Twisted

Have you ever taken playdough and rolled it in your hand until it stretched out? Like for when you were trying to make a little snake or something. So then maybe you put two little dots of green playdoughs for the eyes. Maybe blue. But you know, it took a few tries because if you rolled the strip of dough wrong, the ends would flip around and tear apart on either side of your hand. So maybe then you just connected the two halves and smushed them back together, and then set it on the table and to roll it again with two hands, covering more area. But there was still that one little bit that would extend too far from your hand and bend up, wasn't there? Spinning and twisting itself every time it knocked back onto the table before you reached out and flattened it to make it even.

Remember that?

There's this wonderful stage of depression where, no matter what it is, there's always an excuse to not fulfill the daily obligations of a happy, healthy human being in favor of remaining a miserable mess of a person.. This can happen in any stage of depression, and it comes and goes over and over. It's a mindless, dark feeling that swallows every urge or desire to do anything. It goes beyond mere excuse making. Like, the university is one five-minute subway ride away. The subway itself is only a mere half-block away from my house. My first class is at one pm. I sleep in past noon. So now it's one o'clock already, and I'm late nonetheless, standing next to a black homeless man with no legs asleep in a wheelchair near the metro map.

If I take the next subway to class, then I'll be fifteen minutes late. It's not a crime, but it's a simple excuse to make that I don't need to be that one shithead that shows up fifteen minutes late. So, that's my reason for not actually going, see? As for why I was late waking up, well, I was tired, and that's another excuse when you're depressed, because sleeping is the easiest way to not have to exist.

Doing things halfway is another part of it. Put forth the effort and work to get halfway there--and then simply back out. Not because you don't think you can do whatever it is you're trying to accomplish, or even that you're afraid of failure. Just take away any reason or motivation for doing it, and then suddenly you wonder why you're doing it in the first place. That's how depression kicks your ass. Apathy. You stop caring about yourself, and then about everything else. You fail to think of any good reason to go out and do anything. Like, I should go to the grocery store proper and buy groceries, but I'll just walk to the corner smoke shop and buy cigarettes instead. They're easier to smoke than food is to eat. I should call my girlfriend back too, but I'll wait until she comes over and sees me, saying she's just "swinging by" when I really know she's just checking in to make sure I haven't done anything to myself. Also, I should pay the electric bill, but I'll wait until I get the shut-off notice before taking the little time from my empty and useless day to just get on the computer and type in my card number. It's that simple, and still I put it off.

Then it's the smaller stuff. It's easier to stare at the ground than to make eye contact. Nodding and shaking your head is easier than talking, and when talking, it's easier to be sarcastic and bitter than to take anything seriously. It makes my world go round. Issues are easier dealt with when held at arm's length with a healthy dose of backhanded humor.

Are you taking your medicine? "I haven't tried killing myself again, have I?"
You know we just want you to be happy. "Oh, I know, so do I. And Jesus, apparently."
I know you need your space, but I just wish you'd call more often. I care about you. "I know, but I just get distracted. I'd forget my own head, yanno?"

Just exist. Just breathe. Just the basic motor functions mixed in with some self deprecating humor to remind myself that I'm not normal, but Christ I wish I could be. But if I can laugh, then people think I'm doing halfway okay. And if I can do that much, then maybe I could stop being such a goddamned burden to everyone.

Just smile. It was, after all, and improvement for me anyhow.

So. I'm staring straight ahead because that's easy. I'm waiting for a train that I won't board. Any other time, and I wouldn't care to remember who was around me. But this is that one time. I remember every second of it. I remember him.

The man in front of me has a red backpack on and a laptop case hung loose on his right shoulder. Sporty earphones loop around the back of his head. Black shoes. White shirt. Brown slacks. He's the day warrior. Yuppie or student teacher, maybe. He's standing right on the yellow line like any law abiding citizen would. Now, he didn't know it. I didn't know it. But he was dead. He was dead the moment he woke up and walked out the front door.

The guy who tries to steal his laptop is wearing blue aviators. He also doesn't know shit about stealing bags. He thinks sprinting by and snatching the bag as fast as he can would be the best way to steal a bag, when he should try to act as normal as possible, because it's quick motion and movement that set people off. But no, he doesn't know shit, remember? So when the man with the backpack sees him mid-charge at the last second and jerks around, they ram into each other. The stupid ass in the shades is going so fast that he more or slams the man off the platform, yet he somehow manages to grab hold of the man's laptop bag, yanking him to the ground in the same motion.

