The screaming!

Oh, the screaming!

It was coming from everywhere, and nowhere. “No one else can hear it!?” She thought to herself as she looked around the café bewildered. The café was quiet with the murmur of private conversations over coffee and pastry and the peaceful chirping of birds floating through the breeze as it rustled the leaves overhead. But there was a constant angry scream ringing in her ears and increasing to a deafening volume. She clapped her hands to her ears trying to block out the sound dropping her coffee, disposable cup separating from its lid and spilling steaming liquid over the ground. But still the screaming increased in volume. Even as painful as the sound was, she couldn’t help but notice how familiar the voice was.

The voice continued to get louder even as she struggled to identify it. She dropped to her knees, beginning to draw the attention of the other patrons. “The decibel level must already be at damaging levels” she thought as she began to involuntarily scream in reaction to the pain springing from her ears. As she heard her voice mingle with the screaming voice, she was struck by the realization that it was her own voice. Just at that moment, either from the realization or the pain, she collapsed, unconscious.

Silence! The loudest silence you’ve ever heard. So oppressive that she couldn’t even hear her own breath. “Am I breathing?” she questioned and held the inside of her wrist to her mouth. Sensing the telltale movement of air across her skin she was sufficiently convinced that she was indeed breathing.

It was so dark. “Where am I?” she questioned quietly to no one in particular, and not expecting an answer. She stood quietly letting her eyes adjust to the dim light. Chairs and tables became visible, cobblestone patio under foot, a short, wrought iron fence surrounding the patio, and nothing but blackness beyond. “We’re in your mind” a voice finally answered. This voice made the hair on her arms stand on end. It was childlike and old simultaneously, like listening to many people speak in unison. She spun around on her heels to face the eerie voice.

There was a person sitting at one of the tables. Their pose was relaxed but guarded, confident and somehow also meek. They looked like they were in flux, features changing like a flickering candle, no one face staying visible long enough for recognition. Her breath caught in her throat at what she was seeing. She stood there looking at the person sitting in front of her, aghast of what she was witnessing. Not thinking, not feeling, maybe not even breathing. As she finally came back to herself, she was able to pose the question.

“Who are you” she finally blurted out. The person regarded her like they were trying to determine the usefulness of this direction of conversation, the flickering of features slowing slightly with contemplation. “I,” They began, “am you. And who are you?” “I am me.” She replied.

They regarded each other with cautious curiosity. “How are you me?” she asked, still confused. They straightened up slightly as they prepared to answer. “I am every version of you, lived, imagined, unrealized, and suppressed… all at the same time.” The flux of features slowed as they spoke, taking on the faces and voices of each person as they were listed.

“The child that didn’t lose their best friend. The child who expressed what they felt even without the language to communicate it. The teen who wasn’t bullied, who was good at sports, didn’t struggle with their confidence and wasn’t denied therapy. The graduate who was allowed to enroll in their first choice of college, or the one who graduated as a radiology tech. The young adult who wasn’t shamed by their father and was accepted for who they were. The adult who followed their heart and didn’t listen to the lies their rational brain told them. The mother of none. The mother of many. The grandmother. The widow. The spinster.”

With each variation of herself listed she saw her face, heard her voice, and felt the emotions. With each possible alternative to the life lived, the message became more and more clear. There was an aspect of herself present in each version, like a thread that tied them to each other. A common link that she had all but severed, burying it deep under shame and refusal to accept, in an attempt to silence the truth that she knew, but only in the dreams that she didn’t dare share with anyone. And then she saw herself exactly as they saw her, heard her subconscious mind speak through the mirror image of herself.

“You’ve buried your truth for too long.” They began as they rose from the chair, moving silently towards her. “The pressure has become too much to contain” they continued now standing directly in front of her, not an arm’s length away. She suddenly became aware of a pain developing in her skull. Not the pain in her ears from before. This pain was deep and pulsing. Her vision swam as the pain intensified, her legs buckled, and she fell forward into them. They gently lowered her to the ground, resting her head on their crossed legs. She looked up at the ever-changing face, not seeing, just focusing on controlling the pain, even though she was failing.

She did not notice that the previously dim light that had filled this place was gradually increasing, like the early morning twilight transforming into sunrise. As the light increased, they started to fade. They put their hands on either side of her head, and she knew that they were merging with her. Not to possess, but to become one with her. She found some amount of peace in this notion. The idea that her infinite selves would be one with her, offering guidance and experience to her everyday life. She felt the warmth spreading down through her body offering comfort and connection.

As her vision began to focus again, she became aware of figures moving around her. There was a steady beep making itself known in the peripherals of her senses. The astringent smell of cleaning products, the shuffle of feet of people around her, quiet murmurs of hushed conversation, but no wind in leaves and no bird song like there had been in the café. Eventually she became aware that she was lying in a hospital bed. She had been here for a month after having a stroke that caused her to collapse at the café, the attending nurse explained. She nodded in understanding. She understood more than what the nurse was explaining… that, was the pressure they were talking about.

The stress of buried truth forced into stillness, no longer able to be silenced. Truth forced into the light of her consciousness. The winds of change were stirring. Recovery would be intense, but not as intense as the changes that truth would bring. That which had been buried for so long, was no longer quiet. It never really was, but now it was humming through her like the low buzz of an infinite number of voices.