Word Venting

The following is a story I wrote to help deal with my depression. It doesn't really make sense, but I like to believe in the idea that we can help to fix ourselves, perhaps with a little bit of inspiration. It includes notes on why I write some of the things that I did and some random thoughts and beliefs. It was originally submitted as a piece of coursework for my degree which is why some of the notes may reference a class. Like I said, it was really just a way of me trying to work out what was going on with me at the time. Thanks. 

I don’t know what time it was when I woke up. I didn’t care. I cringed when I saw the laptop sitting at the end of my bed still. Without really thinking I kicked it off. Did it break? Don’t know - don’t care. The only thing I really knew was that I didn’t want to see the world today. I ducked my head under the duvet and took deep breaths. Soon the air was hot and clammy but I ignored it and drifted off back to a heavy sleep.(1)

***

I found the note at the edge of one of the million seas. It washed up on the golden beach inches away from my feet. I picked it up. It was an old Pepsi bottle, worn by the salt water, a tiny paper note shut inside. I fished it out and unfolded it.

Help.

The writing was big, messy, childish, and above all very human. The humans were some of the most complicated to fix – too fragile – too insecure. Still, out of all the entities and species I had come across they were one of the most fascinating. I have many names - a millennia’s worth of symbols and sounds that have been used to try and define me. I don't go by anything often but in the rare occasion I do interact, I go by Dromon. I know everything - I'd say it was my job to bit it's more than that - it's my very existence - my purpose. I was born of the information - right at the beginning when there but a few mega strands across the dimensions. But I fed them - I looked after them - rearranged and conquered them. Though not all alone. I cannot create. The one thing I cannot do is invent. That's what the minds are for. The minds of the countless amounts of beings spread out across everything - they create. I help to look after them too – I know the things they know, but are not aware that they know. I help them see what they need to see what their hearts and minds need to face. Sometimes they see me, though they’re never aware that they do. I am just a face - a misted passing presence – most of the time. There were occasions like this one, ones where I was compelled to intervene. It would hurt me not to - for what was a cosmos that did not grow – did not change. The thought was unfathomable. I arrived instantly.                                                                    

Everyone’s minds are different. They manifest in an infinite amount of ways and are always changing. A mind is not static; it bends into whatever its master wants it to be. This mind however looked like a house. It was tall, red brick with a garden and would have been pretty had it not looked so run down and derelict. The front gate, tall black and made of iron was rusted and screamed at me as I pushed it open. There was no light in this place, just an odd grey hue. I could still see everything – the whole place just lacked imagination, just lacked any sort of, life.

The door swung on its hinges. Never a good sign. Any signs that the mind had been broken into were bad – it could mean damage or leakage neither of which were desirable. I stepped in silently – not wanting to awaken what may still be dwelling in the dark – at least not until I knew what I was dealing with.  Behind the door was a long corridor, with six more doors lining the walls. l knew I had to be careful.

I knew I had to step into each one. In my opinion the outer layers were always the worst. These were where the big Fears lived. Sometimes you came across the Hopes first, if a mind was prominently optimistic the Hopes would be on the surface, the Fears hidden deep somewhere they could be forgotten about or ignored. It wasn’t necessarily bad that the Fears where first, but there was a certain chill to the air that told me something was wrong, and it had been for a while now.  Now, I don’t have any fear for myself, I don’t need to, but the fears of others are projected onto me, so I have complete understanding. This was the part I hated most. I had to search the rooms. More often than not mind cogs would become stuck in them, unable to escape their nightmares. The cogs were the living components of the mind, each representing and controlling their own element of the consciousness. One for love, one for dedication, one for loyalty etc - all adding up and recreating the ultimate personality. When these cogs become stuck or damaged the mind begins to fall apart. I couldn't let that happen.

I opened the first door.

A young woman sat at a vanity table. Her long blonde hair in perfected curls down her back. I knocked on the open door.

Hello ?

She turned on the chair to face me. Her big bright blue eyes made up perfectly, with great long eyelashes that framed them like a picture. Her lips were a scarlet red, a red that dripped down her chin and stained the top of a sweetheart white gown. She smiled and more red dripped. In her hands she held several little pearl like objects. Teeth.

Hello, I’m Belle, who are you?

She continued to smile at me, picking up a molar and ramming it into her mouth repeatedly until finally it dangled crookedly and backwards at the front.

Dromon. What are you doing ?

