The Truth

Part 2: Josh

5 Months Before Tara

Friday

I'm finally back at the house. Today was a long one. I walk into my room and feel the weight of failure pressing down on me. It's worse than failure. It's hopelessness. I don't know what I'm doing for the next hour, let alone the next week, month or year. And then the years after that. They're all mysteries too.

I go to the kitchen and Rhandzu is there, getting ready to run.

"Hey," she says. "How was your day?"

"I feel like shit."

"Oh... What's wrong?"

"Just depressed."

"Do you want to come running? Maybe the exercise will help." Everyone always suggests something.

"Sure."

"Mia's on her way with Thor..."

We stand around waiting. My chest is light, and it's hard to breathe. I take shallow breaths and try not to pace. I wish Mia would just come already. I need this run.

Mia is taking forever. Every second feels like forever. I don't even know what I'm waiting for. Mia will come and we'll run and maybe I'll feel better for half an hour, and then I'll come back to this. Then what? Dr Schneider can't see me today. My medication's not working yet. It reminds me of April last year, when I was waiting to see Dr Nossel. There were still three hours till my appointment, and I went on a run around the block that took forever. I got home and it was eleven minutes later. I don't remember what I did next.

When I finally saw Dr Nossel, he couldn't do anything that we hadn't already done. You have to wait for the meds to work. And they never work quick enough. I had to stay a night in a psych institution then. I don't ever want that to happen again. I need a way out.

I consider taking sleeping pills. Three or four so that they knock me out for a while. But the problem is that it always makes me feel worse. That moment just before, when I know my solution will just be a timeout from this eternity of suffering. Then I'll be groggy, and I can take more and more until I'm immune to them, and I have to be fully awake.

Mia arrives, along with Thor, her husky. We run, but after ten minutes I'm tired. Exhausted. The run is not nearly over. We're going up quite a steep hill. Mia and Rhandzu are talking. I can't say a word. I don't want them to worry about me, but I just can't say anything. They're letting me be in my silence.

After another twenty minutes, my body won't let me run anymore.

"I'm too tired," I whisper to them.

"Maybe you should take a walk back," Mia says. "Are you alright?"

"I'll be okay," I say. It's important that they think I believe it.

It's a long way back. I don't know how I'll make it that far. I don't know how I'll take the next step. But I can't just stop here. I need to get back, lie down on my bed, and then I don't know what. I'll smoke up. That might make me feel something.

When I arrive back at the house we share, I decide to shower. Before I get to the shower, I wonder how I'll manage to get to the shower. In the shower I wonder how I'll manage to get out of the shower. I somehow get out and get dressed.

I go to the kitchen. I will wait here until Rhandzu gets back. Then I'll speak to her. She might help me feel better. She is taking a long time. I don't know if she'll ever return. I don't know if I'll still be here. I pace, breathing quick, shallow breaths.

Eternity.

Rhandzu arrives back.

"How are you feeling?" she asks.

"Worse," I say. "I think I'll just smoke up and go to sleep."

"Can I join you?"

"Do you smoke weed?"

"Sometimes," she says. She goes to shower. I walk back to my room. I pick up the wire dog that I hang my keys on. I stick my hand underneath, into its stomach, and pull out my bag of weed. I went through a lot to get this bag. I drove around for two hours trying to find the dealer. I was groggy from the sleeping pills, and I guess I just don't know Cape Town well enough. Eventually we met in a wide, empty alley. It felt stupid, like a cliché that's not meant to be true for me. The dude had just picked his kids up from school. A girl and a boy. Around four to six years old. He was sweet. Told me not to worry about the time it took us to find each other. Hard getting used to a new city. I told him I was groggy from the pills. I didn't want to seem like a loser.

Now I sit down and take a Rizzler out of my drawer. I lay it out on the desk. I shake weed into my grinder, and grind it into much finer granules. I knock it evenly onto the Rizzler. I cut a small piece of cardboard off the Rizzler box, and fold it into a filter. I place it at the end of the joint and roll the paper, lick it at the end, and stick it. It holds up.

I thought the process would calm me, but I'm still agitated. I still don't know how I'll get from here to the door. I still don't know how I'll wait for Rhandzu. I still don't know how a joint could possibly help me.

Rhandzu and I lie on our backs looking up at the sky. I light the joint and take a drag, and immediately I get that 3D effect of the world that weed gives me. Like I'm only seeing it for real now. That usually my world is flat. I pass the joint to Rhandzu.

We talk. I tell her about my past depressions. I tell her that I'm gay. I tell her that coming out has to be done over and over again. I start to feel better. She tells me about her life. She tells me that... I don't know. I haven't been listening. Now she tells me about how she doesn't think she'll finish her Masters by the end of February, even though she has a job offer starting in March. She tells me about her family. The township they live in in Pretoria. Her mother is a doctor. Her father is a lawyer. Her brothers, who she loves, are moving in a direction she can't recognise. I lose focus.

I think about the depression I felt so strongly just ten minutes ago. I feel great now. I think about how life can be perfect. I realise what I've been doing wrong. It's that I haven't been doing. Tomorrow I'll wake up early and get started on what I'm here for. My expectations have been too high. I wanted to write the whole day, a ridiculous expectation for a novice writer with no clear plan. I'll set an amount of pages to get done. After each page I'll take a break. In the afternoon I'll go explore somewhere. I'll do this every day. Tomorrow will be Hout Bay. I'll go experience the beauty there. I'll look at the sponges and figure out what the fuck they actually are. I'll figure out why they react differently to drinking water than they do to seawater. I'll feel interested in life. I won't ever be bored. I'm going to be okay.