They struggle on the edge of the platform. I feel the rush of air being pushed through the subway tunnel from a very fast and very oncoming train. The owner of the laptop nearly falls off the ledge, everything from his ribcage down hanging over. He's held back by the bag's strap tangled around his arm. The thief is already standing, pulling back and yanking out of sheer desperation to not lose what he's almost got. His shades are knocked off, revealing an expression of pure confusion and terror. I can read it all in his eyes as I watch. 'Fuck fuck fuck he won't let go. It's tangled. I've fucked up. I'm screwed. Too late to back out. Is someone calling the cops?'

Somewhere near the end of the struggle, someone screamed TRAIN, so I can only assume that entered his mind-set as well. But his face kept the same, terrified mask of cluelessness as an involuntary manslaughter charge thundered towards them at something like forty miles an hour.

I could only stare with a dumb blank expression. There's no wrong way to watch these incidents. 'Cause see, in any given situation where momentum, inertia, and mass become your worst enemy, the human body, YOUR body, is nothing more than playdough with sticks rolled up inside. You are a thing, not a who. All the self-awareness and triumph of the human mind in the world mean absolute jack-shit when you're face to face with a piece of metal hurtling at you with several metric tons of force.

The train shears into the man's side and drags him down the line, squeezing and rolling his torso against the ledge. People begin to scream and backpedal furiously from the debacle. His hands flail and hit the ground with feeble slaps as he's rolled about halfway down the platform. Every time the gap between the railcars passes, his body bloats up and jerks back down as he's crushed and twisted again and again by the sides of the rail car.

The train finally stops with a hiss and a clatter. It's quiet in the subway.

The man's facing up with his arms flipped behind his back. The backpack, laptop bag, and the thief are nowhere to be seen, and the platform is nearly empty except for me, the homeless guy, and the man sticking up from in between that five inch gap between the train and the platform, squeezed and twisted like a tube of toothpaste. I'm frozen. I'm the absofuckinglute image of numb horror. I'm fascinated and repulsed, but unable to look away nonetheless.

The man in the wheelchair pushes himself forward, his dried knuckles showing through tattered gloves as he mutters through cracked lips. He wheels himself up and then looks down at the man, shaking his head sadly. Spinning around, he waves me over.

"'Ey! You got a cell-phone. Call the poh'lice, man."

I stare down at the man.

"'Ey! Kurt Cobain! Get over here, man."

Oh, nice, hair humor. I don't say anything. I'm in that trembling world far far away, somehow connected to reality by a string of horror, able to see over and over what had happened, yet unable to function otherwise.

Somewhere in the back of my head I heard the guy in the wheelchair call me a 'fuckin' pussy-ass mofo' for making him roll to the payphone. That was easy to ignore. I slowly moved towards the platform, hesitant, as if I was treading on hallowed ground. Someone just died here, I was telling myself. Someone died here, and every time someone crosses the platform to board the next train, they'll walk over the ghost of someone who once lived, fucked, and breathed, like you and me, and then died.

I was just on the verge of grasping this concept when the man in between the train gasped and let out a weak cough, forcing a dribble of blood from his mouth down the sides of his cheeks. I jumped back and tripped onto the ground, petrified and in disbelief. He was still alive. What the christ--he was still alive, yet I knew it was impossible. There was simply no way.

The man huffed, bringing in air as much as he could without his diaphragm. He pushed against the train, not knowing. Not knowing at all how bad it was. He couldn't feel it, I realized, he was that far gone.

"What happened? Why can't I move? Get me out of here, please," he paused and tried to look behind him, "Where's my laptop?"

The homeless man returned and locked the wheels on his chair and dropped himself down, sitting down next to the man as he tucked his loose and frayed pants legs, never used, beneath his body.

"You got caught in between the train, man. It's bad. Real bad."

It was really only then that the trapped man began to look worried, as if it was just occurring to him exactly where he was. A quick glance left. A quick glance right. See the impossibly small gap you're stuck in, but maybe don't see your legs crushed and warped the wrong way right beneath you.

"Sorry, man, but you ain't gonna make it. Everything below your ribcage is twisted and torn. Crushed up man. This train is the only thing keeping you alive. Soon as they push it off, it all gonna come undone. And then you got a minute maybe."

The man didn't say anything.

"When they get here, they gon' ask if there anybody you want to talk to. Anyone nearby who can come see you, if you'd like. I'm sorry but... I seen this before. You just can't feel nothing 'cause you back is broken."

The homeless man spoke plainly and quickly. God, he knew. He'd lived here long enough and he knew and was laying it all out. There's no room for too many questions in the dying breath. The dying man had to know that he was exactly that.

"Is there anything I can do right now man? I got a pillow on my chair."

"N-no... no thank you," he said, staring up into the subway ceiling as he lay back a bit, "Just don't leave. Just... I don't want to be alone."

"I've got all day."