She paused and looked at me – her bleeding and gummy mouth open in a state of shock at my apparently stupid question.

Making myself beautiful.

And when will you be beautiful?

She turned back to the mirror and stared at herself.

When I am perfect.

I nodded.

And that will be when?

She sighed and looked back at me again.

Never.

I found myself back outside in the corridor. I’d come across many rooms like this before and they were honestly the hardest to fix, though in this case I didn't think this room was very important. Girls will always be self-conscious.

The next door was tall, old and wooden. There was a big old key in the lock and a handle that was stiff to turn. The door creaked as it slowly swung open.

It was night. The air was thick with sweat. I was in a car park, encased by tall metal chain fences. I was alone. My footsteps echoed, the sound bouncing off of ancient cars, most of them rusted and burnt out. I heard her at first. A scream from what sounded like a few streets away, I didn't go towards it though, I knew she would find me on her own.

She ran towards me, unsteady on her feet I caught her. Her body shook – electrified by fear, it had blinded her, encased her. This one could be tricky.

What is your name?

Maud.

What do you need to do Maud?

What do you mean? Please, help me, they’re coming. We have to go.

Who’s coming?

The dead! I run – But they don’t stop,

Have you faced them?

No. No I can’t – they’ll rip me apart – please we have to go.

Face your fears Maud.

I’m not strong enough.

But you are strong Maud. You’ve just forgotten. No one is born weak. They can’t hurt you - Not if you don’t let them.

But I don’t know how!

 She pleaded with me, the panic rising in her throat. She turned and I could see behind her what she had been running from. This would not be fun.

If I can do it so can you.

 I stood firm, fear making we want to run but my determination compelled me to stay. I could feel Maud’s fear and it was strong, but not as strong as I knew she was. I waited until they found me. She tried to drag me away but before they got too close she ran off to temporary safety. The slow shuffle of their footsteps made them seem somehow more sinister. I could smell the fierce rotting flesh and hear the hungry groans and ignored every instinct that ran through my body. I wouldn’t let her be beaten. I had to show Maud. These weren’t new creatures to me. They were common which by no means made them less terrifying. They represented passiveness, loneliness, a world of darkness and death. And they were completely petrifying. Undead hands grabbed at my clothes, I wriggled and writhed but found that I had no place to go. The gnashing teeth surrounded me, broken and blood stained, flecked with picked and peeled skin. I screamed in mortal agony – something I had experienced a thousand times before but somehow stayed still foreign and inexorable. I didn’t know how I was still screaming – my throat had been ripped from my neck but still the sound rang out. I don’t know when I realised I was back in the corridor. The second door was shut and Maud stood over me.

Maud? What happened.

I stood up – all pain left behind the door.

I, I pulled you out. I couldn’t leave you like that.

She looked back behind her at lay a hand against the wood.

I got us through the door.

See, you are strong Maud.

No, no I’m not. Anyone would have done it.

She began ushering me to the door on the far left.

Wait, I have to help the others.

She shook her head.

There are no others. Not anymore. Some are hiding, but the rest… gone.

I’m sorry. Should we try and get Belle?

She scoffed.

No – you don’t need Belle.

Maud opened the door at the far end and held it open for me.

It’s been a while since I’ve been out here.

It was a grand entrance hall. The room itself was massive, with a ceiling so high that I could barely see the door at the top of the giant set of spiral stairs that let up to it.

The walls around me were decorated with thousands of paintings and words in a million different languages. There where dust over all of the glass frames and the wall paper had started to drop from the walls.  A song played on some kind of intercom – though it was stuck and kept playing the same line over and over again. The voice was muffled and I could not hear what it said, but it sounded classical and possibly French. It was beautiful, it truly was a masterpiece. I turned back to see Maud paused at the doorway.

You coming?

She shook her head and pointed across the lobby.

There was a shadow lurking in the corners. I could hear it snarl and growl and even though I knew it couldn’t hurt me it terrified me. It was everywhere. It oozed out of the cracks in the walls, through the gaps in the floor, under the doors and through the windows. There was no escaping it. I’m surprised the mind had lasted this long. I must admit I wasn’t thrilled to find out this was the problem. This was going to be harder then I hoped. The shadows were older then the minds. Some refer to them as the destroyers, and to some extent I suppose they are but I prefer to call them the idlers. It wasn’t so much they ransacked it was more like they paused – like a black hole sucking everything in, making time move slower and slower until everything stood still and eventually – began to crumble away. They were like rot – and once they set in they were hard to get rid of. They turned you against yourself, confusing you until you attacked. Like a confused snake that bites its own tail and begins to eat itself and by the time it realises it’s too late, its muscles have grab of its body and it can’t let go. With outside help they can be saved – sometimes.

