I'M NOT ADRIFT | Eminem

Endless Mental Screaming

A.N. Bruh I remember this day like it happened two days ago lol.

- Detroit, October 1991 -

Mom is taking me to the Emergency Room.
She smiles at me with a sort of fondness.
She knew this moment would come.
There is understanding in her eyes.
Her lips read comprehension.
Her child is not well in the head.
I am not well in the head.
The fog started to settle in when me and my father were getting back from the psychologist.
When I slipped into the passenger seat, he sighed.
He was scared, he was uncomfortable.
When you get a call stating your child is psychotic and needs to go to the ER, it's obviously concerning.
His finger pressed mindlessly on the little digital pad inside the car, sifting through channels until he found one he thought was worthy of me.
I don't know why he did this.
I don't care what I listen to.
Especially not in this moment.
As I watch the intersection fizzle out and seemingly disappear like grains of sand falling through the air, I try desperately to trust my head.
I can't.
I'm not seeing what he's seeing.
To him the intersection is perfectly fine.
The concrete is intact.
"Are you ok...? Do you feel ok?" He's nervous, his eyes dart from the road to my face in scattered seconds.

"I don't really feel anything, I'm fine" my body feels like it's floating.
It does most the time.
I feel like an observer. Someone whose meant to be here short term. I'm a visitor.
Everything is grey.
Detroit is mostly grey.
The red lights and reflective signs are oddly comforting to me.
They stay.
More than anything else seems to.

Time went by quickly.
My dad said nothing else until we got in the driveway.
"I've been reading articles, and all of them- they say sexual abuse is a cause... are you sure David hasn't touched you?"
David is an uncle.
We were close.
We're not anymore.
Not by choice.
My father despises him.
He made me promise to hug him once when he comes in the door for visits and then stay away from him.
I don't want to make my dad upset so I listen to him, though it's incredible hard.
The one man who has never done anything to hurt me is the one I have to avoid.
The one man whose made me feel that maybe all men aren't as bad as they seem.
Uncles get a bad rap.
What can I do about that?
I'm too tired to fight it.

"No, trust me, he didn't"
Small emphasis on certain words is important I guess.
Oh well.
I got out of the car. I was so hungry. My insides were threatening to eat themselves in protest.
I very seldom eat.
When we got inside I quickly slipped my leather jacket off and ran into the kitchen.
I threw the cabinet doors open and rummaged through a box of granola bars.
I ate it quickly, within the span of time my dad went back outside to collect the mail.
My family has never made me feel ashamed for what I eat... when I do.
For some reason, I don't like them knowing that I've opted for a granola bar rather than something objectively healthy.
They don't care.
Their daughter needs to be brought to the ER.
Their daughter is sick in the head.
That is of a much higher concern.

He came back in at about the same time I watched my mom pull in the driveway.
Fog is coming.
I like fog.
Actually I love it, it elicits a desperate kind of misery and romanticism.
I love anything that could be described as poetic.
Later that night, after finally being let out, I would stand in the middle of the street, twirling around in all directions. I wanted to memorize the way it made the streets look. The way it made me feel.
It came on the most fitting night.

"Alright, let's get going" my mother smiles softly, knowing the drive downtown during the fog at the hour of five, rush hour, will take us a while.
I hugged my dad goodbye.
He needs to watch over my brother.
He doesn't come.
It's just as well, he tends to dominate conversations by asking tons of questions of the doctors.
It's something I'd learn later from all the family visits to the psychiatrist.

I rushed down the concrete steps, my bag's straps are too long and I notice it especially in this moment, the bag slamming against my back with each rushed step up the driveway.
I didn't realize how much I felt secure by the items on my person until tonight.
The straps that don't fit right.
At least I had those.
At least I could feel my bead necklace slamming against my chest.
At least I had it in this moment.

Mom met me half way, bringing her arm to the small of my back.
It felt as if she was showing her condolences for me as much as she was greeting me.
It felt warm and safe.
I enjoyed it.

Then we got in mom's car. Mom's incredibly old Ford Fairlane.
It vibrates to the point your vision of the road is fuzzy and altered.
The headrests, heating console and even the gear shift shake and reverberate.
The car wreaks of gasoline despite running on diesel.
Every other time after mom drives it, she grumbles about how the wheel makes her hands feel porous and drenched in gasoline.
I'm very fond of the car for some reason.
I know no matter how broken down it may seem, it's never going to stop working.
The car creaks like an old mansion that would have gone for fifty dollars a long, long time ago.
"So, all things aside was the session good?"
She always wants to hear if I've picked up any profound mantra to say to myself.
She wants to know I'm filling my head with encouragement.
That's what psychologists are for.
They're the ones that really try to help you.

"She said I shouldn't call myself crazy... that to me I'm really experiencing what I'm experiencing" I mumble the words out, nervous about them for some reason.
My parents didn't believe me for a while, a while meaning up until they got the call from my psychologist saying that I need immediate help.
For a while meaning up until an hour ago.

This is when you get the sympathy smile.
The 'I'm so sorry you're experiencing that' smile.
I sink in to my seat, giving her that flat lip smile in response.
It's the only thing I can conjure up without wanting to swallow up my own existence.
After a while you both go silent.
Silent between someone you truly trust isn't awkward at all.
You don't need words.
On a regular day I trust my mom, but sometimes I can hear her plotting against me.
Hallucinated whispers inside my walls.
Sometimes she becomes a spy for them.
I don't know who them is.
I just know they're after me.

"This fog is crazy" she remarks.
Even things obviously observed by everyone can become a conversation starter I guess.
I find the fog perfectly fitting.
It'll only make this night more memorable.
I let out a hummed agreement.
Sometimes my mouth feels sewn shut.
When I had my first psychotic break, lasting two days, through that entire time I couldn't open my mouth.
People's words weren't connecting.
All I could do was nod at everyone's words even if they were questions.

Silence lapse over us again.
The car rattling is the loudest thing to pay attention to.

"This car, man" she scoffs before letting out a soft laugh.