Chrysalis

Faith

The stench filled my head with a fog; I couldn’t seem to move. It was filling my whole being, making me heavy. Everything was black; then suddenly from deep in the pit of my stomach, I lurched awake. I ran to the bathroom, retching the stench from me into the toilet. My throat was hot, but the rest of my wet, sweaty body shook; each retch reaching deeper and deeper into my being. Finally, I was able to stand and bend over the sink; the smell of fresh water helped clear my head. I wanted more. I would have drowned myself in a river, but all I could manage was stripping off the now-damp tank top and underwear I had on, engulfing myself in the hot shower. The stream seemed timeless. It stung my skin, but somehow soothed a deeper part of me, until it began to turn cold. I couldn’t face the clothes I’d just stripped from, so, I reached out the barely-open bathroom door and grabbed my backpack. Rummaging through it, I found a pair of sweats from school.

School— I’ve got to get moving. I found my phone, keys, and shoes in the bag and snatched it up as I exited the bathroom and crossed to the door on the other side of the room. I could feel the room and its fumes engulfing me, purposefully blocking my escape.

“Where are you going?” moaned the buried body shrouded in sheets.

“School.”

“Can you leave me five bucks for cigarettes?”

“Sorry. I’m broke.”

The fog of the room threatened to overtake me as I shut the door behind me before he fully woke. As I came out from under the awning of the apartment building, a cold, misting rain and a sudden gust of wind slapped me in the face. It was a wake-up call. Shit! Had I missed class? I pulled my black hoodie over my head and halfway down my face. I squinted through my own slowly clearing fog down at my phone which was dead, just as I slid into my car. I plugged my phone in and started the engine—not much gas. I’d have to stop.

Professor Forsythe was one of my only professors who actually kept attendance, and of course, his class was in the morning on both Monday and Friday. He actually didn’t take roll, but we each had an electronic clicker that had to be activated when we came into class with an entrance prompt, so within about ten minutes, he knew who was in and who wasn’t. I had given my clicker to Stan, since he was always on time, but it was a risk if I didn’t get there because Forsythe could call on anyone at random, anytime during the lecture. If your clicker was activated, and you weren’t there to respond to the question, you were out! I couldn’t afford to get kicked out of this class.

I checked that my phone was getting a charge and headed for the gas station. As the pump gassed up my car, I ran in for some cigarettes and a five-hour. When I got back in the car, my phone screen said 8:07. I should make it to class; I’d just drive through and get a coffee. One for Stan too. I lit a cigarette, breathing in deep. It stung familiarly, and quickly started its numbing work.

I walked into class and saw the prompt was already on the screen. I found Stan and handed him the coffee, as he handed me the clicker.

“Shit, Faith! You look like death.” He laughed under his breath, “All you need is a scythe!”

“Thanks, bro! You know just how to make a girl feel special.”

“Seriously, you, ok? You’re white as a sheet!”

“I’m fine.”

“That good, huh?” Stan leaned in to whisper in my ear, “And you smell like a wet dog!”

His laugh this time was a bit too loud. My wet hair did seem to have the musky smell of cigarettes and a rough night wafting through it. No water in the world could wash that smell away, I thought to myself.

“Are you simply a product of your DNA?” the penetrating voice of Professor Forsythe broke in intentionally to call the class to order.

“Was that the prompt? What did he say?” Stan was still laughing at his own joke.

“Are you simply a product of your DNA?” I redirected.

“Hell, no!” Stan clicked his answer emphatically beside me. I was stuck a bit longer on my reply. Was I who I was because of my DNA? Or somewhere within this chamber of my being was I actually choosing this life I had? That seemed hard to believe, why would I choose this? Stan nudged me, “Answer, dumb shit! If you don’t answer, you’re absent.”

I clicked, “Yes.”

Stan leaned in again to whisper in my ear, only more seriously this time, “You don’t really believe that.”

“Sure, I do; my whole family is fucked up and that’s why I am. It’s as good a theory as any. Do you have a better explanation for why a relatively intelligent person screws themselves over like I do?” I laughed, but it wasn’t funny. We both knew it.

