Despair

The Past

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Depression.

"Stop living in the past." 

If only it were that easy. "Moving on is something that needs a pair of hands." My therapist said during our last session. Maybe it was the truth. Feeling alone was something much different than being alone. Something that I put upon myself. Perhaps it was my fate. As I was someone who pushes others away. For the best, I thought every time. It was a solution for myself, for others. 

I often forget. Forget that I myself have a life I must tend to. My little brother who I must care for. He is the only one who stays. I mean who would want someone so broken? I'm sure that even my therapist is sick of me. She wasn't my first therapist. I had many, all giving up on such a waste of life. I was diagnosed with GAD (General Anxiety Disorder), depression, and PTSD several years ago.

In the end, all I have is this dog that surely hates my guts as well as my brother who is only five. I sighed as I sat at the edge of my bed. Which was near my window. I kept my windows with metal bars to ensure no one gets in. I cover them with black curtains so that I never lookout. I hate seeing the outside when the sun rested on top of the mountains. It reminded me of the past. It reminded me of another day, another day to dread. The past that was meant to stay behind. Yet it always stays here. In the back of your mind as it never lets go. As it too needs a place to stay. It's hard to forget the past when you're always reminded of it.

I live in a gloomy neighborhood. No one rarely gets out as the place is high in crime. Lots of the houses are vandalized with graffiti, trash in every corner of the place, no house has more than one story.  Last year some kids near my age lit a garbage truck on fire causing lots of houses to burn down. No one knows who did it. It is just one of the many mysteries this place has. Many people can't pay taxes here so police don't bother anymore. Here is where people are forgotten. At the bottom of the system, at life, if you will.

I look at the ran down clock on the floor. 4:00 am, it read. 3 hours 45 minutes before school began.  Our house only had one bedroom, a living room the size of two pickup trucks, one bathroom, and a tiny kitchen with two cabinets. My brother and I share a bed. I normally don't sleep at night so it's like his own. I went to the living room turning on the tiny lamp that also sat on the floor. The lampshade went missing years ago, somehow, some way. I take out my homework from my ugly blue backpack that is slowly turning black. I didn't have too much to work on luckily. Plus, it was a nice way to pass time.

☂︎

By the time I was finished it was an hour left before my little brother starts school. I start 45 minutes after.

"Jackson," I called out. (and no it's not Jackson Wang.) He wakes up immediately, we are light sleepers as we must stay alert as we continue to live here. He starts off by brushing his teeth as always. I go to boil water on the stove. It's hard to get warm water around here. 

"Yuta," I heard a voice call out. I go to the voice that leads me to the bathroom.

"What is it?"

"Can I not take a shower this time?"

"Why do you ask?"

"I just don't feel like it this morning... I also want to spend time with you," Jackson looked at me with those puppy eyes.

"Well okay, let me go turn off the stove," I felt guilty. A lot of the time I am unable to spend time with Jackson due to the fact I am the only one who has to care for us two. I work three part-time jobs most of them being night shifts. However, now I can try to spend all that missing time with Jackson this morning.

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