To the Beat of My Heart

Coasting Waves

- PART TWO -   

You just need to relax.

You can't turn it off.

Just breathe.

I am breathing!

Stop faking it.

Fuck. I can't deal with this. I can't escape their voices even in dreams. All it takes is that goddamn look in their eyes and I know what they're thinking. It was brutal in school. No escape; eight fucking hours a day surrounded by kids who don't give two shits what they say or how you feel. They don't care about you. They don't believe you. I don't wish this on my worst enemies. Why would I put myself through all that shame? Is the attention worth it?

Maybe people fake it for a laugh. Do they fake it twenty-four seven, when they're alone, when it hurts so fucking bad and you're so scared your life is in ruins? I can revisit that pain in an instant—it's never left me.

All this from one hiccup in a lifetime of bracing against their judgement. One quickie interview today out of several this week. The leadup to Clay's first show in London. We're in some studio in the city and a whole team of people stands just out of frame. Clay is glowing, as ever. All strut with Gucci shades, a cashmere sweater, blue denim bell-bottoms and sparkling purple nail polish.

I'm a shadow in the background, where I always am. The interviewer is all prissy and peppy. She asked Clay some benign question about dealing with stress and Clay said the stress never really gets to him and it just slipped. I cried out bullshit. It wasn't a slip of the tongue. It was my bloody Tourette's. Everyone looked. The woman just blinked at me. As if to affirm my neurological malfunction, the exclamation was accompanied by a snort and shoulder shrug. And because it felt off, I needed to do it again.

See, some tics I have this urge in my muscle group, a premonitory urge, my doctor called it. It's this thing where I have to complete a tic or do it enough times in a pattern, odd or even and then the sensation fades. It doesn't make me feel better, I think, but I do it anyway.

The moment passes, the interviewer fully recovered. Clay doesn't offer me a cheeky wink, a blown kiss. He looks bored, even flustered, but it's quickly forgotten. The interview continues. And so does my TS.

It's enough to shatter her bubble. She asks if I can keep it down or please kindly get the fuck out. Even though those weren't her exact words, it's subtext, ya know. Clay offers me a sympathetic shrug and I wrinkle my nose at him. Fine. Fuck this. I'm out.

I'm not alone. Jaz follows me into the corridor, as I slump down on a leather bench, staring through a window facing out to a marble courtyard with steel installations and a trickling fountain. This building is lush and modern, and outside I can see the suggestion of the Shard against the clouds. Her hand massages my shoulder and for a moment we're held in this silence. I know she wants to ask if I want to talk about it. Not really, frankly, but I might as well indulge her curiosity. I dunno, maybe I need to get this out.

Sighing, I lean my cheek into my palms. "It hasn't felt this shit since..."

I feel her staring even though my eyes are fixed on the grey carpet.

"I think," I start, chewing at the inside of my lips. "Last year, last tour wasn't so bad... It was all this mad rush. My tics were non-existent and even when they did make a rare appearance, no one noticed. It's a bizarre fucking world where it doesn't dominate my life. I... Fuck, I stopped taking the medicine because I don't need it."

Jaz sits down next to me, her leg brushing against mine. Her hand hasn't left my shoulder until now, when she folds it around the other one, her left hand finding its place on my remaining shoulder. She starts rubbing soothingly and I begin to feel a little more... Well, I guess a little less like crap.