The Grace in the Fall

A Blast from my Mom's Past

The room was dark and you can hear muffled party music from outside the room. I saw the slow ceiling fan make its rounds, keeping a constant chill on my skin. It seemed like it was mocking me by moving so slowly. I couldn't move at all.

It seemed to be whispering "go on, go. You can leave whenever you want." Except I couldn't go. I was trapped and the room seemed to be getting smaller and sweat appeared on my skin.

"You can go," it continued.

I couldn't go. My legs weren't working. It felt like I was trapped in a useless body. It wasn't working correctly.

There was a girl in the room, she kept whispering things to me but I couldn't hear what she was saying. She was so close to me but I couldn't move her. The girl placed a small kiss on my forehead. My heart started beating faster. I felt absolutely and utterly terrified.

I tried to make my exhausted limbs run away or at the very least push her away but it felt like they had 100 pounds attached to each one. I couldn't move, in fact I could hardly breathe. My breathing was shallow and labored by the sheer adrenaline combating whatever was happening to me.

I tried to sit up but the girl just pushed me back down onto the bed and my eyes returned to the mocking ceiling fan. It continued to move in endless circles. Slowly and mockingly. I gave up and let the weight of the night crush me. I allowed the weight to shatter me into a million pieces. I kept my eyes trained on the ceiling fan.

....

I shot up. My heart was racing and my breathing was fast and shallow. I was covered in sweat. I feverishly looked around the room. I looked down at the bed sheets and saw that they were the blue ones I had since I was 10 years old and not grey sheets. I looked around the room, studying every piece of furniture. Many of which I had owned for years. I pulled my knees up to my chest and continued to look around my room at a rapid pace.

It wasn't real. It wasn't real. It wasn't real.

I continued to chant that mantra to myself as I tried to calm my racing heart. I looked around the room, more specifically at the dark grey paint that Noah had painted one of my walls. Noah.

I searched my mind for good memories with Noah that I could immerse myself in. It wasn't very hard. Almost any memory I had with Noah was better than that.

I shivered as fear rushed over me.

It wasn't real. I'm not even in the same state anymore. It already happened and what already happened can't hurt me.

My mom had kept her word and on Tuesday of the following week, after I had taken all my exams, I had moved up here to Oregon. And with that, my Junior year was over. Since I had finished school about 3 weeks before everyone else my mom and I went on a lot of adventures by ourselves.

We drove up to Portland a lot and found interesting things to do there. I met Carson Lancaster, my mom's old friend. He was a pretty nice person. I couldn't meet Quinn because he had returned to Nevada, where he lived.

Carson was a lot of things but most of all, he was insanely smart and one of the richest people I know. My mom told me he designed software, but what she failed to mention was he designed software and sells it to some of the biggest software companies in the world. He had us over for dinner one night and his house is giant!

My mom had hired me a therapist and I visit her once a week. We have had two sessions but I don't really feel any different than I did before. They both assure me that I will feel different eventually, but it will take some time. My therapist diagnosed me with Anxiety and Moderate Depression and so my mom has paid a lot more attention to what kinds of things I'm doing, how much time I'm spending alone and how often I sleep.