The gaps between moments of clarity were getting bigger by the day.

Really, calling them "moments of clarity" was a misnomer. Things were getting weird. It wasn't just that she was relegated to the status of passenger in her own body anymore - the routes her body was taking were straying further and further from her usual day-to-day activities.  Charges were showing up on her credit card statements for purchases she did not recall making. Increasingly, she'd look at her reflection in car and shop windows and find a vacant smile plastered on her face. Try as she might, she could not register the physical sensation of this smile - there was only finding it in her mirror image.

Her coolness in job interviews was bordering on robotic. At one point, a male interviewer asked her if she was planning on having children in the coming years. It was not the first instance of sexist questioning she had experienced, but her reaction was entirely new. Whereas previous such experiences had been unnerving enough to throw off her composure for the rest of the interview, this time the insult barely skimmed the surface of her awareness. As she answered, her voice was smooth and expressive, melodic, even.  She couldn't recall what she answered, let alone remember if having children was a genuine desire of hers, but she guessed it didn't matter. The interviewer smiled and nodded, apparently pleased with what she'd said, and that was evidence enough everything was fine.

She tried to keep a journal, to have some record of the moments as they went by. She figured if her mind was becoming like a sieve, she might as well use some external supports. The attempts went south surprisingly quickly. Initially, she tried to record the thoughts in a little notebook that she kept in her purse, but she kept leaving it places. She managed to trace back her steps and retrieve it the first two times, but by day three, she had completely lost track of where she'd been, and therefore where she might have left it.

So, she tried another strategy: she created notes on her phone. Every time her mind seemed to come up for air, she'd reach for the device and type in a few words.  This seemed to work better, at first - her brain apparently wanted to hang on to the phone more than it did a paper notebook.

And then, well, at some point, one of those blips of consciousness came to her in the middle of a session. 

She first became aware of her hand searching for her pocket, then her purse, and she realized her fingers were feeling the contours of a very familiar chair.  It was hard to determine which other realization made its way to her mind first, as there were several - that phones were not allowed in the treatment room, maybe, for supposed distraction and electrical noise reasons. Or that her phone was likely in her purse in a locker outside the treatment room. Or that a definite flush was blooming across her cheeks, neck and chest.

Or maybe it was the realization that her other hand, the one not searching for the phone, was well into her pants and stroking her very wet, very engorged vulva, pelvic muscles spasming in what felt like the aftershocks of orgasm.

This instance felt different from the other times she'd found herself aroused in treatment. She felt distinctly detached from her body, from the room, the situation as a whole. She observed herself withdraw the hand, wiping it on the inside of her underwear, and zip her pants back up. Her jeans were thick enough that there was only a faint smell of arousal in the air. She could hear the voice drone on - though she couldn't be bothered to make out what it was saying - and she gathered from this that, even if the block was almost over, by the time John returned to help remove the Within from her head, the ventilation would have ensured no smell was left.  A vague feeling of horror echoed from somewhere else in her being, but the twinge of discomfort that came through only served to trigger another wave of arousal, yielding a final orgasmic twitch against which she ground her hips.

She got home, somehow. The only thing she could recall from the journey back from the Laboratories was spending what seemed like an inordinate amount of time staring at a light-up billboard advertising roofing services. It was light  outside when she stopped in front of it, and she stayed there long enough for it to get completely dark. She stood there, squinting at the bright screen, fixated on the moving text.  The horror she'd felt in the treatment room was stronger now, a dark cloud hanging over her.

At some point, her phone dinged, and she saw she'd received a text from Milo. The passing guilt from ignoring it was enough to pull her out of her daze. Even as she resumed her walk back to her apartment, her thoughts circled around the idea of how she, a renter living on the middle floor of an apartment building, might be able to obtain a quote for a new roof.

The ability of her mind to chew on this problem delighted her somewhat - how long had it been since she'd been able to focus on anything? - but the dread of the problem being unanswerable drowned out that enjoyment.

