YESTERDAY and TODAY by Addison Oliver
“Today”
Today I put a bottle’s worth of anti-depressants in my mouth, thinking I might swallow them. I let them sit there for several seconds, cold on my tongue, and then I spit them into my palm. I did it again—put them in, let them sit, spit them out—and then a third time. They stuck together from saliva. I was afraid; I was gearing myself up; even this, I couldn’t accomplish. I imagined swallowing them, quite suddenly—do it!—the little slide over my tongue and the momentary bulge in my throat. But each time I imagined swallowing them, I became more afraid and dismally hoped I would fail.
I was alone in a room I didn’t like. A small, crowded room in which the bed filled up the interior. I sat on the edge of that bed. There was a mirror in front of me, and I saw my reflection: fragile, pitiful, my hair in tangles but my eyes made up in crimson and black. My best feature I’ve been told—my eyes, the speckled gold green of the irises. My reflection was tarnished by a dark, blotted mirror, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t there to look at myself.
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