Spirals

drift life - 1

~~~

Today is Sunday. It is three months later and it is still cold but getting warmer. It is raining outside today. It is raining. It is a rainy day.

Days. Days feel like a train ride I can't escape, trapped in a never-changing machine, looking out its windows and watching an ever-changing landscape. Days feel like a series of paintings put underwater, blurring into something that is not quite recognizable.

My memory hasn't been great these days.

Traveler was my incarnation. When Traveler died, he returned to my vessel, and I am left unprepared, with everything within me and my senses heightened. It was never meant to be this way. It was never meant to be this way. My consciousness is one but it is being pulled by many. My consciousness is one but I am being torn and split by things I feel too much.

Routine is impossible, then.

My mind has been a puppet that is used for two shows, one done in front of others, one done in a dangerous solitude, both run by the same smiling puppeteers that fight over a string each. Strings for my legs, my throat, my eyes, the corners of my mouth. My mouth likes to smile often in both shows. I feel like shows are terrifying but I also feel like shows are fun. I feel conflicting things a lot.

I don't know what I am going on about; I came to write about my blurry days.

I have been making up for time recently that has often been consumed by spirals. My little sisters are learning division and I am helping them the best that I can. It is nice to see them learn. I cannot help them for too long or I get tired, but they are bright and will often be working on their own before it gets to that point.

I have been trying to spend time with my older sister too. One-on-one time is uncomfortable and she often frustrates me, but I have been trying. I let her into my room yesterday to play a game she likes that we do not have online. She came in and lectured me on the importance of cleaning my room, to which I replied I would get to it later, and she went around teasing the books and clothes she found as I set up the game and tried to entertain her.

"Bro what else are you reading? Secrets Within? The girl on the front look like she can't hold a secret to save her life! You finish this book? She can't keep secrets can she?"

"She can," I said.

"She look like the only thing she can hold in is a fart— is this another pair of jeans? That's ugly, I've gotta take you shopping. Here goes some cargo pants and... a hoodie— bro are you trying to give off school shooter vibes?"

I sighed. "What are you talking about—"

"I know you do not have this game disk lying open on the floor! I almost stepped on it; didn't this cost sixty? Man... and what's this lighter for?"

The game was not loading fast enough.

"You smoke?"

"Nah."

"What, you do rituals or something?"

"Yeah," I said, "I sacrifice nosy people to the devil—"

"Bro shut up, what's it for?"

"I just have it," I lied.

"Gotta be a boy thing. Trinkets, I swear."

She went on for a little before the game finally loaded up. She is better at this game than me and knows it. I was too tired to trash talk and we played until I was tired of playing.

"This the last round?" She laughed. "You don't wanna leave on a win?"

"Who said I'd lose?"

I lost the last round anyway, and we shut down the game. I felt a little better seeing my sister happier, even if she teased around, but I was tired, and I was feeling something in me that I did not want her to know about. She sat on the floor and talked about her college classes and her boyfriend with plenty of red flags, and then she asked me about my high school classes and I told her what I was okay with her knowing. She talked until she saw how tired I was and lectured me on the importance of sleep before leaving in a huff with the door open.

More often my sister is more peaceful like yesterday, but sometimes she is easily annoyed, ready to pick at your flaws just for breathing the wrong way. Sometimes she leaves for a while and comes back with a cynical anger, where, before Traveler died, I would usually try to ignore her, unless she snapped at our younger sisters. She didn't understand why they would get overwhelmed easily, and her tactlessness would infuriate me, and she would be ready to fight me.

For the past few months, however, I have been too tired to become confrontational. On those days I bring my little sisters into my room for a movie or a game night and shut the door like I did when my mother came home angry. I block the door with clothes instead of locking it, and I let my sisters play around under their covers, and when I am sure they are occupied, when I am sure that my sister or my mother were away, I slip into the closet and shut the door with my lighter in my hand.

My sister is not often a problem, though.

My mother is worse by nearly tenfold.

Despite this, I have tried to spend time with my mother as well. I have gone to help her with errands on days I know she does not want to do them. She complains and I sit quietly as she voices her dissatisfaction and trails off to vent about world issues we cannot control. I listen, nodding and being agreeable in the right places, trying to help the job go faster, until she finds something to laugh about. Sometimes she stays cheerful enough and buys fast food for the family, counting up the greasy paper bags and fishing for change. Sometimes she doesn't, and she vents again, mentioning my life and my insecurities along the way, or she stays silent and comes home with snacks and too much beer.