Something was slightly off from our daily acquaintance, the air was more humid and Jack felt a saturation in his shoulders. It was Sunday and many people were buying cream cheese and everything bagels. All was calm and subtle, the air was crisp. The teller approached optimistically, and jack was content. Two onions, a stalk of celery, four carrots, thyme, coriander seed, fresh ginger, and a few habaneros in a futile effort to add some "spice" to his life. He passed a woman and her adolescent child, his stomach churned like bananas in a blender. "Relax", he told himself, "it's Sunday, everyone feels fine, I am buying some bagels and condiments like everyone else". He continued to the checkout. A striking boy, handsome and probably nearing seventeen took his order confidently and with enthusiasm. "Hello, Sir. Did you find everything okay today"? Jack did not, he couldn't place the long grain rice or that seaweed paper used for sushi. He knew it was somewhere within the middle isles but paranoia gripped him, the bright lights made him nervous; he looked at the signs above the aisles but was unable to comprehend what they read.
Five years ago Jack was diagnosed (by a recently out-of-the-closet psychologist) with ADHD along with a few other mental complications, which his psychologist said were "probably the result of your attention deficit"... what a load of shit, he thought. What that meant is still foreign to him, although his five year old brother was surely afflicted with the disease, whatever it was. Jack was smart, strange, and keenly aware of what went on around him. The world was a peculiar oyster, and he tried tirelessly to wash away the grit and make sense of this foreign mollusk of brackish origins.
Dr. Looney, as his name comically hinted, was just that: loony. As a psychologist, unable to outright prescribe medication, he recommended drugs for Jack to take, and Jack took these recommendations to his family doctor, who gladly commended. Adderall, Zoloft, Xanax and the like were prescribed with a sickly smile, a nod of the head and no handshake whatsoever. Jack was suspicious. Once home, he immediately researched his medicines. What he found was bewildering. It was a website called zoloftkillsme.com; it was the epicenter of human sadness and the precipice of humanity. Unfulfilled people pouring their pathetic hearts out to complete strangers, although to them "MissSoLonely",with twenty thousand posts was the closest thing to a friend any of these people ever had. Surprisingly, the sexual side affects did bother these people enough to stop taking the drugs. What a horrible curse from the pill deities. These people hate their lives, they're too emotionally debilitated to even talk to their friends, let alone ask somebody on a date. When, after several weeks, the false courage and eerie confidence confided to them allows them to partake in the salsa dance of copulation with the opposite sex, their sexual members fail them and they are left frustrated and hating life once again. I feel for these sad people, maybe because I can see this happening to myself. "For the past ten years, I have been on and off various SSRI's and various other antidepressant medicines. My life is empty. I am 38 and I do not have any children. Since I was a young man, I don't remember going out in public happily. I am constantly nervous and have been taking Zoloft for some years now." Although slightly less anxious, and more amiable, Jack was not himself. He felt more and more like he was doing a horrible impersonation of himself, whoever he was.
At least the stapler was actually red, that he could confirm. Everything else came to him like a bad dream. His brain hurt, he wanted to die. He wanted to find a small comfortable hole to waste away in, but he knew he deserved a dark, cold, jagged confinement that melodically dripped failure onto his forehead: drip, drip, drip, you have failed, drip, drip. This would be hard to do. He had to maintain, stay strong, remain focused. But on what? that was the question. He was always impressed at the way people buzzed about. He envied their lack of consciousness. They were so confident, so happy, so sure, so goddamn unaware! Everything was in place. How could it be? They had no notion of the dark side, how lucky they were. Nonetheless, he pushed on but came off as a narcissist. He artificially held his head up and stuck his chest out. People wondered if he thought he was better than them, however, he knew he was so much less. He would go days without listening to the radio, deep in thought. Then, he would tune in to the city's hip-hop and r&b channel, this also gave him false hope. How were these people so confident, and were they, or as self-conscious as he?
October was approaching, and Jack falsely exuded anticipation for the coming season. However, Jack was, on the inside, deeply afraid. He knew the feeling that he had gotten always around this time of the year. Leaves were dying, trees were baring: a cold desolation far from the warm comfort of the womb. The air was thin, the optimistic mask of summer was fading and everyone knew it although they tried to remain positive. It was like the beginning of a bad mushroom trip when everyone is giddy but aware of the coming doom that would surely destroy them like a hungry beast.
As Jack prepared his morning coffee and his ego for the unavoidable day at the plant, he attempted multitasking because he read somewhere that it's a good thing to do. However, his movements made no logistical sense at all. He tried brushing his teeth while he urinated; but he only ended up soiling his left pant leg and left a puddle in the far corner of the floor. So many things were going through his head, but the value of these thoughts was never quite worth two cents.
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