More days slipped by. It was pitch black in her bedroom, and she was laying in bed, phone in hand. There was a pit in her stomach, and a migraine was starting to make its presence known. She dialed a number.

"Welcome to your voicemail. Please enter your 4-digit PIN and press pound."

Beep beep bee-beep. Beep.

"The PIN you have entered is incorrect. Please enter your 4-digit PIN and press pound."

Beep beep...beep...beep. Beep.

"You have five new messages. To listen, press 1--"

Beep.

"Hello, the message is for Lily Smith. This is John, the research associate at the Laboratories. I'm calling because we didn't see you at your last scheduled appointment, wanted to know if everything was okay and so we could reschedule the session. Please call us back when you get the chan--"

Beep. "Message skipped."

"Hi there! This is Janine Laslo from Leaf Industries calling for Lily Smith, we got your application for the administrative associate position and we'd like to have you come in for an intervie--"

Beep. "Message skipped."

"Hello, this is John from the Laboratories calling for Lily Smith. Hi Lily, I hope everything's alright. I haven't seen you for your last two appointments and wanted to check in to see if there's anything we can do to facilitate your treatment. Your participation in this trial is really important in improving our therapies and we want to make sure you're feeling supported throughout. Please call me ba--"

Beep. "Message skipped."

"This is an important message from the Social Security Administration. Your Social Security Number has been suspended and you need to contact us to react--"

Beep. "Message skipped."

"Hey Lily, um. It's Milo...I uh...I don't usually leave messages on voice mails but I haven't heard from you in over a week and I'm starting to get worried. I hope you're okay, please call me back. Bye."

She listened into the silence following the message. After a few seconds, the voice mail listed its options.

"To delete the message, press 7. To save the message, press 1. For more options, press 3. To repeat the options, press 2."

She was looking at her phone in the darkness, unable to conjure a response.  Without any input, the voice mail repeated the options.

"To delete the message, press 7. To save the message, press 1. For more options, press 3. To repeat the options, press 2."

She set the phone face up on the pillow and curled up next to it.  Faintly, she could hear the options repeating again from the receiver.

"To delete the message, press 7. To save the message, press 1. For more options, press 3. To repeat the options, press 2."

Beep.

"Message saved."

She hung up. She pulled the covers over her head. Interminable seconds dragged on.  She grabbed the phone and brought it with her under the covers, then rubbed her eyes and dialed another number.

"Hello?"

Milo's voice came through on the other end.  Her reaction came in two parts. First, relief washed over her. Then, she felt the lump in her throat, and she found herself trying not to cry.

"...Hello?"

She realized she hadn't answered him.  She needed to say something. Words escaped her mouth in quick succession, before she could even think about them.

"I'm really sorry I haven't called you or answered your texts, it was really rude of me and you don't deserve that." She hoped he could not hear the trembling in her voice.

"Lily?" He sounded confused. A bit breathy, too.  It occurred to her he had probably been asleep.

"Yeah...um...hi." A singular sob escaped her mouth and she hoped she'd managed to pass it off as a laugh.

"What time is it...Lily, it's 3am. Why are you up at this hour, are you okay?"

Debatable. She was blinking away tears. It was getting hot, hiding under the covers, but she was feeling so exposed she needed the extra protection.

"Oh! Oh. I'm so sorry, I didn't realize it was this late...I just couldn't sleep and I was thinking about those texts and the message you sent me and how distant I've been lately and I felt bad..." Air came back into her lungs in a ragged gasp.

"Lily, are you okay?" He sounded more awake now.

"I...um. Probably not? It's complicated."

There was a pause. She hesitated, then spoke again.

"...No. No, I'm not okay. I can't really explain it on the phone, I don't know where to start. But I'm not okay. Maybe we can have this conversation in person?"

Another pause. She could hear him draw in a deep breath on the other end of the line.

"Okay...I care about you and I don't want to cut you off, but I am not going to be able to do this right now. Can we talk tomorrow, maybe?"

"Oh...yeah, sure."
 

