Mind Palace

A room is completely white. A blank space. It’s not the usual square, it’s a circle. Or, with the ceiling and floor, a cylinder. Once life begins there will be only two factors that give away the front of the room, if it has a front. This particular room has been in use for a while. The screen at the front, currently black, and the wheel in the middle are the only things signifying that there is a front, that there is a purpose to the room. Suddenly, light. The day has begun. A figure flickers into being in front of the wheel. She is average, in the way that every human being can be average. With all their differences and changing who isn’t average? Taking hold of the wheel, her eyes slightly close before being widened. The screen changes as the morning routine is followed. The figure at the wheel, stands silently. She has no name, for she is the only one there. She doesn’t need something to address herself by, as she doesn’t need to address anything else. The day drags on. Many moments of tiredness, the nodding of the head, the closing of the eyes, the lagging of the arms and legs. Then there are moments of pure awareness. Of focus. Finally home, a weight slides from her shoulders, into her hands, and onto the floor. An uncomfortable hotness is released, as well as her feet, as the thing containing them flys off. A thump, and a slight moment of sinking, being absorbed into the cushions. It is time. The figure at the wheel flinches. She had felt glimpses of them throughout the day, but that was normal. There had been a hope, a gossamer thread hanging in the wind, that they wouldn’t appear, at least not today. Still, they came. She came first. Poppy. Amber regrets flinching. She likes Poppy. Poppy is fun and energetic and lively and excited about life and everything. She is bubbles, and childhood, and freedom. Amber knows this, she loves this, she just dreads what comes after, what always comes after. Poppy takes the wheel. The siblings come home. As always they are joyous at Poppy’s emergence. They don’t know. They haven’t made the connection. A while after, they are annoyed and tired, they can’t keep up with Poppy, and while they love her, they need some rest. Poppy tries to hang on to the wheel, tries so hard. Isn’t it better for her to have it? No one wants Magenta at the wheel. Yet Magenta has come, and try as they might, she gets the wheel. Once she touches it, even the slightest bit, not an ounce of Poppy remains. Amber could still be heard if she tried, if she wanted to. But Amber is also tired from Poppy’s fun. Amber doesn’t care, Amber doesn’t want anything except peace, except quiet. Magenta wants tears. She wants release. She has been holed up for too long. But Magenta is too kind. She listens too much to everyone around her. She listens to Poppy, who pleads for her to be happy, to have fun, to do something worthwhile and exciting and something that makes you just love life. She listens to Amber, ever practical, who whispers from her corner about the family and friends. She doesn’t care, she doesn’t want, but Amber never forgets her family, her friends, everyone else. If you cry, what will they think? If you tell them your problems what are they supposed to do? You can’t be a burden. You shouldn’t be sad. You have a great life. Look at the blessings. Look at your family. Look at your friends. Look at your objects. Look at your experiences. Look at your privileges. What right do you have to complain? Then, she listens to Crimson. Crimson, her twin who is always with her, but rarely grabs the wheel, who prefers to be a backseat driver, yelling insults at the screen. Magenta hates Crimson, but she hates that hate, for she is kind, and she shouldn’t hate. She should only love. The only place to direct hate is at herself. She can’t show people hate, and she can’t show objects hate, because if something happened she would feel horrible for it. It’s better to hate herself. She still just wants to cry, to release, but Crimson wants revenge. Crimson wants to yell. To yell for the insecurities, that she doesn’t know where to go. THat the people she turns to give the wrong answers. They don’t do the right thing. They hurt her, they tell her she can’t have depression, she doesn’t display the signs, she doesn’t have a reason to have depression. They tell her she can’t be suffering from a disease, from a disorder, of the mind or otherwise. She just can’t. And Crimson yells, she yells her hate for herself, she yells her hate for other people, she judges them because she doesn’t know how else to figure herself out. She yells at object, simple and lifeless objects, because she made a mistake and she wants, for once in her life, for it to not be her fault, but she can’t blame others, not unless she is brave enough to take the wheel from the kind Magenta, so she blames the only thing she can. She blames objects. And both she and Magenta hate themselves. People around her are confused. She was fine a moment ago, whats wrong now? She’s quiet...oh, she must be tired. Okay, she can just endure for a little longer and then she can go to bed. It’s not that big of a deal, just a little longer. She should be fine, it’s not that late. And finally, when it’s bedtime, Magenta can cry. She is no longer surrounded by people. Amber has finally stopped whispering. Magenta’s hands slip from the wheel and she cries, body and tears dropping on the floor. The clean floor that never shows her pain. Crimson has her chance, but rarely does she take it. It’s too scary. If she is allowed to take it, she might yell out loud, where people can hear, where people can judge, where people can try to help. As much as she wants help, she hates too much to ever believe that they can do the right thing to help her. They will always mess up. THough they won’t ever know that, because Magenta is too kind. Amber finally takes back the wheel. The sobbing has stopped. Poppy had long since disappeared. She wont’ be returning for a while, hopefully a long while. Magenta stands up. If she has enough energy she takes the wheel once more. Tonight she does not, and Crimson helps her sister as they too disappear. Amber stays, to steer them to bed, and to ponder. She thinks about the hate, and the sadness, and the joy. She thinks all of them are fake. Perhaps they are an excuse for attention, not that it works, she hides it too well and too often. Perhaps it is just hormones. But this often? This many times a week? Perhaps it truly is a disorder, perhaps it is...but no. It cannot be. It cannot. Her life is too good. She has been told many times that it cannot be, and she believes, or at least tries too. She knows this is why she won’t ever tell anyone. But she has given up. She used to be in control, Poppy and Magenta and Crimson used to not exist. She was fine then, she was herself, she knew herself, life wasn’t so complicated then. But now it is too late. Amber no longer has energy to fight back. If someone wants the wheel, they can have it. Amber no longer cares, or she tries not to. She doesn’t read as much anymore, she doesn’t care about her grades (except to keep up appearances), she doesn’t care about tennis (she has started to dread it), she eats less, she doesn't want to go to sleep, she doesn’t want to wake up, she just...she just...just…

But she will. She will wake up. She will go through the day. Poppy may or may not come. If Poppy comes then Magenta and Crimson will come. And Amber will move, out of the way, back to her corner. The corner she has made for herself in the circular room. In the room that she once owned for herself, and now she doesn’t know. She doesn't know. She fades away. The screen goes black. A room is completely white. A blank space.