“Are you working today?” Susanne asked with remains of cereal still crunching in her mouth.
“I’m finishing some writing for tomorrow’s show. I think I’m going to have pizza for dinner tonight to reward myself if I finish on time.”
“Either way, you should get pizza. You’ve barely eaten; the calories would make up for that.”
Emma yawned in Axel’s arms. She wrapped her arms around him, leaning onto his chest and closing her eyes. “Emma,” Susanne said. “You’ve got school. You can sleep when you get back home.”
“But I want to stay with Uncle Axel.”
“I’ll visit the day after I perform,” Axel said, now turning to Susanne. “Is that alright?”
“You’re family, Axel,” Susanne replied. “You’re always welcome here.”
“Do you promise that you’ll visit more often?”
“I promise.”
“Please don’t go away, Uncle Axel. No one here draws as well as you do. They’re not as funny, either.”
Axel and Susanne ached with laughter.
Emma kissed her uncle on the cheek.
3
After hours of writing in frustration, Axel wanted to give up. The sky had been blue when he first started; now it was black. Axel dwelled alone in rivers of doubt. The leech had no emotion to feed on. Now the leech was alone, dwelling in agony. His depression evolved. Anxiety and depression strolled down his mind, hand-in-hand; two best friends smiling at their destruction as they came across broken thoughts. Echoes of curse repeated in Axel’s thought-lanes, crumbling up the significance of existence and reminding him of failure. He still hadn’t eaten anything and thought that some food would help with his thinking. Axel still felt keen on the idea of pizza.
Once outside, the spice of surprise stroked his stance. Everything was slow and quiet. The fresh air flew through every inch of empty space, surrounding Axel, trying to burrow through his thick mentality. The shadows surrounding him seemed brighter than any light. Trees, once brown with the light of the sun, were now black. The diner was located down the street, onto a square of cement where other buildings stood. It was not far, and perhaps that was a bad thing, for Axel wouldn’t have enough time to calm down. He still felt anxious. His veins carried sharp grit rather than blood. A piercing feeling swam beneath his skin. Axel shoved his hands inside of his coat. He felt warmer than usual. Within seconds, sweat built inside of his curled up fists. The warmth radiating from the pockets of his coats reached his forearms. From there, it spread, surrounding him. His heart tried to keep up with this bodily change, increasing the haste of beats. Waves of each beat brimmed throughout Axel’s entire body.
Axel turned from the walkway of his apartment, onto the curb of a street. He felt dizzy, and miscalculated the distance of the curb, stumbling on it, but managing to catch his balance. Walking on the street toward the diner, Axel had his hand pressed against the beat of his heart, unaware that he was doing so.
4
Axel’s mind tried to awake from concern as he stepped inside. His mind felt heated—as warm as a pizza oven. In the fumes of his mind, the words: it’s going to be okay were on repeat like a bad song without context.
Voices from a television struck the air of the diner. Axel couldn’t hear them, however; his thoughts were too loud and too menacing. The diner was empty except for a man who sat in the far back. The man was of middle-age. He had carpet-hair slicked back in strings of brown. Purple bags hung beneath each eye. The forehead was wrinkled like worn paper. The man’s face—a relic of a traumatizing past, burned with uncertain horror. Wrinkles acted as scars, glued to his forehead, expressing wonder from a fashionable brain. The man’s eyes were blank, silenced behind moist, not telling of any emotion, wanting to remain hidden, unknown. He wore all blue; even had blue socks. His mouth seemed to be chewing on thoughts rather than pizza.
As Axel approached the counter to order, his thoughts dove inside molten lava and smeared their bodies with heat. They shot up into the tunnels of thought, which directly communicates with Axel, and has an effect on his physicality. Pressing down against the air, Axel thrust his hand down on the counter in front of the cashier; the cashier painted a thin smile. Axel’s left hand, now above his head, held up the index finger, which acted as a One Man Army. Axel’s index finger shook in waves as the other four fingers were laid down against his palm, nails digging with pain.
