"She Knows Just What I Need"

loss of a loved one

She was watching over me. I managed to evade the virus for two years, dodging the lefts and the rights. The political chatter, policing fact versus opinion. The blackened rabbit-hole of fear and propaganda, fueled by squadrons of disinformation. However, I did catch the virus.
I caught it right after she died. Her family cried together, fought, loved each other cathartically, lost touch. I left the group chat because I had too much twenty-something rage to respond to bickering appropriately. This is mine, you can't have that, fine you can have that- I know you need the money. Dark, ruminative daggers of speech spat by people shattered by their new reality. The world without her. I forgive them, it's just a cry for help. There is some room for regression after loss.
However mature I'd gotten, whatever new life I'd created for myself, I knew this would hurt my progress. There's no way for me to say that in a way that doesn't sound inconvenienced, but perhaps it's not something words can describe. Inconvenienced is how someone feels when the bus is late, not when they lose a parent. If I could hide how I really feel with a weak word like that, I will. I f*****g need the illusion. I've done a lot of LSD and it will never come close to the ego-death one feels in mourning. The threshold, the veil is so close. You can't see what's behind the curtain, but you try to peek around its edges. You're just an audience member watching someone else's time come to an end. 
Loss, this time, triggered a substantially severe manic episode for me. With textbook grace, I lost my job, lost my friends, had several new friends- complete strangers- lighting up my phone, under the impression that I had been serious with my advances. It comes from a place of lost trust, but they had no way of knowing. I just wanted the illusion of having power while I felt completely powerless. I lost a guide. I was choking on desperate tears, thumbing through the pages of my vices, looking for somebody stupid - just like me.
But I caught the virus.
It pinned me to the bed, held me so close. Rocked me to sleep, shook me awake with feverish night-terrors. Fits of anger, lashing out at anybody who'd listen, and spamming the ones who wouldn't. Skin-crawling, paralyzing anxiety and thoughts about ending my journey. Stuck in a room without hospital pamphlets or golf pencils, no pretty girls with heart problems to keep me company. Just me, my room and I. We spent five days seriously considering a drug relapse, just to show anybody that we were still here- I was still here and I was on fire. Totally engulfed by burning desire to release my particles into the air, with the final sound of silver taps vibrating in a few hearts, maybe. If only I hadn't screamed them all away.
I'd been talking to ghosts for several hours one of these foggy, empty days, when I realized the perfect time for me to contract the virus was during a manic episode. I couldn't leave the house and do anything I wanted, and I also had time to finish collapsing before I returned to work. The timing made me think she was watching out for me. 
None of us have "ever really known", but yeah, I know. I know she's with me, I talk to her. We can all spend our entire lives afraid of how much we actually know about the other side- whispering cautiously a belief in superstition, indirectly telling someone under the guise of religion- but we know. Maybe it was nicotine withdrawal, maybe I was lonely, maybe I was angry at myself for making so many new "friends" so quickly- but I just wanted you to know. At least, I hope you do.
I know you're here, I know where you've been, I know where you're going, and my love-

I'll see you soon.