I'm not very good to myself.
I ration things for myself like coffee, warm baths, painkillers, alcohol, sleep, sweet dreams and breaks like a drill sergeant and then I wait until I'm hanging by a thread, til the nightmares catch up with me, til I'm not sleeping through the night more often than I am, until my nerves are riddled with holes, until I realize I walk around holding my breath and the headaches have reached critical mass and then I implode slowly, from the inside out, a distant scream sounding faintly in my ears that just grows louder and louder until I can't hear anyone anymore, can't do anything right and can't pull myself up over the edge of the hole I fell into because I'll suddenly weigh tons instead of ounces and it's too much for me to deal with by myself.
I wish sometimes that the screaming would just start on the outside and drive them crazy instead of me. They would hear it long before I do, before I even know what's happening.
That would be so nice.
But my brain doesn't work like that. Sometimes I think it doesn't work at all. Sometimes I think it was a practice brain with a wiring diagram posted beside it but no one checked to see that it was done right and hoo, boy, will they be surprised someday, when it's cracked open like a coconut and they will peer into its depths and nod somberly.
Yes, this explains everything.
I donated my body to science after I die but at this rate I'm going to give it to them early, just rip off my skull and hand it to them and say here, it's a present. Just tell me I was right. Tell me you'll never let a practice brain go off the assembly line without being inspected ever again, because it really wasn't fair to me or to the people I love.
But they're not real so they'll just stand there unfeeling, still nodding robotically like mass-produced bobble-heads. Like me. The test subject. The practice girl. The not-quite-ready-for-the-real-world girl after all.
With no off switch, no filters, hearing messed up completely and the weird uncanny ability to conjure up imaginary holes that she then falls into for real, breaking all her limbs and all of her resolve too.
Why would you fight over that?