Thoughts of anxiety molded into physical invaders that ran down his face in tears of sweat. With a dancing tongue, Axel tried to communicate, but to no avail. He let out a frustrated laugh and stared at the cashier who was stuck in an infinite swallow along with an itch on the back of his neck that never seemed to settle.
“Sir,” the cashier managed. “Is everything alright?”
Axel leaned forward toward the counter, intruding personal workspace with his upper torso, waving the One Man Army as if to try to make a point. His mouth trembled and, with a thud, he went head first over the counter.
5
A mental brush painted the world with blur along with a layer of bewilderment. Axel thought that he had been out for hours, for a large color of blue hovered above him, resembling the sky. He began to feel parts of his body fade back into reality, darting with presence. His saliva jumped down the waterslide of his tongue, heading toward the dry back of his throat like water covering desert, saving lives. The sides of his lips were glued together, but an opening in the middle was small enough for Axel to blow vocals through. Smell kicked in, and he realized that the blue color above him was not the sky, but a person; the same person who had sat at the far back of the diner. This man treated Axel.
“Are you a doctor?” Axel muttered.
The face of the man came into focus as it leaned closer. “Hello there and welcome to my office! I’m glad that you’re already seated,” the voice of the man said in monotone with no humanity attached. “My name is Chris, and I will be your dentist this afternoon.”
Axel’s eyes grew in size to make sure that he wasn’t dreaming.
“But why—“
“Unfortunately my journal is not present at this time,” the voice continued. “Even more unfortunate, you lost a tooth. But no need to worry! We’re here to help.”
Axel brewed a laugh that came out as a hiss. His stomach weighed with pressure and pain. “That is unfortunate, indeed. What’s even more unfortunate for you is that I lost a regular tooth instead of the tooth in which I store my values.” Axel slurred on the last word, and it came out as valuables. “You can’t trust banks these days.”
Axel was still trapped in a blur, and didn’t realize the change in the dentist. The face of the dentist went blank. His before expressionless eyes now turned to life. Axel laughed, thinking that he had made light of the situation, unaware that Chris did not get the joke at all; a comedian’s worst nightmare. Axel never understood just how terrible that nightmare could be.
“Excuse me,” the cashier said, looking at Chris. “Would you like us to call an ambulance?”
Chris didn’t react.
The cashier turned to his boss, who gave him a nod.
6
When the paramedics arrived, they placed a cushion underneath Axel’s head, lifting him back into reality. With his head elevated, Axel’s vision somewhat cleared.
They spoke to Chris, who had stepped aside. He stood cuddled against the rear wall of the diner. Behind him, the wallpaper displayed an image of a large man with a black mustache, wearing a chef’s hat, and holding up a pizza.
“Do you want to tell us what happened here?”
No answer.
“…on another note, I think that clothes made to shame women should not be displayed in the front of stores,” said a voice from the TV.
The paramedics waited for an answer. Flashes of sirens reflected across Chris’s face, turning his gleaming eyes red.
“He’s probably a close friend or relative, maybe in shock,” one of the paramedics said to the other.
<
br /> “I can tell you what happened,” Axel said, turning his head to look behind him, facing the paramedics.
“Whoa! Hey, easy there, buddy. Just lay still, okay?”
“Look, I’m fine, really,” Axel explained. “I’ve been under a lot of stress lately. This has happened before. I had an anxiety attack. I’m going to start taking medication for it now—it’s okay. I have a show tomorrow and—“
One of the paramedics gasped. “Hey, yeah, I know who you are! You’re Axel Gardner, that comedian on TV. I didn’t recognize you with all that blood around your mouth.”
Axel looked at the paramedic as his hand searched his mouth for blood. “Good of you to say; I’ll be sure to sell my soul to the local vampire cult and become of them so that I can use this look as a disguise in public to avoid confrontations.”
