Prose

What You Need to Know about Depression

/ Katrina Kaye

Katrina Kaye

You need to know that the sun does not guarantee a good day and the promise of a friend and cold beer will not always be enough to lure me from my self-made cave.

There are nights so black I cannot catch my own breathe.

You need to know often there are no words.

Sometimes when I hug another person, I hold on too long. I can’t help it.

Bricks have formed from the days when the rain turned my collection of masks and cynical remarks to mud. I have built a wall so high it is near impossible to scale. It is impossible to escape.

This morning, after running four miles, I stopped to catch my breath and began to sob without provocation.

You need to know I cannot control this.

You need to know the drugs have saved my life. They do not make me emotionless or hopelessly stoned. They do not turn me zombie. The pain still pulses. The sorrow is still present. The drugs make life possible, but they do not take the sadness. Nothing ever will. I live my life beside it.

You don’t need to know about the variety of medications that I take or the ritualistic therapies that provide me comfort. You don’t need to know that something as simple as a hot bath can save my life. You don’t need to know how simple compliments can leave me feeling sour and used. You don’t need to know that a certain song at a certain time can change my entire being.

Sometimes I set fire to bridges because feeling the flames is the only thing that warms my veins.

You need to know I love stronger than a grip on bridle. That even though few have been invited inside, those who have will never be forgotten. They will leave a birthmark singed on my soul remaining long after they tire of my moods. I will not forget their kindness.

I love unconditionally. How can I see anything but the beauty in others when I am this?

I hold onto things, people, journals, pens, regret, anger, rebellion, too long. I do not accept the wear and rot of these precious things.

It is not easy to let things go.

I need you to know, you are not the first rope thrown into my grasp. But I have never been able to grip and climb, one hand over another. I merely have the strength to hold on.

I feel so alone sometimes the world erupts into a perfect understanding, only to dissipate with the tick of the clock.

You need to know that I am grateful. That I do not cherish or desire this selfishness. I want only to give, so I do. I give until I am left with nothing. I often feel as though I have, I am, nothing.

This happens every day. There is no cure.

You need to know I am not asking to be fixed.

I am not asking for anything.

I am merely surviving.

I make no promises, no commitments. I can say only that I will try.

“What You Need to Know about Depression” is previously published in Light as a Feather First Edition (2014).

Scars

/ Katrina Kaye / 1 Comment

Katrina Kaye

One of my students asks me if I used to cut myself.

This is not a usual conversation, but then we do not have a usual relationship. She thinks I saved her life.

I tell her, I did, sometimes, but more often I would muff cigarettes out on my thighs.

She didn’t know I smoked.

“For fifteen years,” I tell her. “But I haven’t done it for over three years now.”

The cigarettes or the burning?

I smile at her. She decides on the answer herself. She’s a smart girl.

You must have started young.

I nod and look at the bracelets covering her wrists. Her long sleeves in the spring time. I wish I had a cigarette now, wish I knew what to say, or what answers would help this girl. There is no manual, no instruction, no class, to truly prepare a teacher for the reality of human connection.

Did they scar?

“I have a few.” I hike up my skirt a bit and show her a constellation of circular scars across my right thigh. “They are all pretty faded,” I assure her.

She nods as I lower my skirt. She is silent.

“Yours will fade too,” I say. I never had a conversation like this before. It is terrifyingly honest. I never had the guts to ask anyone the questions she asks me, but I am so familiar with the look in her eye, with the stutter in her throat, the way she seems to shiver through her skin.

“They will heal. In years, people won’t see them. There are creams to reduce the scarring.”

She asks me what kind and I scrawl a few names on a list for her. She glances at it and shoves it in her pocket.

“Alice,” I say. “I don’t do it anymore.”

I know. She gives me her signature shy smile. I don’t either.

She gives me a hug. She seems like a girl who doesn’t receive a lot of hugs.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

I smile at her although I recognize sadness behind her eyes. I feel empathy swelling behind my own. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She ducks her head, offers a half wave, and slips out the door.

I lean back at my desk, let a hand linger over the scars on upper thigh. I can’t remember the last time I wanted a cigarette so bad.

“Scars” is previously published in Electric Monarch Monthly (2016).

Swear

/ Katrina Kaye

Katrina K Guarascio

She swears there’s a constellation in the shape of a butterfly cresting the corners of the moon. She also swears she’ll pick you up at two and she will take you to the zoo. You wear the pink dress she bought you and lace up your new shoes. Can’t wait for her playful scold: “Tennis shoes with a dress? Oh baby, how does your father let you leave the house.”

She says, we’ll stand like flamingos and get chocolate dipped ice cream. She tells you to remember your sun screen. She calls at 2:30, says she is running late, got a flat, but don’t worry, those sea lions slap their hands all day long.

She used to tell you there were butterflies in your hair and pretend to catch them before dancing a shiny wrapped candy before your eyes. She had the most beautiful smile. You couldn’t wait to see all those white teeth, to feel her hand stroke your hair like a well fed cat.

Dad tells you to come inside and eat lunch, but you stomp your stubborn feet and say you’re holding out for ice cream cones and caramel corn.

She used to warn you about telling lies and pulling the wings off of butterflies. Don’t destroy beautiful things: like truth, like paper.

You dig your toe into the dirt and pretend not to hear the telephone. You pretend not to hear your father’s huff and exasperated sigh, pretend not hear his sharp tone: “She’s sitting outside waiting for you,” waiting, waiting, waiting for you.

You stare intently at little white butterflies swarming the lemon bush. You haven’t smiled in hours.

She told you once, when she was braiding your hair, that the sun wasn’t really setting, it wasn’t really going anywhere; we were the once spinning and we were the ones always moving. Sometimes so fast, it is hard to see faces clearly, like the flap of a butterflies wing. Sometimes we had to be pinned down, held under glass, sprawled and fixed to keep still, to be watched.

You told her butterflies are prettier when they are flying and she agreed.

You’re cold now. Father sweeps you up from the concrete steps. You rub your face with a sleep fist, too tired to admit you’re hungry.

“Princess, time for bed.”

You croak a stubborn, “No,” but your body rolls easily into his arms, knees to chest.

It is not the first night he put you to bed still wearing pink laced tennis shoes. You pretend not to hear him when he mutters under his breath, “I swear, this will be the last time.”

“Swear” is previously published in Cloudy Quarterly (2017).