Status: complete
Whispering of a Mad Woman
Whispering of a Mad Woman
Luke. The name of one of Jesus’ beloved followers; I always laugh at that. My brother’s name is Luke but he is not a saint at all.
He is my elder brother of sixteen months, but I people believe I am his senior because I am more mature.
From the beginning he tormented me; pulling my hair and stealing my dolls. So distressed I became that I had a severe case of alopecia. Through the years it seemed he would never get better, until he was eight and nine when his temper seemed to go into remission.
When he became a teen it got much worse. He is sixteen now. It seems that this little town in the middle of the prairie cannot hold him any longer with his attention deficit disorder.
The tension in the household is growing; you can almost cut it with a knife. Luke has been progressively getting worse since he was introduced to alcohol and the magical weed that gets him high. All he appears to do at the present is party and run away from the police.
I write in this little red book that I hide under my bed. My fears and anxieties I hide from all; because no one understands what I go through every day in my silent Hell that is all my own.
I have been more on edge, snapping at people at random. Trying to keep my anger under check around people is increasingly getting harder with each passing season. Sadness is threatening to consume me.
***
I swear that I can hear one of the neighbors through the walls of my room; a pillow over my head and all.
My parents and Luke are fighting in the kitchen below, but I can make out the whispering of a woman. Luke’s voice has irritated her. Her low voice is getting louder and louder, she is nearly screaming now; giving me a headache. I attempt to ignore all the voices around me, crying as I sleep even though it is not long after school has ended.
Awakening does not lighten my unpleasant mood. The angels are nowhere around me, only devils. The woman speaks again; tempting me with words, like Adam and Eve with the forbidden fruit (Gen. 2:16-17).
Drawing does not even appeal to me these days, but writing seems to be an unlikely retreat from the world. The poetry in this little red book looks questionable to the woman; who perceives it as waste of time.
I feel myself falling short of the words I want to express myself and how I feel. I end up feeling more frustrated and deflated than before I started to write.
I feel so drained, like all my energy is being seeped out of me. All my defenses have left me standing here alone to fight this battle. I am a lone soldier fighting an army of invisible devil spirits.
***
It is getting worse.
I am the empty shell of the girl I used to be. The young woman I see staring at me in the mirror I hardly recognize. The black eyeliner running down her face is unfamiliar to my previous self. Anger and betrayal reflect back in my eyes as I listen to the fading echoes of Luke yelling at me.
He is infuriated because I flushed all his medicine, which he was going to sell to people, down the toilet. I could not let him ruin other individuals along with himself. What he does not understand is he has destroyed the only family he has already.
He thought I was betraying his trust; a trust I had long ago learnt not to believe in.
Now, I do not know what to do. The woman surrounds me, I hear her voice again. She entices me with words of escaping this world; of terminating this life. I seem to be in a dream-like state as I hold a knife to my wrist, imagining what it would be like. What would it be like, to have my lifeblood flow from me? What would it be like to have a gulp full of water as my last breath? Would anyone miss me?
I snap out of it as I think of my last question. The woman retreats angrily from me, she has lost this battle.
I think of my mother, my father, and my dear sister. All of whom would be devastated if I perished, especially at my own hand. They are what keep me here; not Luke, never him. He is the one I never wish to speak to again; the boy I wish would disappear so our broken family could become one again.
The woman wants him dead; to stop existing. I cannot say I wish for anything different.
***
I do not allow myself to dwell on Luke while I am at school. Pretending the creature, with the same blood as I, is not here is easy if you do not see him. He skips out of school often enough now.
Living in a small town however, has its downfalls. Everyone knows everything about everyone. And Luke seems to be the number one piece of gossip today.
At school I can hear them. They all look at me in the halls and talk in groups.
No one dares to confront me.
I try to hide myself before class. It feels like hours are passing on the clock as I wait for the teacher to make his entrance.
This makes me nervous.
My hood covers my head and half my face and my iPod is playing in my ears while I sit in my desk. Trying to block out everything seems to work for me, but not for the woman. She is angry with them.
She is yelling in my ears; radiating through my head. She wants me to face them, to fight my classmates I see them staring at me whispering. I try to shake her off to no avail.
I see a boy I despise looking at me with a cheeky grin on his face. He sits two seats ahead of me. I stop my music to hear him say offensive things about my parents who have kicked my brother out of the house the night before. He calls my parents “unfit.” The whole time he speaks to the other boy he is looking at me; like he wants to me hear.
This time I let the woman take over.
I rip off my iPod, push my books away and stand towering over the boy. The woman formulates in front of me. She slaps the boy, rips at his plump fleshy skin, leaving red marks across his face. I can hear myself screaming at him to, “Stop interrogating about my family!” as the woman puts her hands around the boys neck to strangle him.
