Part 38: James
The night was ruined. It was horrible, unbearable, unfair. He had already done this. He had already been through the hell of the day - or the purgatory, at least - and this was supposed to be his reward: this long, unbroken stretch of time where they would finally get around to talking about everything. An image of some kind arose in James’s mind involuntarily: a small, amoeba-like cartoon character wailing, “There was time now!” From TV - his mind was poisoned - but that was exactly how it felt. But on the show it was supposed to be funny, wasn’t it? Laughing at the torture of a small, pathetic, worthless creature. That was what TV was all about.
As he continued to click through profiles, no longer even reading them, he felt the same feeling he had felt on the swings resurface. But it was worse now - because he didn’t have the sky and the school and his shadow on the parking lot to look at; because he had already felt it earlier; because there was no hope of talking to Hannah about it; because he couldn’t cry, not with his mom and sister sitting in the same room.
Could he have cried if he wanted to? If he let himself?
xx themachine: do you ever wonder if
xx themachine: you could pee your pants
xx themachine: like at this age
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: lmao of course i could
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: if i wanted to
xx themachine : i dont know if i could
xx themachine: like my brain might not let me
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: have you tried?
xx themachine: kinda haha
xx themachine: but it’s like that thing where
xx themachine: you could bite off your finger
xx themachine:it’s just like biting a baby carrot
xx themachine: but your brain won’t let you do it
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: LMAO BABY CARROT!
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: i could bite off my finger though
XXxSuicidesxGracexXX: i just don’t want to
Remembering old conversations with Hannah was more fun than actually talking to anyone else. No one else would get such joy from the phrase “baby carrot”; no one else could make him see everything so differently. Of course you could bite off your finger. Or Hannah could, at least. But it was also a form of torture. It made him think of all the conversations they could be having right now, if it weren’t for Hannah’s fucking mom and her fucking drinking. He cast a glance at his own mom, basking in the glow of the TV, and thought, well at least her poison doesn’t hurt anyone.
James thought of the guy they had learned about during their Mythology unit in English, the guy who could see food dangling above him but every time he reached for it, it went away. That was him. What was his name again? Finding his name was suddenly incredibly important: it would give him a name for his pain, a tiny bit of relief. He opened up the search engine and typed in every variation he could think of: mythology guy who can’t reach food; greek mythology starving guy; food drink mythology man. His hands flew over the keyboard, slammed the enter button each time.
“Easy,” commented his mom from the couch.
James didn’t respond or look up, just kept searching.
Finally he found the name he was looking for. Tantalus. I am Tantalus, he thought. I feel like Tantalus. I am just like Tantalus. Tonight I am Tantalus.
His goal achieved, he closed the window. His conversation with Hannah was still up, the fruit (an apple?) just out of his reach. For lack of anything else to do, he went back and read through it again. He had been so happy then, so full of hope. It was like watching an old home movie of yourself as a child, when all you can think is: how can that be me? He reached the end - no, not the end, the place where it had been artificially cut off, like a song when your headphones get yanked out, or like a pure, innocent child gunned down in some act of gang violence - and wished for some way, any way to keep that little spark alive.