Lately when I’ve felt trapped at home I have been going out for walks. I used to try and time it to make my housemates think I had a social life, but now I’ve started walking at strange times. It’s a pretty lame way to attract attention to yourself, but I can’t ask for help directly. I’ve stopped actively isolating myself for the most part, but I just can’t come out and say what I’m going through.
Last night I slept in the back seat of my car. After I’d been drinking (not heavily) I decided instead of walking I should drive. I’d cover more ground that way and would therefore feel less depressed at the end of it – or I would just end up a long way from home.
Thankfully I came to my senses enough to realise that drink driving on a Friday night isn’t the best thing to do so I crawled into the back seat and tried to sleep. After I got there I really wish I’d taken a bottle of scotch with me, but I didn’t want to go back into the house in case one of my house mates asked me what I was doing. In the morning I walked down to the beach in bare feet. It takes about an hour to walk there (for me anyway, when I’m doing my little depression shuffle). My feet felt a little sore on the way there but I figured it was just the cold.
After sitting on the beach for about an hour I started to wonder what I expected to find there. I guess I was hoping somebody out of the goodness of their heart would sit down and ask why I was crying. But the beach is a very posey place, and nobody really wants to notice the guy wearing jeans and a jumper sitting 100m away from everybody else. There was a group of kids surfing down there and one of them got into trouble and had to be rescued. Don’t know the full story, but an ambulance came about half an hour later. That seems important, and I know I should have felt something about that. I’m pretty sure the kid didn’t die anyway.
Up until three months ago I haven’t really felt any emotions. Even now I don’t quite know what to make of some kid I don’t know drowning. The only emotion that sticks out is loneliness.
On the walk back home my feet started to hurt more. It took me an hour and a half on the way back. I managed to sneak into the house while one of my housemates was in her room (the other one was out). I’m pretty sure she heard me come in, but she didn’t call out or even poke her head in my room. She just carried out doing her washing and getting ready to go out.
Later this afternoon they will both be home. They are both going out to a masquerade party and are spending the day buying masks and getting their hair done. I’m pretty sure they have bought dresses especially for it, and they will be very chatty with one another before the party. The house is pretty echoey so I’m going to cop every word no matter where I am.
I’d like to hide. Grab a bottle of scotch and walk to a park somewhere and wait until around eight and they have both gone out. But I can’t. My feet are swollen from my walk to the beach and I can barely stand. I’ve got large blisters on both my heels and the balls of my feet are red raw on one side and the skin is flaking off on the other side. I’d like to take the scotch to the back seat of my car, but it occurs to me that this is the perfect time to attract attention to myself. That’s selfish and I hate myself for dumping my depression in the middle of other people’s lives. That’s a cheap thing to do and I’m an arsehole for wanting to do it.
No. I’ve decided to stay home. I will be home when they get back. I will answer them if they ask where I was last night. I will pour my heart out to them if they don’t freak out when I burst into tears.
Provided of course, that one of them bothers to knock on my bedroom door.