The silence hung in the air.  She was trying to come up with some platitudes to end the call, some magical combination of words that could disarm the minefield she felt she was stuck in, but no words were coming to mind. It took a few seconds to realize she was holding her breath, and when she willed herself to breathe again, the air entered her lungs in a long, shaky, sobbing gasp.

"I'm sorry, I just...things have been weird and I am behaving in ways I don't recognize and I don't know how to handle all of this." 

"Where are you right now?"

The question caught her off-guard. "I'm home?"

"Are you safe?" He asked the question immediately following her answer.

"What do you mean?"

"Are you going to be able to stay there until morning?" He seemed to be stirring on the other end of the line. "I can be there at 8. Can you sit tight until 8? Maybe try to get some sleep?"

"Yeah, I can do that."

"What are you going to do if you can't sleep? Do you have a book you can read? A game on your phone?"

"Um...I can play Solitaire?"

"Okay. So when I hang up, you're going to try and get some sleep. And if you can't sleep, you're going to play Solitaire on your phone until I get there. Are you okay with that?"

He was going through the questions methodically, like this was a routine he was familiar with. The matter-of-factness with which he checked off one mental bullet point after another made her feel more secure and broke her heart at the same time.

"Yeah, that works." Lily felt small, like a child waiting for her parents to pick her up at daycare. 

"Okay, I'll see you at 8. Sit tight. Bye." His sigh was cut off halfway as he hung up.

Lily estimated she slept perhaps fifteen minutes in the hours that followed. The feeling of the ball in her throat had subsided somewhat after the conversation with Milo had ended; it seemed that, as long as she was not speaking to him, her body had no difficulty pushing off the guilt somewhere she couldn't access it. Still, she felt uneasy. She spent the rest of the night alternating between playing Solitaire and staring at the ceiling, too restless to sleep and too tired to do anything of substance.  Over the hours, the migraine came and went. Doing anything about it, like taking painkillers, felt impossible. She rose from her bed at 7:30am and sat on the couch in the living room, unsure what to do with herself.

The knock on her door startled her at 7:43am.  She realized then that she was still in her pajamas, but she didn't have time to get dressed, so she opened the door and found Milo there in his red jacket.

He looked tired. Not because of anything in his presentation - he was dressed, his hair brushed, face freshly shaved as usual. She was used to finding a liveliness in his eyes, but today his gaze seemed dull, two silver irises fixed on her, cold and flat.

She stepped aside to let him in.  He entered her apartment, let her close the door. Then, still in his jacket and boots, he wrapped her up in a firm hug. She hugged back.

He smelled like fresh air and shampoo. She could feel the cold from the outside on his clothes. She tried to absorb comfort or reassurance from the moment, but found herself unable to. When she relaxed her embrace, he did not. He kept clinging to her. She realized that, though he was coming to check in on her, he needed something from her too. Her heart sank.

She hung his jacket in the closet and he took his boots off. They sat on the couch, facing each other. Neither of them spoke for what felt like minutes. She was holding one of the couch cushions, fixating on a hem. Finally, she heard him speak and looked up.

"What's going on, Lily?" She wasn't sure she had ever heard him be this quiet. His voice had the quality you take on when approaching a fearful animal, so as to avoid startling it into running away.

Where to start? How to explain?

"So you know I have struggled with...mental health things for a long time."

He nodded.

"For a while I started doing better because I started these new treatments...I'm in this clinical trial and it was working really well. It's actually why I was even able to go on that first date with you."

He waited a few seconds to ensure she was finished speaking. "...'was' working? Are you not in the trial anymore?"

She shook her head. "No, I'm still in it. But...I'm not sure it's doing what it's supposed to be doing. Or, that it's...only doing what it's supposed to be doing. Like, I don't really...feel like myself anymore?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well...I mean, how are you even supposed to know? Like, I've been depressed for so long I don't know what is 'me' and what is 'depression'. In therapy when you talk about how you're feeling and what you're thinking and you're depressed they tell you 'oh, that's the depression talking' so if all I've been is depressed for all of my twenties, where the fuck did my personality go, y'know? Who the fuck am I? Is this new person I'm becoming who I've been all along? How the fuck would I know?"
 