I didn’t look back at Maud as I started my assent. The stairs were steeper than I first anticipated and although I could tell I was making progress, it was a lot slower than it should have been. It was like running up a going down escalator – you were moving but slowly and with a lot of effort. It seemed like a lifetime until I reached the door. I knocked but no one answered. I gave it a push but predictably it was locked on the inside.

I could hear voices, mumbling from behind. I pushed against the door but it did not budge.

 I turned to see Maud following me up the stairs. Her face was red with determination, her shaking subsiding but leaving her with an awkward twitch now and then.

What are you doing here Maud?

Trying to be strong

She looked over her shoulder frequently at the smoke and shadows, they seemed to sense her presence and shook and swelled with some kind of sick glee. She paused for a moment and then stuck up her middle finger to it. Oh the humans where amusing.

She knocked on the door.

It’s me.

***

I struggled out of bed and stood up in front of the mirror. My hair needed washing, in fact all of me did really. No matter how much I slept the dark circles under my eyes kept growing. It didn’t matter though – I didn’t intend on seeing anyone today. There were some messages on my phone and I did my best to reply to them – but found that I was incapable of forming worthwhile sentences. For a second I considered opening the curtains but pushed the thought away. In the end I just crawled back into bed and thought of nothing.

***

I could hear the bolts tug open on the door, there were more than I would have guessed. This mind was certainly doing her best to keep the shadows out. It was another room, it was dark and absent of any colour. There were heavy curtains draping which could have been windows but I couldn’t move them to be sure. The air was thick and dusty and the whole place smelled putrid. The room was round with no corners. Every now and then it seemed to warp smaller, becoming tighter, like the room itself was taking a deep breath in and forgetting to let go. A girl stood facing the wall. I placed a hand on her shoulder but she did not respond. Her hair was down to her waist but a stark white- limp and thin. I took her hand nothing more than skin or bone. I tried to talk to her but she couldn’t listen. She was an echo now. There was no getting through to her this way. I sighed. It was a shame. By putting up the walls and locking the doors the core had started to decay – too scared to do anything it went to waste, rotting away alone. It was sad but something I had seen many times. I turned to a tiny creature that rocked in the centre of the room. On close inspection I saw it was a child  - a small dirty rag wearing little girl that sobbed dryly her little shoulders heaving through exhausted misery. She shook with fear when she saw me and scrambled away like a feral animal, still I persevered and somehow I managed to pick her up and hold her. I was relieved to find that ever so slightly her cries began to ease, this one could be rescued.

I rocked and shushed her -

Tell me, what’s wrong?

Everything! Everything and nothing at the same time

She looked up at me with empty eyes. Eyes that were blind to the future now, eyes that were drowned with worry and sickening anxiety. I touched her face but it was ice cold.

What will fix this? What will make it better?

She carried on weeping, her hair gradually starting to turn white from the roots. Her eyes were sinking into her skull and her skin became paper thin to touch.  I was losing her.

Listen to me, what do you need that will make you feel better?

I could see her trying to register, trying to understand, but the lack of concentration mixed with the very stress of her being was making it nearly impossible for her.

TELL ME!

I pleaded with her. I took hold of her shoulders and shook her, begging her to help me help her. She could be saved and I would never forget it if I didn’t – I never forget anything.

I just want everything to be okay…

It will be okay! Tell yourself it will, come on now tell yourself.

But it won’t!

I wanted to tell her that I knew it would be, and promise that everything would be fine – but I couldn’t, it was a battle she had to fight herself. Only she could break the hold. It was a rare occasion that I was willing to break the rules to save a mind cog. There was something about her that was so desperate that if I had a heart it would have broken for her.

You have to tell yourself, trust me. Trust in you.

Everything will be okay…

It was nothing more than a whisper, but I heard it. I shook her again, her head lolling exhausted. I wouldn’t let her stop – not now.

And again!

Everything will be okay…

Her pale face began to peak up a bit, she sat up and leaned against me, holding onto my cloak with her little fists. She repeated the words over and over to herself until her eyes began to focus again. She looked up at me, seeing me properly for the first time.

