Archive of Our Own ^beta

I come back and nothing has moved.

They're so used to it by now.

I disappear for days, sometimes even weeks.

Then I come back with a smile like I never left.

They know it by now.

They don't care, it doesn't phase them anymore.

Because everything goes back to normal as always after all.

Sometimes I don't even fully disappear or leave. Sometimes I just vanish for hours then spend hours with them, then it goes just like that, on repeat, for days upon days.

Sometimes it develops into me disappearing like normally, gone for days or even weeks without a single sound as a warning.

Other times it develops into my getting plastered on my phone and my friend.

Hanging out with one after another.

Texting one after another.

Interacting with one after another.

Because if we fill our brains with the dopamine from interactions.

Maybe then we can pretend, like we are happy, like we are enjoying life.

Maybe then we can pretend like we are having a good day, maybe that lonely dopamine is JUST enough to make us believe that MAYBE life isn't awful.

MAYBE that tiny sprinkle of dopamine in your mind is enough to fool yourself for another day or two that everything is alright, that you're happy, or that you at least will be, that you're healing from the past, that you are moving forward in life or that you are getting there at the very least.

Maybe that tiny dopamine is enough to give you a false sense of hope for JUST enough time, so that you don't give up JUST yet.

But then again, it has to run out eventually.

Because after all, what can a call to a friend, a meal with a colleague, a message from a relative or a comment from a stranger really give?

What could that give that would leave a lasting impact, an impact that would make you truly BELIEVE, and FEEL the hope and possibilities of life.

All it does is give you a false sense of comfort.

It only really takes a day, sometimes a few more if you're lucky.

Then you're dragged back into reality.

Faced with the nasty and gnarly truth.

That you are no one.

Well that's not fully true, after all we are all SOMEONE. That's just something that comes with the package of being born.

However, the reality remains the reality, no matter how "someone" you are.

The truth is you can barely get up out of bed, it's by pure luck and remarkable chance that you get up to get to work, sometimes the pressure of disappointment is enough to peer pressure your legs to sway off the mattress.

Other times.

There's nothing.

Except a tiredness and a clench so deep inside your heart it doesn't feel like any emotion. Just this deep inner pain that's impossible to name, a pain that's so deep inside your very heart and soul that you can't even see it clearly.

It's all pain. And the more you think of it, reflect on it, FEEL IT.

The more it builds.

No that's a lie, it doesn't build. It can't. It's stuck where it started. Perhaps it's grown a molecule. But no, it hasn't grown much, what it has though is become louder.

It's like suddenly it walked closer to you. Like someone bringing a speaker closer to you. The music never grew louder and neither did the speaker. It just moved so you can sense it clearer, stronger.

I know I'm supposed to try.

But what do you do when you don't even care to try anymore?

What do you do when you don't even care anymore?

What do you do when you don't even care.

Care is an interesting concept, isn't it.

C a r e.

Many people relate care with empathy, which in return would connect it to humanity.

Isn't that odd though.

I look like the rest, function like the rest, I can love and care at times.

Yet at other times people would've stripped my title of being human if they would've known how empty and hollow it was inside my heart and chest.

So as I walk back to the office yet again.

Been gone for multiple days, maybe even weeks.

Not a single mountain moved, not a single change in the weather.

Not a single break in schedule and pattern.

Everything flowing like normal, people moving from station to station throughout the office, getting their work done as smoothly as always, moving automatically due to the muscle memory of their years of work.

So me walking in, for what felt like dozens of times. No one bats an eye, welcoming me back like it was nothing, like I was just on a vacation. Like it was muscle memory.

But what if I wanted the care, what if I wanted them to see, what if I wanted their worry, what if I wanted their inner alarm to go off.

What if I wanted to make a reaction. But then again why would I, I could not do that. I wouldn't be able to handle their worried glances, their worried sentences.

Because when they ask I still got my sprinkle of dopamine in me. I'm alright and okay for now.

I am good.

I don't need their help now.

I don't need their comments, I don't need their looks. It would bring nothing but anxiety and dread to my rotten brain, fooled with fake sense of hope infected from the sprinkled dopamine.

The effects still running high.

But when I go back home that night and lay on my bed, unable to change the bedding, the floor full of dust bunnies, dishes sitting neatly on the floor as any upper surface is either filled with dishes, clothes or random clutter.

As I lay there on that bed that night, the happiness will run out of me like a drain.

And then suddenly, at that moment, then I'd wish that they asked, that they cared, that they gave me those looks, that they loved.

That they loved me as a verb.

Seen me, looked at me. Cared about me, worried about me, seen the signs, called me up.

Asked us to talk, asked me if I wanted to talk.

I wish they could've done SOMETHING.

I wish they could've been there in my rundown nasty apartment, given me a hug and told me all the right things as I cry myself to sleep from the pain of KNOWING.

That despite me crying, screaming, begging and sobbing into my pillow that night like every night.

I will remain alone.

No one will call.

No one will message.

No one will check up on me.

No one will ask.

No one will wonder if he's okay.

No one will wonder if I'm okay.

No one will go out of their way to pay attention, because no one will break muscle memory.

No one will ever notice as I will as always return to work with my usual smile and jokes, running on some cheap version of the true dopamine we all crave.

And no one will notice, as I return home that night, like every night, crying, feeling my chest and heart in pain, wanting to sob but the eyes are running dry, having to think of the pain in order to sob. Because if I don't cry how will I make it through the night to the next day?

I have to be alive until I can get my new dose of dopamine after all.