Tears were spilling from her eyes, words bubbling up like foam accumulating on the surface of a river. She was fidgeting with the hem on the cushion, speaking faster and louder than she wanted to.   She waited for him to respond, to pacify, to reassure, but he said nothing. She drew a deep breath in and sighed.

"So it's...really confusing. Because on the one hand, it works! I can do the things now. I clean my apartment and I am searching for a job and I was even interested in sex. But I don't know if I even want those things, as I'm doing them? Like, on some level I guess I must be if I keep doing them. There's like...two 'me's. And lately it's been getting worse. Like the other me is the one steering the ship and I don't really have much choice."

"...You aren't interested in sex?"  She looked up at him. His eyes were wide in utter concern.

"Well...again. I don't know? I wasn't before. And then I met you and we do it a lot. But I met you around the same time I started treatment and the difference from before and after is so big that I can't assume it was just a you thing? And like...I don't really...enjoy it?" She was wincing as she was speaking, acutely aware of the clumsiness of her words.

Milo seemed to be searching for his own. "Lily...We...If I had known, I would never have..."

"Milo, I made the first move on you. I have made...a lot of moves on you. Remember? This isn't some 'you making me feel like I need to do this' thing. This is 1000% on me. I-- Please don't feel like this is your fault. You did nothing wrong. I'm just...fucked up and I don't know how to deal with this and I'm sorry. And I don't know if how I've been showing up is actually how I am. And even if it is, I don't know if I can keep showing up like that with you."

"Is this...are you breaking up with me?" A quiet panic swept into her body swiftly. She searched for the right response, but realized she didn't know what it was.

"I mean -- no! I don't know! I don't know what I want." 

He looked at her, waiting. For once, she hated his ability to leave space for her in a conversation. 

"I think you're sweet, and kind, and caring, and funny. I have been so happy to have you in my life. But...I don't know if I can be who you think I am, Milo. And I feel bad about that. But...I like you a lot."

He nodded. Again, he said nothing.

The tension had fallen, somewhat. She wiped the tears from her face. Fatigue was beginning to settle in; the emotions, the sleepless night were starting to get to her. She was afraid the conversation had damaged their relationship, but she wanted to feel close to him.

"I feel weird asking you this, but...can you stay and have a nap with me? I haven't slept all night. And I feel safe with you. And...you can say no. If you don't want to please say no."

He considered the question for a few seconds. His facial expression was impossible to decode.

"Okay."

The tone of his voice was so completely neutral it was difficult to decipher how he was feeling.

They entered her bedroom. Sunlight streamed through the closed blinds and infused the room with a delicate light.  He sat down on her bed, then lay down on his back.  Gingerly, as if a sudden movement was capable of shattering the stillness of the moment, she curled up by his side, ear on his chest. He put an arm around her.

Her eyelids fluttered shut. The crying had made it difficult to keep her eyes open; they were imbued with the fuzzy feeling only waves of tears could bring.  She could feel his warmth alongside her, the softness of his worn cotton t-shirt beneath the palm of her hand.  She could feel the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed, hear the whooshing of the air going in and out, long and slow, like lazy ocean waves rolling on the shore.  She wondered if he was deliberately slowing his breathing down.  She could feel her breath skitter from her chest to the back of her throat without an ounce of steadiness.

She tried to make out the color she saw on the backs of her eyelids, tried to focus on the feeling of her palm against his shirt. Even under the heavy weight of exhaustion, she was struggling to steady herself; she feared he could feel it.  She fixated on his heartbeat, the pulse slow and steady.  She willed her breathing to mirror his, lazy inhales and exquisitely slow exhales cycling through her. 

Part of her longed to be an island, to exist in isolation, to pull meaning from thin air rather than need this.  Worries flitted in her mind like used tinsel in a stream.  Finally, after breath after breath after breath, she fell into a dreamless sleep.