Who are you?

I’ve come to help.

To help?

She looked over to something and I had to focus to see what.

There was a pile of empty bottles clumsily stacked next to a wad of crumbled paper (What I later discovered to be colouring books), the pages ripped out bit by bit. There was a tiny hole in the wall and I could just make out the blue waves of the sea.

You sent the note.

She nodded.

I sent it a while ago, I’ve been trying to send more since but the shadow…

She looked over at the hole fearfully, I watched as a flicker of darkness hid the view of the sea.

He keeps grabbing them before they get free - I’m too scared to try now.

Why are you scared?

Because he freezes us. Or he locks us in the rooms downstairs. He doesn’t stop, he’s always there.

She looked towards the door where Maud stood, crying over the white haired frozen girl.

Did you help Maud get out?

Maud got out herself, I just showed her she could.

She nodded and stood up slowly. I hadn’t noticed in my panic before, but in the middle of the room was what I assumed was a trap door. The core of the mind is nearly always hidden away in a human’s consciousness. Why they are so bent on hiding their true selves from others has always been a mystery – even to me. I was nearly certain that this trap door was the secret entrance to the core. I pulled at it and pulled at it but it was locked. Apparently this mind was even more withholding than most. I studied it for a second – three little key holes lined the middle. I called the child.

What is your name?

Lieu.

How do I open this Lieu?

You don’t-

She held up her hand then, clutching something tightly between her tiny fingertips. It was a small gold key.

We do.

We? Who are the others.

She pointed to Maud and the white haired girl standing against the wall.

Me, Maud and Lavada.

Lavada? And what is she?

She writes and stuff, she paints pictures sometimes though not for a while.

Lieu turned to look at me,

Can you help her? You helped Maud?

I can’t help everyone. I couldn’t help Belle.

No one can help Belle. Could you try though please? We need Lavada. She makes the colours.

I looked back at the frozen girl. I noticed she clutched a paintbrush in her numb hands. So she was the muse - The creative spark. It was the saddest thing to come across a mind that could no longer create, a mind that lacked imagination. Some would say that the human minds main purpose was creation – the thing that takes them above the other creatures of their world.

She likes stories…

Maud had stopped crying at some point. She stepped away from Lavada and stared at me with pleading eyes.

You look like someone with a lot of stories.

I couldn’t not try. Not now. I walked over to her and spoke to her in a lowered tone.

I’ve heard you like stories?

She didn’t respond, though I knew she wouldn’t.

I can tell stories. Stories of weird and wonderful things that you have never seen. I have seen them all. Long long ago, so long ago that there is no term for the amount of eons that have past between now and then. At the beginning – no before the beginning – I was alone – all alone in an empty space. I had no purpose – no reason – just existed- alone in the mega strands of nothingness. But then came the first mind. It wasn’t human and its name is not something that I can say in your language. It was perplexing to me – this mind – this thing that was so intricate and broad. I studied it – became obsessed with it and found the reason of my being. Imagine a hole, a little hole in a tree. It’s empty. Just a space of nothing. Then a spider crawls in and starts to build its web. At first it is but a few wobbly little strands but soon, the whole space is filled with an intricate design of a beautiful woven picture. The web is a home, it is a trap, it is a mystery but most of all it is beautiful. Now imagine for me the strands extending as far as the eye can see, even the tiny ones, the ones that you can barely see. Imagine, even the smallest strands have billions of billions of smaller strands, everything connecting to everything, so complex that your eyes can’t follow or keep up. That is our world.  The minds are the spiders Lavada, they create the strands. Without you, she can’t do it anymore and she has so many parts to add.

I heard a tiny laugh.

She hates spiders.

I looked up into her face. She was still frozen, her hair still white, but she wasn’t facing the wall anymore, not completely anyway.  Her eyes were still open, but there was something behind them now, a spark of some sort, faint but there. She was waking up.

I can tell stories, weird and wonderful and full of colour and light. They never make sense, most of the time you can never understand. But you can tell them too Lavada, you have to try.

I watched as her hand twitched. The paintbrush she was holding jolting in her fingers.

Take it.

I did as I was told and took the brush. Her grip on it was strong – I pulled as hard as I could and was disheartened when the brush snapped between my fingers and surprised when something small clattered to the floor. It was the smallest key I had ever seen and when I picked it up it grew into the same size as Lieu’s. What a creative way to hide it.

