echoes through the empty halls of the house. At one time it was tainted by the shame of Owen's night visits. Now it is tainted with memories.
That was the chair where Gerard sat and sang to me while I pretended to sleep. He slept beside me in that bed. His hair is still on that pillow. There is the doorstep he stood on and became my Destiny, the stars forming a crooked halo for his head. That was the shower in which he kissed me softly and threw my world into chaotic turmoil.
This was the house where I fell in love. Now it is the house in which I lost it.
How did I lose it?
I still do not know.
And the little red light blinks, flashing in my peripheral vision. I will ignore it like the other twenty-three messages left on the machine. It has become habit not to hope.
And I am a creature of habit.
* * *
I write him long letters. They talk about my mother. My day. Mikey. The song I'm listening to. The words etched into my brain.
They do not talk about how I'm feeling. Never how I'm feeling.
I lick the envelope and I place the stamp in the corner. There is never any type of address, sender or return. He will never get them, and I don't want them back.
They are postcards from no man's land.
But at the end of the day, when all the letters are stamped and sent, I still have more to tell him.
There is always more to say.
~ ~ ~
"Sweetheart, I...I'm worried about you," Mom says.
I want to tell her I'm not worried about me at all, because I just don't care about me at all. The pain medication has stolen my emotion, Gerard as stolen my heart. There is nothing left in me to care.
"You're not dealing with this in the way you're supposed to." She knows this because she's a shrink. "I'm afraid you just won't heal."
The hole in my chest rots a little more. A slow death.
I give her a blank stare. Sometimes, that's all I can seem to muster. I'm just not healing.
* * *
I play a little game. It's called Be Invisible. I'm sure you've heard of it.
It's where you hide out in your room all day, not eating, not sleeping, not existing. It's where you lock the door and ignore your mother pounding on it and yelling and then finally giving up because she babysits social rejects all day, and she's too tired to deal with another one. It's where you take too many of your pain pills so that you can just sit in everlasting stupor until your brain just clicks off and you fall asleep. It's where you touch yourself and pretend it's Gerard's hand on your heated skin, and then you cry because you open your eyes and realize it's just you and your own fucking hand.
Be Invisible.
I'm sure you've heard of it.