Blue Anesthesia

by Daniel Lidman

  He did as many comedians do. He thought about recent events and things that were going on his life to make jokes about. Would it be in poor taste to joke about depression? If the jokes were aimed toward other victims, then yes, but he assumed he could try and make light of his own depression. He also had a missing tooth. As he walks out on stage, he could say something along the lines of: “I assume many of you have noticed that I’m missing a tooth. Yeah, the comedian who I’ve kidnapped and who I’ve been forcing to write jokes for me finally decided to fight back.”

  The show wouldn’t be televised, but that didn’t exactly matter because people would surely record on their cellphones. After twenty minutes of staring at the paper with his elbows on the table, hands supporting his own head, which wanted to smash itself against the table, he finally started writing. He didn’t write anything great by any means, but at least it was something.

  Axel knew that these jokes were not good enough to fill him with confidence. He would start shaking on stage, and knowing that terrified him. Once his body began to shake, so did his voice. It wouldn’t be steady and clear, but rather wobbly, stumbling over words and repeating itself. Jokes are not only about context. They’re also about delivery. Some of the most efficient jokes involve physical movement, facial expressions, changing voice patterns, among other things. Of course, doing all of that with a clear tone and smooth motion requires confidence: having the right posture, not being nervous or showered with anxiety. If a comedian starts to sweat, the grip on microphone loosens. A comedian, who toddles around on stage, constantly readjusting the grip of his microphone, doesn’t look too good. When Axel pondered over all these details, he realized that he would be victim to every bad symptom of anxiety. He wasn’t even stuck between being confident or not, he existed way below on the bottom of the insecurity meter.

  It sure is odd how depression can not only change the way you think, but also act, Axel thought. A social person surrounded by best friends, love, and joy could all the sudden become a bed-ridden mess who no longer dares to approach any social situation.

  He took the paper in his hands and walked toward his room to lay down in bed and practice. As he passed a window, catching a glimpse of the beauty from outside, Axel wished he was dead.

  8

  Axel had once considered his bed to be a safe haven, but that had been before his bed became infected with intruding thoughts. His hands curled behind his head, tied in a grip as if he held onto himself from falling down a pit of darkness. He became aware that his breathing wasn’t relaxed, but rather harsh. In between each inhale and exhale, his heart beat with a strong force, a drum preparing to head into battle. His heartbeat echoed throughout his body. His body felt like the receptor of all negative energy that had taken place on this night. Every murder and horrendous crime would find him, enter him, and make him their home. His hands started to tremble against the pillow. He flexed his face with every muscle into a grimace that spoke internal destruction. His cheeks filled with anxious air and grew in size—balloons containing air of cataclysm. His hands became sticky with inner goo. Axel exhaled the air from his mouth in a loud cry. He panicked and curled up against the wall. His chin rested on top of his knees; his hands were struck by the voltage of anxiety, clasping against the sides of his face.

  I can’t do this, he thought, and let out a whimper of defeat. There’s just no way. I won’t be able to do the show tomorrow. I won’t. I’m a failure. These jokes are fucking terrible. I’m fucking terrible. This pressure is killing me. I want to give up, oh God; I just want to give up.

  He shook his head in despair, feeling the hair on his knees rub against his face, sharp like the hairs of an insect. Axel let out a loud cry and felt how tears escaped from the cracks of his fingers, down his arms. He looked up, removed his hands from his face, and felt his now damp cheeks get struck by an outer cold. Teeth bit down on his lips to stop them from quivering. In an instant, Axel’s eyes focused on an exercising rope, which hung on his wall.

  Axel Gardner let out a deep breath.

  He closed his eyes, feeling the tears build inside of his eyelids, warm and boiling. The extra layer of darkness on top of the night felt inviting, comfortable.

  Everything is going to be okay.