Right there. Right there was my limit. I didn't say anything as I stood, quietly picking my backpack up from the ground as I turned away from the scene. I wasn't sure what was coming over me as I began to turn back. I suddenly wanted the man to be dead. I wished that he'd cracked his head too hard on the concrete, or that he had fallen and been fully hit by the train. Anything, anything but this. I was beginning to feel it. Feel that ancient fear deep within me of life's only finality. We never think about it except during close calls or in passing conversation. But this man, twisted up in a five inch gap, soon to be the latest accident statistic, had begun to see it just as I'd walked away. The concept was coming over him like a penultimate epiphany, and his only request was that he was not alone.

I made it as far as the edge of the station hall before I keeled over the nearest trash can and tried to throw up the cold, sick feeling in my stomach, but I'd had nothing to eat, so I drug up nothing more than a sickly mouthful of stomach acid, burning my sinuses and nose with its rancid stench. I heaved twice more with no effect, coughing as I straightened up and looked around, seeing who all had seen my momentary break down as I wiped my face. No one had, not even the passing officer who joined the macabre gathering against that subway car. I could see the train conductor hovering somberly over the victim, speaking quietly.

I watched for awhile, from almost around the corner. A loiterer to the scene of death. I felt almost as if I had to see this through, to the very end, no matter how revolted I was by it. I wasn't sure why. An officer taped off the entrances to the single platform, giving me a questioning look as he taped off the hall I was standing in. He asked if I'd seen what had happened, and I quietly lied and said that I'd shown up after the fact.

I didn't leave until actual rescue personnel arrived and began assembling aluminum rods into rectangular sections around the accident scene, unfolding dark colored tarps and draping them over to form a semi-private barrier from the rest of the world. My mouth was dry as I walked back the way I came, climbing the set of stairs back to street level, wincing at the sunlight that poured in from the entrance above. The turnstiles leading in were locked and shut down, but the separate exit was open.

I made my way through and was immediately confronted by a blonde haired man with thin glasses, red faced angry as he demanded to know why his morning commute had been shut down, and how he swore to god he was going to jump the gates if they didn't take his metro card. I ignored him, not even wanting to try and satisfy the curiosity of a person who could see, just as well as I, the silently flashing ambulance parked on the curb where two stone faced paramedics sat silently in the back on either side of stretcher, an unzipped body bag draped over it.

I walked the block back the apartment in about ten minutes, slowly putting each foot in front of the other in a strictly mechanical way. When I did get to my front door, I looked up, as if surprised I'd gotten there so soon. I grabbed my keys from my pocket and opened the door in measured movements, stepping inside as it occurred to me that I'd formally skipped that particular class seven times, a full week. My only reaction was to set my bag down by the door, collapse on the folded-down futon in the living room, and look blankly at the ceiling. I felt confused. The train kept coming back. The man, always there and always dying. And over a laptop, no less. I wasn't feeling guilty, exactly, but what I couldn't shake was a sudden sense of worthlessness. A sense of self-waste. I was wasting away for no reason. My life felt stretched thin and thinner, but I didn't know why. It was so goddamn stupid. I just wanted it fixed, gone, cut from me, this part that refused to let the light in.

Unthinking, I stood up and went to the kitchen, idly opening the fridge for no reason at all. Ketchup. An empty case of soda. I closed it and went to my room, where a computer sat shut down on the desk in the corner. I turned it on and went back to the living room, stepping over dirty clothes on the ground, but then almost immediately turned back and picked them all up. I suddenly felt like I had to be doing something. I tossed the clothes in a pile next to the front door and scoured the house in a frenzy, finding every conceivable spot where I might have undressed and tossed something aside. Socks underneath the couch. Stained jacket in a forgotten closet. Boxers on the floor of the bathroom. All of them went into the pile next to the door, and when it was done, the pile of laundry came up to my knees.

Well, I'd done something.

I stared at the bits and ends of clothes for a moment, trying to find significance. Was this it? Pick up a few clothes? Was this supposed to really make it better? Change anything? I didn't know. I shook my head and went back to my room and sat down at the computer and paid what needed to be paid. From there I checked what emails needed to be checked. Numerous messages from professors. Even a few from family and a vague classmate or two.

I briefly replied to a few of them before I left the computer, leaving open the browser tabs that held the most relevant things. I walked up to the window of my room and looked out, down to the streets. People walking back from late lunches. Cars trundling down the road around them. The lights on the corner crawling from green, to yellow, to red. On and on. I looked over to the desk and grabbed my cigarettes. Only one left, so I pulled it out and threw the box back onto the table. I lit the cigarette and burned through it, vaguely wondering nothing at all. No epiphany. No realization. No revelation. Just existence.

After a few minutes, I went back to the living room and picked up my phone, checking the fridge one last time. I left the apartment again and walked down the block again, stopping at a crosswalk. I waited patiently. When the red hand disappeared, I carefully looked both ways and crossed the street.