Bryndal

Her legs shook as she sat at the old wooden table in our one bedroom apartment. Her red fingernails danced around the bottle of beer that sat only a foot in front of her. I periodically took glances at her, making sure to not draw her attention by staring too long. I turned my eyes away from the baseball game, that I wasn’t really watching in the first place, and watched her raise the bottle to her lips. She took a drink and then set the bottle back down. Her motions were robotic; her muscles had memorized these actions. Her brown hair went almost to her waist, and her straight bangs clung to her forehead from the sweat that had begun accumulating. Her bare feet were dirty as they bounced off of the wood floor; the pink nail polish on her toes was chipping off. She wore a blue floral dress that was a size too big for her, so she had to put a belt on to keep it sitting where it should. She was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

She was coming down from one of her manic stages. She had been on a high these past few days, a high that she didn’t even know she was on. After being together for four years, it still takes me a while to realize when she is becoming manic. But it becomes clear to me when she stops taking her lithium. She says she feels so much better, so much happier, that she feels she doesn’t need her lithium anymore, just one of those grand plans that comes from her mania. I try to tell her to still take it, I say it in the most positive way I can. She simply laughs and the most beautiful smile adorns her face. She ignores me, until a night like this where it all comes crashing down.

Her green eyes snapped to meet mine, and they looked empty. I could see the thoughts formulating in her head. Her eyebrows creased together, and in the middle of the silence she slaped her hand down on the table.

“What?” her voice is louder than necessary. I hunched my back and placed my knees on my elbows, preparing for what was to come. I stayed silent for a moment, maybe if I simply ignored her things will settle down. I felt something hit my shoulder, and I looked down to see a notepad, the closest non-harmful thing she had next to her to throw at me.

“What?” she asked again, now standing, her knees shaking.

“Nothing Bryndal,” I sighed and sat back into the couch, “Nothing.”

I stayed looking down as I heard her bare feet pad right in front of me. I shut my eyes, my hands were becoming clammy and my stomach was in knots. I thought about praying, but I knew it wouldn’t help. My beautiful Bryn was already too far gone. Any sane man would have left by now, and whenever I would talk to my friends about Bryn’s bi-polar disorder they would all tell me to leave too. I learned to stop talking to my friends about Bryn after that. Bryn was fine when we first started dating in college. She was bi-polar, recently diagnosed. She felt so grateful to have been diagnosed. She had been dealing with sudden surges of happiness one day and then suicidal thoughts the next. She felt that now she could begin her life over again, and with her medication she could finally be happy. She hid it from me for the first few months, afraid it would scare me away. When I found out, I was surprised, but by that time I was already in love with her. We moved in together after two years, after we had graduated from college. I began to see how she took her medication like clockwork. We were happy, she was happy, until something changed.

Bryn sunk into a deep state of depression. The signs were small at first, and I choose to ignore them. She would stop eating dinner, saying she ate a big lunch. Then I noticed she stopped packing a lunch all together. She said she was eating out with some friends from her office. She would stop talking for hours at a time; she said she was just tired. Things kept going downhill, and that’s when I found her lithium bottle, full. I tried to confront her about it, when she went off. I had never seen her so furious and she began crying uncontrollably. The final straw was when she fainted because she had stopped eating all together. She stayed in the hospital for a few days, under psychiatric care. She began taking her medication again, things were supposed to get better. They didn’t. Bryndal became bitter at her disease, resented it, and felt she could control it, so she stopped working like clockwork.

“Look!” I raised my head just as the pill bottle hit my chest and fell into my lap, “Look Will! See, the bottle is half empty. Half, so before you even accuse me of anything just look at the fucking bottle!”

“Bryn, these are from last month. Did you even get your prescription for this month?”

“Fuck you,” she sneered as she came up and grabbed the bottle from my hand. Her hands shook as she opened the bottle, dumping about seven pills into her hand.

“Bryn what are you doing?” I stood up in one swift motion, blood rushing to my head and causing my vision to blur.