  In the inner darkness of his eyelids, it did indeed feel like everything would be okay if existence transferred to this darkness, permanently. Night-thoughts made their way into his mind. Their offer was tempting, so tempting. His thoughts convinced him that there was no other way. Axel had been trapped in the current of depression for too long now, and for the first time, he embraced it; he accepted the reality that there’s no use in fighting back. It did no good to try and swim against it anymore. The only thing left to do would be to let go. Let go, and let the darkness swallow him whole.

  When Axel opened his eyes again, the perspective that had grown seeds of evil within him now made complete sense. The pain had to be stopped. Every man has his breaking point. Axel had tried his best.

  Everything is going to be okay.

  This conclusion turned into a vibrating impulsion. Axel felt miserable, but soon he would be free. He went up in a hurry, almost excited, wanting to have a taste of freedom. He ran toward the exercising rope. Happiness and hope had perished from his mind. His depression gathered for the finale on the dry, flaky floor of his mind, which had been sucked of any smooth, watering thoughts.

  Axel held the rope in his hands, fascinated by how an object he had thought little of would now become his golden ticket toward peace. Inside his head, cheers roared and popcorn crunched. He turned on the light, squinting against the burn. He gnawed his knuckles against his eyes, still wet with tears. Looking up, he spotted a family photo resting on his wall, encased in amber colored wood.

  I’ll end the pain for me, Axel thought. But the pain would move on to them. Would they become the new receptors for all the negative energy within me? Would it become a chain reaction of plagued misery?

  He gently trailed his fingers over the faces of his family, managing to smile. Axel stared at the photograph. Tears of depression were now replaced by tears of longing. He thought about his mother, about his sister, and about his brother. He also thought about Emma. He thought about how all the dinners would turn into a spinning fork fest if he were to end his life; and how all of them would be thrown into the same current of vast darkness. Think about Emma for God’s sake. Think about how it would affect her. She would be in so much pain, and Susanne wouldn’t be able to help her, for she would experience the same thing. And what would your mother do? Knowing that every time she reminded you about how you could talk to her about anything, she could’ve perhaps saved you by pushing conversation a little more?

  Axel thought about all of this. He grabbed the photograph by the frame and headed to bed with it against his chest.

  I’ll call tomorrow before the show, Axel thought. I’ll talk to mom. And I’ll visit Emma the day after the show. I’d like that. I miss them.

  As his body drifted toward sleep, his mind stayed awake. Depression started a slideshow in his head, explaining how his thoughts would haunt him in his dreams.

  9

  The clock punched 3 a.m.

  Axel woke up from vivid dreams of his family. The photograph next to him now displayed small wrinkles. He pulled the photograph closer to him. In his now waking state, thoughts of his dreams grew clearer. Axel had dreamt of his sister, Susanne, and their times in elementary school.

  Susanne Gardner is two years younger than her brother. The day she started elementary school, she wore a red band decorated with roses, separating her golden hair from her shy eyes. Their mother, Dee, had dressed Susanne in a green blouse, a black skirt, and knee-high socks, which were white and brought out the paleness in her legs. Susanne wore a pink backpack. The night before, she had memorized every pocket of that backpack, where she neatly stored her glittering pencils and textbooks. She held her mother’s hand all the way to the classroom. Unconsciously, s
he used her mother’s hand as a way to signal her fright; tugging at it whenever they walked past a group of children. Her black-rimmed glasses, too large for her, bounced on the ridge of her nose with every other step. Susanne had to tinker with them at least once a minute. There were even times when she would walk around with her finger pressed against them, making sure that they stayed in place.

  “Is this classroom five?” asked her mother to a teacher who smiled silent greetings to every child trailing past her.

  “It sure is,” Brittany replied. She offered her hand. Dee shook it.

  “This is my daughter, Susanne Gardner. She’s starting today.”

  Brittany kneeled down in front of Susanne. “Welcome, miss. You’re going to have so much fun today!” Brittany’s face burst into colors of red, along with a smile. Her teeth were stained with age, but she had a nice smile, nonetheless. Looks were not yet hammered into Susanne’s brain, and she found Brittany’s smile to be beautiful. In fact, it caused her own smile to grow; a smile that stretched across her entire face and made her glasses slide down toward the bottom of her nose, stopping at the upward curve above the nostrils. Susanne used her finger to push them back up.