I let the woman win this battle as she consumes me; I slam the door on the way out.
He is my elder brother of sixteen months, but I people believe I am his senior because I am more mature.
From the beginning he tormented me; pulling my hair and stealing my dolls. So distressed I became that I had a severe case of alopecia. Through the years it seemed he would never get better, until he was eight and nine when his temper seemed to go into remission.
When he became a teen it got much worse. He is sixteen now. It seems that this little town in the middle of the prairie cannot hold him any longer with his attention deficit disorder.
The tension in the household is growing; you can almost cut it with a knife. Luke has been progressively getting worse since he was introduced to alcohol and the magical weed that gets him high. All he appears to do at the present is party and run away from the police.
I write in this little red book that I hide under my bed. My fears and anxieties I hide from all; because no one understands what I go through every day in my silent Hell that is all my own.
I have been more on edge, snapping at people at random. Trying to keep my anger under check around people is increasingly getting harder with each passing season. Sadness is threatening to consume me.
***
I swear that I can hear one of the neighbors through the walls of my room; a pillow over my head and all.
My parents and Luke are fighting in the kitchen below, but I can make out the whispering of a woman. Luke’s voice has irritated her. Her low voice is getting louder and louder, she is nearly screaming now; giving me a headache. I attempt to ignore all the voices around me, crying as I sleep even though it is not long after school has ended.
Awakening does not lighten my unpleasant mood. The angels are nowhere around me, only devils. The woman speaks again; tempting me with words, like Adam and Eve with the forbidden fruit (Gen. 2:16-17).
Drawing does not even appeal to me these days, but writing seems to be an unlikely retreat from the world. The poetry in this little red book looks questionable to the woman; who perceives it as waste of time.
I feel myself falling short of the words I want to express myself and how I feel. I end up feeling more frustrated and deflated than before I started to write.
I feel so drained, like all my energy is being seeped out of me. All my defenses have left me standing here alone to fight this battle. I am a lone soldier fighting an army of invisible devil spirits.
***
It is getting worse.
I am the empty shell of the girl I used to be. The young woman I see staring at me in the mirror I hardly recognize. The black eyeliner running down her face is unfamiliar to my previous self. Anger and betrayal reflect back in my eyes as I listen to the fading echoes of Luke yelling at me.
He is infuriated because I flushed all his medicine, which he was going to sell to people, down the toilet. I could not let him ruin other individuals along with himself. What he does not understand is he has destroyed the only family he has already.
He thought I was betraying his trust; a trust I had long ago learnt not to believe in.
Now, I do not know what to do. The woman surrounds me, I hear her voice again. She entices me with words of escaping this world; of terminating this life. I seem to be in a dream-like state as I hold a knife to my wrist, imagining what it would be like. What would it be like, to have my lifeblood flow from me? What would it be like to have a gulp full of water as my last breath? Would anyone miss me?
I snap out of it as I think of my last question. The woman retreats angrily from me, she has lost this battle.
I think of my mother, my father, and my dear sister. All of whom would be devastated if I perished, especially at my own hand. They are what keep me here; not Luke, never him. He is the one I never wish to speak to again; the boy I wish would disappear so our broken family could become one again.
The woman wants him dead; to stop existing. I cannot say I wish for anything different.
***
I do not allow myself to dwell on Luke while I am at school. Pretending the creature, with the same blood as I, is not here is easy if you do not see him. He skips out of school often enough now.
Living in a small town however, has its downfalls. Everyone knows everything about everyone. And Luke seems to be the number one piece of gossip today.
At school I can hear them. They all look at me in the halls and talk in groups.
No one dares to confront me.
I try to hide myself before class. It feels like hours are passing on the clock as I wait for the teacher to make his entrance.
This makes me nervous.
My hood covers my head and half my face and my iPod is playing in my ears while I sit in my desk. Trying to block out everything seems to work for me, but not for the woman. She is angry with them.
She is yelling in my ears; radiating through my head. She wants me to face them, to fight my classmates I see them staring at me whispering. I try to shake her off to no avail.
I see a boy I despise looking at me with a cheeky grin on his face. He sits two seats ahead of me. I stop my music to hear him say offensive things about my parents who have kicked my brother out of the house the night before. He calls my parents “unfit.” The whole time he speaks to the other boy he is looking at me; like he wants to me hear.
This time I let the woman take over.
I rip off my iPod, push my books away and stand towering over the boy. The woman formulates in front of me. She slaps the boy, rips at his plump fleshy skin, leaving red marks across his face. I can hear myself screaming at him to, “Stop interrogating about my family!” as the woman puts her hands around the boys neck to strangle him.
I let the woman win this battle as she consumes me; I slam the door on the way out.