Claustrophobia

By Jia Zhang

Part I : Poison Apple

Her breathing was fast, haunting—but it was nothing but an insignificant echo, as the world raged outside of her sanctuary. There were sounds of sirens, the voices of people, shouting and crying, and the gunshot that can be heard across the world. She willed her monochrome and pained body, turning her head just a little for her eyes to gaze out at the pitch-black night sky. She hoped to see stars, to be comforted by their serene magnificence, like so many poets did before her. But the lights of her wild and urban city took away whatever hope that was left in her.

Outside, she could hear yelling. Glass smashed and broke, sprinkling into a thousand pieces on the floor. She’d have to pick those up in the morning. The door slammed, and she knew someone was gone, but she didn’t know whom. Her entire body ached—she felt bruised and battered, but no body touched her at all. She was so tired, so weak against this pressure that seemed to crush her will.

She was so tired of this.

Tired of being unwanted.

Of being forgotten.

Of being alone.

She hated that feeling of being stuck inside a box, and the air was getting less and less, and she was finding it so much harder to breath. Her mind was in chaos, as was the world she lived in. She often wondered what was the point of this endless struggle.

Like so many before her, she was forgotten by our society of Duality, left alone to cry in the corners. At school, at work, around friends, and even family, she’d lie and lie and lie…to make it seem as if everything was all right, that everything was perfect. To those standing outside of her glass box, her life seemed so utterly ordinary—nothing unusual. She was never a problem child.

She kept wearing that mask, and she didn’t know how to take it off.

But it didn’t matter. They didn’t care. All they cared about was the outside, and as long as it looked nice, nothing else mattered. That was the point wasn’t it—to fit into that cold clay mold, to become another statistic in their census of normality. But she hated that, their expectations and predictions. She wanted to call out, for someone to care, for someone to love her.

But she was so utterly alone.

And she constantly told herself, “This was just a phase…it’ll all go away by tomorrow…the hurting will stop…”

Everyone goes through it.

It’s normal.

But she knew it wasn’t normal, to feel such pain, when she wasn’t physically hurt at all. She wondered what was wrong, why she was such an obscurity. She wanted to end that chaos, to stop the hurting. To stop the expectations, the mistakes, the dreams that lay in ruins before they were even built. She wanted to end the suffering, which she knew no cause to, simply that it hurt too much to comprehend anymore.

Her body weak and throbbing, she reached over to her bedside and took another white pill, carefully putting it in her mouth. Drink, and swallow, she told herself. Another one. Drink and swallow. Another one. Drink and swallow.

Lessen the pain, lessen the ache, lessen all sensation.

It was so nice to be numb, she thought.

And all those pretty colours flowed into her. The sky above her bed was becoming a vast stretch of white and blue. She smiled and closed her eyes, and fell asleep to her own music, and the soft numbness that surrounded her. And for an Eternity, she finally felt relieved.

Author’s Note

Poison Apple is the first chapter in a short serial I am working on, entitled Claustrophobia. This serial is all basically “in the moment” one-shot drabbles based on some note of reality. Claustrophobia is probably my most personal work, because it is based partially on my personal experience, and that of people whom I’ve met. Each short-story falls into the lives of very regular people, unnamed and unmasked, and follows their struggle to find some solace in life in a moment of desperation.

I don’t intend for this to be so cliché, though some of it may end up being. I’d simply like to express what I’ve learned, what I’ve felt, and what the rest of the world may feel as well—because after all, no one is perfect, and all of us has to deal with our own issues. As you may have noticed, Poison Apple, the most vague out of all the drabbles, deals with drug use/abuse. I only just highlight the actual act, but it’s the emotion the user feels that I am trying to convey. I hope it has come through.

Some chapters of Claustrophobia may have some subject matter that is not suitable for all readers. Discretion is highly advised.