  She hugged her mother goodbye, feeling comfort in her mother’s momentary warmth. “Have a good day, sweetie,” Dee said. Susanne watched mother exit from the hallway. Her backpack now felt heavier. Brittany led her into a room where kids scattered around like ants. Susanne tried to make eye contact with three girls on her right, but they were too busy drawing. Brittany told Susanne that introductions would start soon, and then she left to attend to a boy who waved around a paintbrush like a sword. When the boy stopped his swing mid-air, he bellowed a scream from the side of his mouth, reflecting that in his own mind, he had indeed slashed someone to pieces.

  On Susanne’s left side, a couple of girls sat on a mattress. Susanne approached them with her hands knotted around the straps of her backpack. They all stared up at her, trying to decide if they liked what they were seeing or not.

  “My mom packed an orange for me to eat,” Susanne said in a shaking tone. “What do you guys have to eat?”

  “Your glasses are ugly,” one of the girls said. They all burst into mocking giggles.

  “Oh. I guess so,” Susanne replied. She lit up in blushes and felt how her throat began to tickle. She started for the other side of the room, glancing backward to check if they had just been joking. They had not.

  The boy with the paintbrush ran toward Susanne, poking her with it. “Ouch!” Susanne exclaimed with a slight whimper. The boy stated at her with mystified eyes. “She’s not dropping! She’s a WITCH!”

  “Am not,” Susanne said in a sad whisper, but no one heard her. The boy continued to slash the air, exaggerating sounds with drops of spittle.

  Brittany blew a whistle and started clapping her hands. Most of the children ran to form around her, including Susanne, but a few remained in their places. Brittany raised her voice, and they rushed to join her. Nothing was scarier than a raised voice bringing you to shame. Susanne knew that, and so did every else in the entire elementary school. The children formed a circle with giggles. A boy, who picked his nose, sat next to Susanne. He turned toward her. His finger twisted and wiggled, popping bubbles of snot. His upper lip was stained with breakfast: dry snot. On his jumper, a piece of paper had been clipped to the right side of his chest. THOMAS, the paper read. A horse had been drawn beneath the name. The horse was purple.

  “Are you blind?” Thomas asked. Susanne started to answer, but her words were silenced as he blew his nose. A finger still moved inside of a nostril.

  She tried again. “No,” she said. “I just have trouble seeing.”

  “Okay,” Thomas replied. His voice gurgled. “So, you’re blind?”

  The teacher started talking again, explaining today’s activities. Susanne tried her best to listen, but she lost Brittany’s words. All she could think about was her brother, Axel, who sat in the classroom two floors above her. Axel always cheered her up with jokes. Susanne had the funniest brother in the whole, wide world. As soon as the bell rang, she would find him during recess. And her brother would cheer her up, as he always did.

  10

  Axel became lost in the photograph of his family. He turned on a nightlight to appreciate the detail of their faces. Here was Duncan in a woolen sweater, looking to the side and trying to act too cool for the picture. Duncan, the oldest sibling of the Gardner family, had already started middle school when Susanne began her first year of elementary school. Axel, however, always attended the same school as Susanne up until college. This allowed for them to grow close during their younger years.

  Dee stood in the middle of the photograph, with her arms stretched out over all of them. The thing that caught your attention the most when you first looked at the photograph was the bliss radiating from her smile.

  On the opposite side of Duncan, stood the shortest and youngest of the Gardner family, Susanne, who smiled shy. She stood on the tip of her toes. Axel remembered how she had tinkered with her big glasses seconds before the picture. He recalled all those times during recess when his sister had sprinted toward him, one finger pressed against those glasses she wore to keep them from bouncing.

  One of the many hobbies that Axel and his friends at elementary school took part of involved eating berries from the bushes, which surrounded the outer walls of the school. They pretended that these were magical berries, and Axel said many times that they had given him the power to be funny.

