Thicker Than Paper

Excitement

Giddy and woozy.Cheerful and traitorous. Shaky and intoxicating. I bite my lip, fighting back a smile on my lips. My knees shake as I push the little paper crane in the water. It spins in the water. I laugh, feeling like I'm the little paper crane. It'almost better than drugs and alcohol. And it won't ruin my liver. I keep smiling, all the way home.    

~~~

My therapist says that sometimes a loss in time of decrease in memory are symptoms of depression or side effects of the medication to help depression. She says that is probably why I can't remember what I ate yesterday for dinner, or when I look at a clock and I can't figure out how three hours have passed.

I don't tell her I can't remember what I've learned in school all week. I don't tell her how I can barely believe a month has gone by. A month of being out. A month of dodge conversations and fuzzy memories.

I don't tell her I still love for Travis to smile at me in the hallways. I don't tell her I jog to my car after school, to miss anybody who wants to fix God's agenda. I guess I don't tell her a lot of things you should tell a person that's paid to listen to you and is under confidentiality. 

Sometimes that makes me worried. I can't even trust the person who's paid to be trusted. It makes me worried the depression is back. It makes me worried I'll never have healthy relationships because I can't trust anyone.

I'm worried I'll never get a real relationship. More than a hookup, more than an Andrea. I'm worried now that I'm out I'll never find someone who doesn't just want to use me. It stupid, they should be worried I'll use them. Maybe I should come with a warning label.

I stare at my eyes in the mirror. Forgetting I'm washing my hands. I guess this is good for my stalling. I just don't feel like doing weights today. I suppose it's an off day. My eyes look gross. Wrong. Like they don't fit me.

Brown, and amber color. Wide and terrified. Shocked and guilty. Like I'm being held up for bait. Like I'm being jailed for no reason I can think of. Brown and insufficient. 

"Phoenix?" Why does it feel like this is how all our conversations start? Him being weirdly shocked I am where I am. 

I turn around and blink. I'm still washing my hands. Well, at this point it's just running my hands under water. I quickly turn the faucet off and pump the machine for paper towels. Travis looks scared. Wide-eyed and terrified. Like I just was. He's twitchy, biting his lip, and diverting his eyes up and down. 

"Oh, hey Travis," I look down at his twitching hands, "Is everything okay?"

He licks his lips, nodding his head with his eyes closed. I know for a fact he's lying. I decide to let him do what he needs to. Something's very obviously lying.

He sucks in a deep breath, and when it comes out it's shaky. He opens his eyes and looks at me, "Phoenix, I...I...oh god, I don't really know how to do this. I've thought about this for so long. And when you did it, it just seemed so easy!" His laugh has me very confused, "I knew a couple years ago. I guess I just wasn't ever really interested in girls like my friends were-" I know what this is about. I feel the need to cry, "I like it when my little sister made me talk about boys with her. I don't know, it was stupid. I brushed it off. 

Figured I just hadn't hit puberty all the way yet. Maybe my hormones were short or something, I don't know I came up with a lot of excuses. I can't even remember half of them!" We both laugh, and he swipes under his eye.

"Then my sophomore year, I guess I was just so...confused. And tired. Tired of not being like my friends. So, I very stupidly asked some boy I had a slight crush on if he wanted to go to the party with me. I tried making it seem, very casual. But, he laughed. Laughed, like, really hard. in my face," He cringes, and my heart drops.