The paramedic’s laugh blew his head back into a tilt. “You do that, Mr. Gardner.” The last of his laugh danced the air. He patted Axel on the shoulder and gave a grunt as he got up.
Axel shifted his attention to Chris. “Are you okay? I hope I didn’t scare you.”
No reaction.
“…rivers of waste surrounded the town, leaving people stranded on top of buildings,” said a female voice from the TV.
Chris started to bite his fingernails as he headed outside. Axel reassured everyone that he was alright. The cashier offered him a free pizza, but losing a tooth didn’t really bring much of an appetite. Besides, as Axel had now grown to learn, anxiety was the ultimate killer of any appetite; even the appetite of life.
When he walked out of the diner, it dawned on him that performing tomorrow with a missing tooth would make him feel even more insecure.
This is just terrific, Axel thought.
“Nice teeth,” said a voice from behind. Axel turned to face the voice. Chris leaned with his back against the outer wall of the diner. He didn’t make eye contact; instead, his head motioned downward, eyes into the cement. His face was submerged in the natural, giant shadow of the night. “You’ve bleached them. Glossy-white up to the root, those are. They nearly blinded me. The procedure must’ve been at least five-hundred dollars, considering their shine. The shine is most important, wouldn’t you say?”
Axel took a step forward with a smile. “Nice observation. Hey, thanks for helping—“
In a fast jerk, Chris’s stare left the ground and his eyes met Axel’s. He carried the smile of a politician. “You can give us feedback on our website! I thank you for our time and I hope that you’ll leave us your thoughts.”
“…you’re welcome.”
Chris’s stare moved away from Axel’s, slowly, as if it was on a spring. Seconds later, his eyes met the ground once more.
Why is he staring at the ground? He’s barely making any eye contact.
Then it hit him.
He’s staring at the ground, avoiding eye contact.
There was a technique used by many public speakers; it meant focusing your attention on something that was head-level with the audience. It could be anything from the wall behind them, a poster, or a rail at the top of a walkway. Anything that could serve as a focus point for the eye was deemed reliable. The purpose of this technique was to solve stage-fright. Using this technique meant that you never had to make eye contact with anyone in the audience, even though all of them assumed that you did. It helped people who suffered from anxiety and was often practiced in the early development of various performers and public speakers. It also helped people who felt insecure.
In the theater that held tomorrow’s show, the farthest row of seats touched the wall. These seats were usually occupied by the tallest people, who would block someone’s view if they sat in the front row. When these tall people sat against the wall of the farthest row, their height would cover the entire wall, leaving no empty space above their head for a focus point. If Axel were to look any higher than that, he would be blinded by the spotlights.
I need a focus point, Axel thought. And he’s avoiding eye contact.
A campfire spat flames in his mind. His thoughts danced around it, singing happy songs of great triumph. Axel clapped his hands together and stepped forward again.
“Hey—uh—sorry, but I don’t know if I caught your name. Is it Chris?”
Chris’s head jerked back toward Axel again. His eyes seemed to leap in their sockets. “Hello, sir! Chris Michael is my name. Do we have an appointment?” That fake smile followed once more.
Axel laughed an uncomfortable laugh. Still, it felt good to laugh, nonetheless. “No, I don’t think we do. But I have a show tomorrow. It’s a comedy show, a stand-up jig. As thanks for helping me out, I want to invite you, for free. It’s not far from here. Are you familiar with the local theater?”
The fake smile disappeared from Chris’s face. As his eyes stared into Axel’s pearly-white teeth, he saw visible spots of dry blood coating some of them. The smile became real.
“Yes.”
“Okay then, Chris! Uh, you’re okay with directions and everything, right?”
Chris nodded a bizarre nod. He tilted his head up, making the top of it touch the back of his neck, then back down, chin touching his chest. In that moment, as Axel saw the dentist’s head move slowly up and down, eyes never moving along with it, completely still in their sockets, something told him that this was a bad idea. Axel put the thought away, thinking that his anxiety had just come back to say hello. Axel winked and pointed at Chris Michael.
