Episode 69 - Breakdown

  Welcome back to the podcast. Or I think we’re back in the podcast. There’s a part of me that doesn’t know for sure. It should be so obvious, so easy to see. I should know exactly what’s going on, but I don’t. 

(Music fades in)

  What is the least jarring way of saying that I had a mental breakdown between this post and the last time I posted on this feed? Did the fact that I phrased it as a question help calm your nerves at all? Probably not. In fact, you might be more alarmed that I was so nonchalant about it. After all, that’s kind of a serious thing that no one should make light of. And I’m not trying to make light of it. But I can’t pretend that I’m alarmed by what happened anymore. On one hand, I’m on the other side of it. I think. On the other, it’s happened enough times that I’ve gone numb to the whole thing. 

  Because what else am I supposed to do, really? It came and went. No somber air will undo what happened or prevent the next strike. In fact, it’s guaranteed to happen again. 

  I know this because this is not the first breakdown I had. There’s a pattern here. It really is just a part of my life.

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  Once again, the house did not quite fit in with the world around it. This time, it seemed to command more of a presence. It was larger than the surrounding homes, in some way. The scenery also didn’t quite seem to work on the whole. Or–at least–you wouldn’t think of homes in the Wild West being gathered together like some kind of modern day neighborhood. You wouldn’t think of home amongst the sand bunching up in that way. If you think of it at all. Most don’t.

  And because we don’t think about it, it makes sense to just copy and paste the familiar layout into this cartoon: to take what we know so well, to take our conceptions of a neighborhood and place them into this world, into this new setting. Just like they did with that other episode. It was the same thing. Maybe they thought no one would notice. After all, this was a kids’ show. Kids don’t seem that likely to put the pieces together.

  Which actually makes it seem worse somehow. Because when I look back, the uneasy feeling is there, waiting for me. That dissonance between what I should have been seeing and what was actual there was loud and clear. It just wasn’t something a child could explain.

  And frankly, speaking from experience, an adult can’t easily explain it, either. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  It’s not just the repetition or frequency of these spells that enables me to be so nonchalant about it. It’s also that I have some vague understanding of what happens. Or rather, what that triggering moment might look like. I have a vague sense of what it is that sends me spiraling. It’s something… familiar, I’ll put it that way.

  And that’s not a satisfactory answer, I know. Narratively speaking, anyway. Because now that I’ve captured your attention with a podcast, now that there’s a story here that you’ve become invested in, I owe you some degree of coherence. The exact figure is up to debate, I suppose, but there’s a difference between giving something that isn’t up to everyone’s standards and giving you absolutely nothing. There’s a difference between dropping subtle hints for what will come later and implying that there’s something more that you may never know about, something that I fully recognize as useful but I am deliberately holding back for reasons I won’t explain. 

  Except, I can explain, I guess. But in the explanation, I might just be rehashing the problem. Because there’s only so many of those details I can give you.

  When it comes to myself, on the whole, there’s a lot I can’t tell you. Call it old school internet habits. There was a time when we all knew to not be too upfront with our reworld lives and identities. We knew to keep our cards close to our chest because the happenings of the online world had the power to destroy the real one we were enjoying. That was what the real danger was. You could lose and recreate an anonymous online life with enough care. Birth and rebirth is part of the digital charm. But in the real world, you only get one chance. And you might have already been dealt a hand that was not ideal. 

  Never mind the damage that other people can do while you are still trying to get your bearings. We start out in life so vulnerable. We don’t know much of anything. And we never seem to learn quickly enough. We’re vulnerable to damage that might last forever. And while you can fix a lot, you can’t fix everything. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  The woman stepped into the building strongly, confidently, as one should when they are entering their own home. There was no reason to pull back. There was no reason to be hesitant when entering a space that operated according to your own principles and wishes. There was no reason to enter a space that you knew so well with any trepidation or fear. After all, if there was a trap, you were likely the one to set it. For what reason, only you would be able to say.

  Wyatt followed her inside. His step was heavy but somehow quick. It was his own need that spurred him along despite the crushing weight of grief that was threatening to hold him back. His wounds were raw and left exposed to the cold chill in the air that sent a shiver up Jade’s back.

  She hesitated before she followed him. Before she did, she let that chill ride through her body. It was trying to tell her something, she knew as much. Though she was young, she could sense that something was wrong. The signs were in the air. There was a writing on the figurative walls around her that she couldn’t read, but it was there. She just seemed to be the only one to know it was there, the only one who could see it. The woman had retreated inside, and Wyatt had his back to her. 

