At first, Mom blamed it on my vivid imagination.
Picture a three-year-old Imogen hopscotching her way down Stratton Rose Garden park's path wallpapered with tall trees and an extravagant variety of flowering plants.
She'd stop mid-jump to burst minty bubbles coming from the seraphim's bow over by the fountain. They'd pop—to her delight—in a mint-scented shower of smoke, causing her to wriggle her nose and clap her palms for more of them to come.
"What are you doing, Imogen? Little rascal, get over here. You'll ruin your Sunday dress." Mom never understood the importance of staying still, without pestering Mr. Seraphim with his magic, rusted bow. He gave me bubbles if I was a good girl. He'd give me more if I was super-duper good.
I'd tried so hard to be still, but Mom had ruined all my efforts with her squawking and gesturing.
Fast forward a few more years. A younger me checking under my bed for monsters so ferocious they'd torn off my soft flesh with one stroke of their deadly, cadaveric fingers. I would scream in panic whenever Mom turned off the lights. Didn't she know monsters fed on darkness? Turns out my delusions worsened with it too.
After several visits to the optician—she thought something was wrong with my eyes—and some more visits to the otorhinolaryngologist, a head and neck surgeon, they cleared me from glaucoma and ear infection. No complaints about my neck either.
Turns out schizophrenia isn't supposed to manifest until you are a teenager, so until I turned fifteen, it was all a matter of finding the right child therapist to 'fix' my night terrors and meddle whenever my daydreams became oddly vivid.
It all collapsed on my fourteenth's birthday, when I verbally attacked a waiter for poisoning my pizza just like it happened to Michael Jordan the night before Game 5 of the 1997 NBA Finals.
Only my situation was worse. This was no ordinary food poisoning theory but full on death conspiracy. Apple seeds contain amygdalin—a substance that releases cyanide into the bloodstream when chewed and digested. My melted mozzarella topping had bits of that. Mom swore those dark bits were black olives. After a heated argument, we agreed to disagree.
A week after that, someone in a white lab coat diagnosed me with paranoid schizophrenia.
Coming out of the doctor's office with not one but two two plastic orange containers of meds dangling in my pockets wasn't my idea of a mother-daughter getaway.
As we make our way out of the office and into the impersonal foyer, they clash inside my black, oversized hoodie. It's cringeworthy. Turns out, I also needed something for my depression—no kidding. We blanket the ride back home under a heavy coat of silenced and repressed thoughts.
Mom tries cheering me up with her famous banana pancakes, and as she rummages the kitchen cabinets for the ingredients, all I can think about is how these stupid roundish lids mock me with farting sounds when I open them.
"Did you hear that, Mom?" I croak, failing to sound nonchalant. One of my newly learnt techniques for checking what is real and what is not is asking casually.
"Hear what, honey?" Her cautious expression and whirring tempo give her away.
"Must've been nothing." I shake my head, remembering how auditory hallucinations are the most common ones, at least according to my psychiatrist, Dr. Elena Jackson. I have plenty of those. Right on point, doc... yay.
"Hey, do you know why your pill bottles are a translucent orange?" She tries changing the stiffness in the air with a bit of casual conversation. Odd choice of topic, Mom.
I shrug and make a mental note to remember the actual color of those, for to my eyes they were azure—the same color from the famous blue pill Neo refuses to take in the movie "The Matrix."
Before my diagnosis, I'd watched the film thinking who would choose slavery and ignorance over freedom? Now? Not so sure.
That freaking blue pill is looking mighty swallowable. After all, life is hard, bad news is everywhere, and maybe, just maybe, ignorance is bliss. My heart plummets to the uneven wooden floorboard. It shatters into a gazillion splinters that dissolve into a wobbly slime. The reddish goo slides into the cracks... I sigh in relief. At least Mom won't be scraping those with her new mop. I know how much she hates a messy home.
"Iggy, darling. Are you listening to me?" Her high-pitched cadence makes me yelp. I peer at her. We lock eyes. She scans me and sighs. Her innate talent to read my face like an open book, calling on my schizo bluff, knows no limits.
"I am, Mom." I plop on the counter, with puppy eyes and the works.
"Well then, do you know why?"
"Nope." I shrug.
"To mimic amber-colored ones. The coloring helps keep UV light from damaging the medication inside them." She looks pleased with herself. Her voice mingled with a crack-stir-sizzle melody. Mom takes her research very seriously.
"Compelling stuff, Mom."
She smiles and talks some more while I remain barely there.
Truth is, I couldn't give less shits about any of it. I'm so mad at the world and all the 'normal' people around me. From Fred, our next-door neighbor with his barking, poorly trained poodle, to Miss. Evergreen with her endless collection of succulents. I blame them all for my new label. It's pointless and teenagery angsty—I'm aware, yes. But it works. My irrational anger is like an oasis. It fights the dumpster fire inside me.
Days bleed into weeks and then months. My meds kick in. My visions become blurry as the world around me turns dull. I realize they screw up with my energy levels, turning me into a sloth. My head has discovered a new trend—to hang upside down while I lay on my bed in a permanent slow-motion mood for hours on end.
Did you know sloths can lose one-third of their body weight when they poop? Well, my antidepressant medication did the same to me—sort of. My stomach rejected some chemicals resulting in massive weight loss. I was skin and bones for at least half a year, ready to change my name to 'Jackie Skellington' and steal the next Christmas.
My best friend Kass—bless her tiny body and huge ironic soul—mocked me endlessly.
"This new undead look becomes you, skinny cow." She'd snorted and tossed me a sturdy kitty cushion which landed flat on my face.
"You would know, right? I mean, with your scrawny face and all. Is it from Urban Decay your go-to make up palette?" I'd snarled back.
"Slut." We've both cracked up after that and the weight on my shoulders from concealing the real reason for my cadaveric looks had lifted a tad.
Lucky for me, I had her in my life. Kass fits perfectly to what my Grandpa used to tell me. "Imogen, you can't pick your nose because it's gross, but you can pick your friends. Be smart on your choices."
She's by far the best choice I've made. We met in primary school. I ate her pudding, and she punched me in the eye. Then a boy made fun of me for crying, and she punched him too.
"Don't mess with my best friend," she hissed to the poor sucker. We became inseparable after that.
Hanging out with Kass is the only bit of my day that remains 'normal'. I cherish it with every breath I take, hence why I haven't told her the truth. I can't have her looking at me with pity clouding her green, curious eyes. I know she would. She'd stare at me with worry etched in her face, knowing something was not well.
Kass would think I wasn't okay. Maybe she'd think I was in denial of my condition. I'm not. I just can't let it slip through my pores just yet.
Anyhow, Dr. Elena—aka the looney shaman—has found another set of pills with a fancier name, different drug component and higher price. She promised this new drug and dosage would end my nightmare-before-Schizo days.
Permission to swoon because of impending weight gain, brain.
Petition denied. Go back to wallowing, you nerdy wacko.
Fine. I will, but I shall also name thee. You mean, repetitive, weird, emo voice in my head. And you won't like it one bit.
Enter—Anamathea.