She didn’t answer me, she just walked on over to the wooden table. Her free hand picked up the bottle of beer and she held it high in the air. “Cheers!” she yelled and then put the pills in her mouth.

“No!” I yelled and rushed over to her before she could put the bottle to her lips, “Damn it Bryndal!” I grabbed her face and forced her mouth open, as I manage to get all the pills out of her mouth.

“Now you don’t want me to take my mother fucking meds Will! Now you know better than me! You know how to fix me huh? Then fix me Will! Fucking fix me!”

“Bryn,” I forcefully wrapped my arms around her waist and had her look at me, “Please,” was all I could say. I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes, praying that the girl I fell in love with was hearing me. The girl in my arms right now was not her, my Bryndal was buried down somewhere deep inside and I needed her back.

Something changed in her eyes, a sudden spark and the expression on her face changed. She gently pushed herself away from me and walked away. I stood there, stunned. The emotional rollercoaster was too much to handle. It made me sick to my stomach seeing someone I love so much unable to control how she acts, how she feels. I heard the door to our bedroom slam shut and a part of me just wanted to leave her alone. Maybe I should just sit back down and pretend it was all over. I didn’t know if I could walk in that room and deal with it anymore. I closed my eyes and breathed in deep before taking my first step.

“Bryn?” I opened the door slowly. Her back was towards me, shaking from the tears that overwhelmed her body. Clothes still on hangers sat on the bed and the floor surrounding her.

“Baby?” I asked, but she still didn’t turn to look at me. I moved closer to see exactly what she was doing. An open duffle bag sat on the bed as she stuffed clothes inside.

“Bryn what are you doing?” I asked as I stood by her, seeing the tears stream down her face.

“You shouldn’t have to put up with this Will,” she mumbled.

“I love you.”

“I’m messed up Will,” she stopped packing to turn and look at me, “Don’t you see? You’re too good for me, I need help Will, I need help.” She turned back to her bag, putting more and more clothes into it.

“Bryn, just stop okay, breathe and stop for a minute,” I placed my hand on hers, forcing her to stop her packing.

“No Will!” she screamed and swatted my hand away. “Stop acting like everything is okay! Stop letting me do this to you! Open your eyes! I need help!”

“We can get you help!”

“No you can’t, we can’t, I need to.”

“What do you want Bryn?” my voice was becoming raised. She was so frustrating and I couldn’t make her wrap her mind around what she was saying.

“For you to let me get help! To stop living like everything is okay!”

“Fine Bryn! You need help okay!? Living like this is driving me fucking insane but you don’t need to hear that! You don’t need me making things worse! I’m not blind Bryn, I’ve been dealing with your moods for over a year now! You think I don’t want things to change? But how can I make you take your medicine? How can I make you open your eyes? Is that what you want to hear Bryn? Is this,” I threw some of her clothes into her bag, “What you want!?”

The tears became more forceful as she stared up at me. Reality sunk in as all of the stress began coming out and anger flowed from my lips. Before I could apologize, before I could beg for forgiveness, she spoke.

“Yes,” she said softly, “That’s what I want,” she zipped up her bag and slung it over her shoulder. She didn’t even bother to grab shoes as she walked towards our front door, me right on her heels.

“Bryn,” I begged as she opened the front door, “Please don’t do this.”

She took a step out into the hall and turned to look at me, her tears had stopped and now all that was left were her red eyes that looked up at me. “Will, you deserve better.”

“Stop.”

“No, just listen. I can’t do this to you anymore; I’m going to get help.”

“Bryn, listen to yourself!”

“I love you. I’m checking into a psychiatric care facility. Maybe they can fix me.”

“Bryn, please you aren’t making sense, just come back inside,” I felt my heart breaking; I felt all the air being pushed out of my stomach, leaving me completely breathless.

“No Will, for once I am making sense,” she pushed herself up on her toes and kissed me softly, “You don’t have to wait for me.” And just like that she walked away, leaving me stunned. I closed the door behind her, I couldn’t see straight, I couldn’t think. I just sat down on the couch where it all started, and I looked at the old wooden table, where she sat just minutes ago.