I was driving. I wasn’t myself. I wanted some distraction.
The road and the mountains were like the perfect set, but I imagined a circus.
Mechas, animals, airplanes, tanks, balloons, flying saucers, giraffes, cruise ships, giant people crushing trees with their feet. All were terrorizing me.
I forced my head to imagine something else, but it was lost and tired of this energy.
I imagined breathing the mountain air.
One. Two. Three. Four. Hold.
Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Breathe out.
Eleven. Twelve. Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen?
It was stressful.
I focused on driving, but the cars were menacing. Nothing worked.
I was not paying attention, but she kept talking.
I really wanted to reply. I was squeezing my chest to get something out.
I felt like a voodoo doll with the needles pushing through and perforating my mind.
I kept throwing a few words, but it became weird, so she gave up: “Let’s stop”, followed by a long silence.
We stopped at a station, finally.
It was cloudy, but I was not prepared for the cold. I closed the door and looked at her. “I’m going to the bathroom”. “OK”, I said.
I decided to open the door again and headed to the café. The wind was cutting my face, and I felt alive.
The air was fresh. The tarmac was wet. I avoided some puddles.
The café was busy. I could tell it from afar. The windows were foggy.
I decided to enter. It was too loud and too hot.
Pieces of dialog were invading me, and none made sense. They were entangled and smudged.
My brain stopped processing at a certain point, and the voices became only a drone.
It was… cozy. I was not sure if I was panicking or if I was enjoying the background sound.
I went directly to the espresso counter. Someone else was there.
They looked at me, and I felt ashamed. I was not brave enough to deal with my feelings.
I just looked straight.
“You want sugar?”
They couldn’t care less. They were looking at someone else they knew behind me. “Yes! One packet’s enough”.
I felt a heat. I was on the verge of being taken by an ambulance.
“How many?”
“What?!”
“One coffee?”
“Yes, yes!” Humiliating. Just how I like my coffee.