The Remnants of the Dark

Every day feels like sinking an inch deeper into the crevices of your bed. Every day feels like a fall into a bottomless abyss. Every day feels like you’re getting cloaked over from an old friend you thought and wished had already left you for good, but you realize now is here to remain a spectator to your daily life.

My old friend and I go way back from 2012-ish. I was a typical high school girl just watching the world drift by, slowly sinking into the mundane order of things, until I met my old friend. Since the day we met, he had always been with me wherever I went at any time of the day. We were tight; best friends, even! He had always been with me, but there was something about nightfall that seemed to have him all geared up. He kept me up at night going on about all the things that went on every day, from the large, down to the smallest insignificant details of the day.

My old friend was a smooth talker. He always knew what to say and when to say it. On days and nights when I’m troubled and alone, he’d always be there. He’d always talk me through my grief. He used to always talk about this place we could go to if I’m up for it; a place where everything is sound, still, and quiet; a place where I could be at peace, and where no one could ever bother us again; our own hideaway away from everything and everyone! Every time I felt like I couldn’t handle any more, I’d tell him so and he’d gladly start journeying with me to this magical hideaway only available to the two of us. But the journey always gets cut short and we always both end up going back home because my indecisiveness always gets the better of me. I don’t want to leave the people I love behind, even though my old friend was pretty much the only one I could confide in at the time. I still thought about what my family and few closest friends would feel if I went to this magical place with this one old friend. I wasn’t ready to go to this magical place yet, I kept telling my old friend. Every time we started the journey to this magical place, I’d be dragging us both back to where we started.

Sometime in 2013, my other friends found out about my old friend. I was beyond embarrassed at how I could be so dumb in keeping my old friend and I’s little secret. I didn’t want anyone else to find out, but they all did. I tried shrugging the humiliation off, but my old friend insisted that it was high time to go to the magical place he’s always been on about. He told me that then was the perfect time. So we journeyed again to this magical place that I heard only good things about. But I chickened out again at the last minute.

When I started college, I got preoccupied with all the changes happening in my life and all the new faces making an entrance. My old friend kept me company less and less often than he used to, until eventually, for almost two years, I hadn’t seen my old friend. I wasn’t sure where he had gone during those two years, but I never went looking for him. I lived my life in those two years as if I had never even met my old friend, like he never kept me company during the nights I felt alone, like he never offered to usher me to a magical place of peace and relief.

Came my summer internship, I had accidentally come across one of the people I tried erasing from my memory. From that split second, my old friend came to my aid again. My insomnia-ridden nights and abundant melancholy were once again shared with my old friend. The only difference I could note was that this time, he no longer spoke of the magical place he used to go on and on about. He remained silent most of the time, just hovering above me, keeping me company.

I couldn’t yet explain why, but I didn’t want my old friend back. I wanted him gone again, possibly for good. I now looked at him more like a stalker than an old friend. I went to a person who I thought could help with getting my old friend off my back. Surprisingly, he said my old friend had already been gone for long up to now and that the old friend who “came back” was just conjured up by my feeble mind. My old friend wasn’t real. I could go on with my life again as I had been living it for the past two years.

But as much as I keep reinforcing that my old friend was already buried in my past, I still felt him lurking over my shoulders everywhere I went. This time, he was persistent in remaining my old friend even though I no longer wanted to be associated with him. He didn’t leave. He tenaciously kept hold of me that he even went under the guise of another friend. For a few months, I believed the spectacle he pulled off. He changed his guise as one friend to another, and I just kept buying it.

I’m supposed to be graduating this year, until I came across a failing grade in one of my major subjects. All hell breaks loose. I sank into the recesses of my mind, until I heard a whisper from a familiar voice.

It was my old friend. I had uncovered his real identity because of the familiar invitation to the magical place we’ve always talked about five years ago. No more guises as two different friends. It was him, just plain him out in the open, inviting me to the magical place once again. For years I haven’t heard this invitation, and now I was up against this offer again. I didn’t know how to respond. I tried to politely decline, but my old friend insisted.

I remained hesitant, but before I could even think, my old friend handed me the 4″ pair of scissors on my study desk and I started violently, mindlessly slashing on my left forearm. Before I could really start traversing the path towards that magical place, I got a good grip of myself and dropped the scissors. I just sobbed and screamed helplessly into one of my pillows, but I still felt my old friend’s shadow above me. He wasn’t pleased that I stopped my trek with him to the magical place.

To my old friend, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t think I’m quite ready to go to the magical place just yet. I don’t want to leave my family and few close friends behind just yet to go with you. Coercing me to join you to go to the magical place sort of disqualifies you from being a friend, but I guess I have no choice but to keep you as my friend. I realized that there is no escaping you even if I don’t want you lurking around me anymore, so I might as well just make you my friend and coexist with you throughout my slow voyage towards the magical place you’ve always wanted us to go to.

Despite the fact that you always have been rejoicing in the darkness and shadows, I think now’s the right time to shed some light on you. Depression, my old friend, I think now’s the right time to let the light heal, grow, and flourish what you can only command me in the dark. We have a long way to go, my old friend. You don’t have to hide anymore. The dark is no longer a place for you. In the shadows, only remnants of your memories lie.

Journeying to the magical place can wait. The place where I’m at right now is pretty magical in its own right anyway.