“Here, take some Adderall and you’ll feel better. Caffeine just ain’t the same.”

As he handed me the little blue pill, I felt like Neo. Was I making a life-altering decision for reality or sleep? What a joke, of course, I was; I always chose sleep. I swallowed the tiny pill with my last swig of coffee.

Forsythe’s voice broke into my thoughts, “The human genome project seemed to support this idea. Through it, scientists were locating genes for obesity, alcoholism, and even sexual preference. Genes were linked to personality traits such as introversion, neuroticism, and even risk-taking behaviors. So, I ask again, are you the simple product of your DNA?”

Forsythe’s voice faded, replaced by the voice in my head. “Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” Yeah, that’s fair, I thought. What kind of God would do that!?

“Fuck this!” I got up to leave, but Stan pulled me back into my seat.

“What?” he whispered.

“Nothing. It’s too hot in here. I gotta go.” I got up a second time, and this time he moved his knees for me to pass by.

“What if he calls on you?”

I just shrugged. As I left the building for the parking lot, a breeze caught my still-damp hair and sent a shiver up my spine. The scent of freshly cut grass filled my head and, as I shut my eyes, I felt a peace come over me. I should pick the red pill! the thought brought a smile to my tired face. “Which pill would that be?” I retorted, “I’ve taken them all.”

As I got to my car, I realized I didn’t have a clear direction to go. So, I went home—not to my apartment, but to my parent’s house. I drove the familiar drive and parked across the street from the house. My beater car leaked oil, so I always parked it on the street. I typed the code into the garage door and walked through to the kitchen door which was rarely locked and up to my old room.

The gleam of the pure white room nearly blinded me as the late morning sun shone aggressively through the diminishing clouds and into the eastern windows of my room. Sun always seems brighter after a quick rain. I headed for the attached bathroom and stripped down, turning on the hot shower. I took off my earrings, rings, and lip ring, and even took out my tongue stud and laid all the jewelry in the little China caddy on the counter. I avoided the mirror and stepped into the hot stream. It hurt.

Tears mixed with the channels of water and tasted salty in my mouth. I let them flow, unburdening myself of what they were carrying out of me. The floral and vanilla scent of the velvety wash filled my head. I stood there in the scalding waterfall washing, conditioning, shaving, exfoliating, rinsing, and weeping, until I was spent. Exhausted, I took the white bath sheet from off the wall and swaddled myself in it like a newborn. The blanketing towel held me secure as I sat down on the toilet’s shut lid. I sat there like that until the evaporation of the water off my hot skin shook me to attention. I was so tired.

Finally, I walked back to the sink and cleared the steam off the mirror. I looked long into the eyes staring back at me. Where was the little girl that used to look back with wide eyes and expectation from this mirror? These eyes seemed old. Not wrinkled, but worn. Tired. Dead. I opened the small medicine cabinet, but it was filled with bubble gum-scented perfume and orange nail polish. I fished through the drawers of the white bedroom for something to wear. No luck. I pulled the sweats I had been wearing back on and walked out into the hall and down to my parents’ bathroom. Opening their medicine cabinet, I searched through the amber plastic bottles with child-proof lids. I could feel all I had washed away creeping back in. I took the bottle of Temazepam, and headed back to the white room. I crawled deep into the cocoon of down blankets and covered myself. I would sleep. I would really sleep.

Suddenly, it was storming. The rain beat down with the intensity of a waterfall and the black night closed in like a pall over me. The night was so thick I could barely see in front of me; there were no stars visible, and the moon’s rays were held captive by the ominous clouds. There was no path to follow. The vines of the wilderness floor kept snagging my feet as I stumbled through the forested overgrowth. Branches clutched and groped at my clothes, leaves slapped at my face. I ran as fast as I could manage, as if some beast was tracking me when I fell to my knees at the brink of a small brook. Somehow, I knew this was my destination. I had made it. Relief enveloped me, as I knelt at the water’s edge. I looked down into the water, just as the moon escaped the cloud cover and shown down upon me. I was face to face with a reflection of myself looking back at me, but this was a much younger me....