  And she wanted to call out to him. She wanted to yell, to warn him what was going to come. She wanted him to see, to understand, or to at least know that something was amiss. 

  But Jade never talked. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  I don’t think a life is ever truly over until it is–in fact–over. It can always be improved upon. But there are hits that knock you so far down that what could have been your normal is a high you might never get to. Your life isn’t over, but it is forever transformed. Likely for the worst. 

  Though I suppose a transformation for the better is always a possibility. It’s just not something I’m familiar with.

  Case in point, my mental breakdown. It was entirely from something that reminded me of my past, a past that I’ve never directly taken ownership of or admitted to. One that I can’t directly admit to. For so many reasons, many of them selfish. 

  It’s self-centered to think that way, I know, but that doesn’t mean I can change. Not so easily, anyway.

(Music fades out and new music fades in) 

  Wyatt did not go far into the home. He felt no need to. It was enough for him to be under the roof, staring into the maze of seemingly random walls. The walls weren’t random, though. There was some order to them, some pattern or logic that no one else could see. Or the unskilled and uninformed eye wouldn’t be able to see it. And for someone like Wyatt, a product of the Wild West, his eye had no way of being informed. His world had never been that way. It couldn’t be that way. There’s something painfully impractical but a sea of walls in a world where building material could be so hard to come by and where ease of movement within the home likely had its advantage. Even now, in current year, we have gone back to open floor plans, as if something in us was always going to push against the boundaries that walls present.

  But all those walls did make the space feel bigger in a very specific way. The space was occupied, but it was still there somehow, almost like a castle.

  “This is a lot of house for a little lady,” Wyatt said, echoing my thoughts.

  The woman stopped amidst the walls. She bunched up her nose as she stared Wyatt down. That hint of disgust was impossible to miss on her face. Not that she made any attempt to hide it. 

  “My brother lives here too. And his wife.”

  She leaves it at that. It seemed like there was more to say, more she wanted to add. The end of her sentence was not properly tied off. It was not complete. But whatever else was there, she kept to herself. 

  “You’ve got family then?” Wyatt asked.

  She said nothing in response. I don’t suppose she had an answer to give.

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  I am haunted. That’s the root of so many problems. I am haunted and unable to clear the ghosts away. They often lay dormant in my mind. I can even gaze upon them at a distance, enjoying our reluctant truce. They leave me alone, and I do nothing to remove them from my life, but occasionally, there is a moment, a chance for them to seize me, and when that chance arises, they always take it. They always go after me, truce be damned. Or maybe this was in the fine print. I don’t know. And I also don’t know what happens then. Not entirely. 

  But I do know that when they let go, when the storm passes and my mind clears again, I’m never at home. And this time was no different.  I was out in some unfamiliar place, staring up at trees I knew I had never seen before. I was never one for the outdoors, you see. I grew up in the desert where the flora and fauna might kill you so that they can survive, assuming the sun overhead didn’t pick a victor first. We moved, sure, but I never fully got over that habit, the fear that something in the shadows was out to get me. Especially on a night like that, when I was alone, unsure of where I stood.

  At least I had my cell phone.

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  “Can I get you something to drink?” the woman asked instead.

  A small smirk was pulling at the corner of her mouth. Jade could see the uptick in her lips. She could see the evil lurking therein, but Wyatt had his back turned. He was still gazing at the walls, the maze therein, and all that it could mean. His mind was elsewhere, on an interior design that did not make sense, on a loss he would never fully be able to fathom, on a world that was no longer what he knew. 

  “The little girl of yours could help me,” the woman said, trying to pull him back into reality, into the question she was so desperate to have answered. 

  But Wyatt shook his head.

  “No, thank you, ma’am,” he replied. “But I think I should speak to your brother, perhaps.”

  “Oh?”

  Wyatt nodded. “Let the men handle this, after all.”

  He said that so simply and so plainly. Like it was nothing at all to say. Like those were just words, keys to something that came next. And it did trigger something else, namely the release of all the air in the room.

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

  I’m okay, I should remind you. I’m back at least. For the moment. But I don’t suppose that’s a guarantee. Things could change at any time. Life is quick, and it always catches you by surprise. 

(Music gradually fades out)

  Aishi Online is a production of Miscellany Media Studios. It is written, produced, performed, and edited by MJ Bailey with music from the Sounds like an Earful music supply. If you like the show, please leave a review, tell a friend, or post about it on some mysterious online forum. You do you.