“8 p.m., Chris. I’ll see you there.”
Axel turned to walk home, feeling the pain of losing a tooth creep up on him. His gums were aching. His anxiety still blew bubbles of discomfort from inside, but it wasn’t enough to make him faint again, he hoped. Axel walked past a grocery store, hearing his stomach rumble. It wasn’t hunger; it was disgust.
“Yeah,” Axel said to himself, as his tongue rested in the spot where a tooth had once sat. “Anxiety is a killer of many things.”
He made his way across the street.
Birds were chirping. Distant laughs from drunken folk were heard. Heat from anxiety surfaced on top of his skin. However, the cold wind of night combated the heat, preventing it from becoming any sort of annoyance. Axel tried to breathe in the positives to make his tiny bit of happiness wake from deep rest. When nothing spawned, Axel took his stare to the ground, feeling numb. Despite the darkness covering his thoughts, he tried to forget about what had happened at the diner, focusing instead on planning jokes for tomorrow’s show.
Chris Michael was also planning something on his way home; something that was the opposite of comedy.
Axel kicked a rock in frustration.
Chris whistled.
Axel sighed.
Chris smiled.
7
Axel opened the door to his apartment, noticed the mail on the floor, and skipped through it as if it belonged to a world he wasn’t familiar with or involved with. He threw it toward the counter situated in the hall. He missed. The letters fell on the floor with a depressing sound. He didn’t care.
He walked into the living room. His entire body seemed heavy, and he almost dove into the couch, not caring much for how soft it felt against his skin. The silence became a noise of itself—an awful one. Silence was good for thinking, but right now Axel didn’t want to think at all. In fact, he wished he could turn into an animal solely driven by instinct. He wondered if animals realized how lucky they were. The human mind was more of a curse than a blessing.
Axel grabbed for the remote to turn on the TV, surprised with the ease in which he found it. He pressed down on the ON button with furious force. On the TV screen, a man and a woman were standing on a beach, holding each other by the waist. The woman’s hair caught in the wind, making her appear as one with nature, as if she had never spent a day in any city. A very attractive trait, Axel thought.
Her hair swayed. The camera zoomed in on the man’s face. Inside of his blue eyes, the image of the woman reflected. “Catherine,” the man whispered in
a lustful tone. “I never saw your flaws as flaws. I saw them as a way of bonding and relating to you, because, you see, I too have the same flaws. Our flaws only brought us closer together. Don’t you see, Catherine? Is it not clear on that we’re made for each other?”
The camera now zoomed in on Catherine, who agreed with a smile and rosy cheeks. Now back to the man. “I saw them as a normal person would see interests in another person. They allowed me to get to know the real you, and it was the real you who I fell so hard for.”
The camera panned out. Their full bodies were shot from below, making them seem powerful, making their love seem powerful. Behind them, the blue sky loomed, merging with the darker blue of the still ocean. A violin started to play in slow melody.
“I love you,” Catherine whispered, with the world in the rim of her eyes. The camera zoomed in on her face to catch a tear running down her cheek in high-resolution. The screen went black.
Axel turned it off.
He felt alone. He hated himself for allowing such a silly scene to have an impact on him. He looked up at the ceiling, wishing that it would collapse on him. The white color of the ceiling pressed into his vision, reminding of paper. He had to write down some jokes. Axel closed his eyes with pressure and rubbed the sides of his temples. An inner argument spawned in his head.
You should write some jokes.
How does rest sound?
It’s best if you write some jokes.
Yeah, but how does rest sound?
Axel screamed.
He forced himself to get up and marched into the kitchen, where he slammed down a piece of paper and a pen. He sat down. The white piece of paper seemed to mock him. He once considered the paper to be his friend, his therapy. Now Axel looked at it with hatred.
Blue Anesthesia Page 4