  Susanne always checked the berry bushes when the doors of temporary freedom swung open. On her first day of elementary school, she had trouble finding Axel. She had been ready to go behind a building and cry when she finally spotted him. Once she did, she knew that she would only cry from laughter.

  She hollered his name in her sprint. Axel and his friends turned their heads simultaneously. When she reached him, she panted, but that did not keep her from laughing. Her brother had told her so many funny jokes and stories that the mere sight of him turned funny, in a good way.

  “Hey, you,” Axel said. “Would you like a berry? They’re magical.” Susanne nodded. He threw a berry at her mouth, missed, and all of them burst into friendly laughter. He tried again. This time, she caught it, and they all cheered. “Way to go, sis!” Axel cheered. “How’s your first day at school?”

  “People are mean to me. Can you tell me a joke, Axel? Please?”

  “Who’s mean to you?” One of Axel’s friends said and molded his fingers into a gun. “Just say the word, Axel, and I’ll blow him to pieces. Like this.” The boy aimed with his left eye, raised the imaginary gun and gave off sounds of explosions as he pretended to shoot.

  Axel ignored this. He kneeled down in front of his sister. “Why is the sun yellow and warm?”

  Susanne seemed to be thinking about this. “Um, I don’t know. Is it cornbread?”

  Axel pulled her closer and looked deep into her eyes with a serious face. “Pee-pee,” he said in a mysterious, dark voice.

  Susanne laughed until her stomach started to ache. She begged her brother to not make any funny faces because she felt positive that she would turn into a sun and pee herself. When she calmed down, she stuffed her face with magical berries. Her face still showed signs of a laughing episode.

  “Tell me one more! Pretty please, Axel?”

  He was going to do just that when the bell rang. Entire flocks of kids shouted and turned to run back inside. “Let’s go, Axel!” One of his friends exclaimed. “We can’t be late. They’ll hang us from our feet.”

  Once again, Axel ignored this and let his friends run inside. “I’ll draw something real funny for you. I’ll show it to you in the car on our way back home with Ma.” He picked a few more berries. “Eat these on your way back. As I said, they really are magical and with them, you’ll make friends in no time.” Axel dropped the magical berries into his sister’s hand.

  “Thanks, Axel.”

  She hu
gged him before she started toward the building, throwing the magical berries back into her mouth. Everything will be okay now, she thought. On tomorrow’s recess, she would run to her brother again, and not only because he’s funny and made her laugh; she enjoyed his company.

  Susanne loved her brother.

  Later that day, Susanne made some friends. She knew that this had not been the work of the magical berries, but of her silly brother who had given her confidence. Maybe Axel is the magical one, after all.

  As time went on, Susanne grew to be in awe of her brother. She didn’t know how to say it back then, but she looked up to him because of his carefree nature. Axel never seemed to have any problems; any at all.

  One night some years later, Susanne sat in her bed when a thought spawned. This thought had felt real, too. Axel is going to be happy forever, she thought.

  Axel is going to be happy forever.

  11

  An inner wonderful winter land grew in size as Axel swallowed ice cream without letting it melt in the heat of his mouth. He suspected that it would perhaps combat the warmth of anxiety, and it did, to an extent. He also found out that it was an excellent way of experiencing brain-freeze. He sat on his couch, listening to the screech of the wind and the sound of rattling branches. His vision studied the TV, which wasn’t even turned on, and Axel took notice of his reflection. He saw his reflection in the dark filter of the TV screen. Dust surrounded the edges, making the TV seem more of an ancient relic than a modern masterpiece. Axel waved to his reflection and watched it wave back. He chuckled. Darkness submerged his reflection. The dust made it hard to see his features in detail. The person he looked at seemed unknown to him. A weird thought came to life then.

  The image on the TV was the physical form of his depression. He had waved at it. And it had waved back. As he scrapped the remains of the ice cream with his spoon, the sound of metal striking against glass snapped him back into logic. He shook his head in disarray.