I went to hand the key to Maud and Lieu but they shook their heads. Instead they gave me theirs and ushered me in direction of the trap door.

No – you go

Tell her everything will be okay.

I locked the three keys into the grate and pulled. I couldn’t tell how far down the chamber went, but with trusting glances from the girls I jumped in.

I fell for a second and hit a cold floor. Inside the chamber was huge and empty apart from a tiny light right at the back but it was dim and fading.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

Barley a whisper.

I have a message for you, from yourself.

***

I woke to a fierce buzzing on the floor next to me. I scrambled for my phone in a dazed stupor and answered it.

‘Hello?’

‘Oh, thank god! I’ve been trying to ring you for days and you haven’t been answering! I’ve been so worried!’

‘Sorry Mum.’ I said, standing up and opening the curtains a bit, letting in the first bit of sunlight that the room had seen in days. It looked so much bigger and friendly without all of the shadows in the corners.

‘You can’t do this to me again – you’ve been acting so weird lately. Do you want me to come and get you, bring you home for a bit?’

‘No Mum, don’t worry, it’s fine – I’m fine. Everything is going to be okay.’

***

(1)     Something that has been bugging me through this whole module was the idea that ‘the art of writing is detachment from the self.’ Well sorry, but in my opinion no. Firstly and most obviously, this piece was inspired by my own experience and reactions to the outer world and how I think it affected my inner self. So no – I’m very much attached to this piece, secondly, how can you ever detach yourself fully from something you write? Even if you type an apparently random amount of letters on a keyboard in an apparently random order, you can still not fully detach yourself from it. Something inside you told you to push those buttons at those times, even if you don’t believe it. It comes from you so you are involved, even if you don’t want to be. This is a subject I’m sure could easily be debated but as I’m sure you can see there is no real back up logic to anything I say – it’s just my beliefs, and I can’t get more real or honest than that.

(2)     I have always theorised that the inner world is just as broad as the outer and just as connected. My logic? Everything has an opposite, something that is of equal value. Why can’t the inner world exist and be just as amazing as the outer? Information isn’t a physical thing. It isn’t something that the physical world can process, it is the mind. If this is how I imagine the subconscious to be, does that in itself make it real? Is everything we imagine real for us, hidden away in the dark corners of subconscious storage? I think it is, waiting for us to access.

(3)     These are dreams that I have myself. I am very interested in these and thought that including them would add a little more insight into an actual subconscious. I included some research that I did in my journal regarding dream meanings.

(4)     I have included these separate sections flipping to and from the real world because I wanted to show their effect on each other. I wish I could have included more in this piece and showed a deeper and more involved transition and connection. I would have liked to include minuscule details and showed how they could through each other out of balance.

(5)     I didn't want to put the character’s dialogue in speech marks when in the subconscious because I wanted to give off the idea of a more silent connection. In the outer world we hear each other by molecules vibrating but in a world that is not physical I’m sure it would work differently. I tried to imply a more telepathic connection to make it more reasonable.

(6)     Compulsion for self-expression – I speak for myself when I say I write to transfer my inner thoughts into outer thoughts. To be honest, I think everyone must. I am compelled to express myself, even if sometimes I find it difficult.

(7)     I was really struck by the idea of inner conflict. I did study psychology for a few years and have always found it to be fascinating. Everyone has inner conflict. It makes you who you are, even if you don’t know. That’s what amazes me so much, one tiny little incident long ago that you might not even remember can set in motion the building blocks of change and reprogram parts or even your whole personality. I wanted to include different aspects of the mind. I personified them into humanoid characters . Originally they’re where many more, but I did this to show that there are different components to the mind, components which singularly change and are both separate and a part of each other.  I am aware I haven’t worded most of this as well as I could, I have just found it hard to try and articulate all the different ideas that subside in my own inner world.

(8)     I’d just like to add that writing this piece has not only been a joy to write, but very beneficial for my own inner serenity. Recently I have had a lot of my own inner battles, an ongoing journey that I hope will end soon. I would like to tie this whole piece also with writing for therapy. Everything I have included I this piece is very true and personal to my life recently. Having been suffering from depression for just over a year now that has progressively got worse I tried to put into words just how I feel inside in a way that could be relatable but also different. I wanted to go for a sort of post-modern twist because I thought it would tie in more with the whole theme and also found it easier to express myself with that extra bit of flexibility.