Paint Pastel Princess

Tylenol extra-strength. Non-aspirin pain reliever.

Indications: For the temporary relief of minor aches and pains associated with the common cold, headache, toothache, muscular aches, backache, for the minor pain of arthritis, for the pain of menstrual cramps and for the reduction of fever.

Directions: Adults and Children 12 years of age and older: Take two caplets every 4 to 6 hours. No more than a total of 8 caplets in any 24-hour period.

Watching the large, round face of the bedroom clock ticking down the seconds - 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46 and he’s had enough. Two hours is a long time. Two hours is enough.

The bottle is opened, tipped to produce two small white ellipses in a small white hand. Only they’re a little too small, a little too inactive. The bottle is tipped again, capped. Three tablets.

He reaches for the tall glass of water at his bedside, cold and wet to the touch. He tastes it. Clean. The pills disappear - one, two, three.

The effect is almost immediate in a therapeutic sense, disregarding any physical side effects. Medicine makes things better. Medicine makes pain go away.

Tick. tick. tick. So says the clock.

Twenty minutes later he is grinding his teeth in a disappointment he knew would come. He glares at the bottle of Tylenol. Piece of shit drug. Supposed to do something... anything...

Yet simply the knowledge of having those pills in his system has indisputable control over him. Doing what he can... all he can... for now. He always wants what he cannot have, it seems to him. What he cannot. Why not. He wishes and nothing happens. He wishes he didn’t have to feel this way.

He thinks of the pain reliever again. The drug is laughing at him as it courses through his system.

He closes his eyes.


...begin this medication’s initial trial.
How long before the switch? Do you know?
It depends on the effects. We’ll see how it goes.


small white saviour

Tick. tick. tick.

The telly is on in the next room. Dysfunctional families are explaining exactly why they hate each other to a talk show audience. “She’s lying!” “Am not!” “Yes you are!” “Stupid bitch!”

His cold hands close over his ears, giving him a chill. They falter in blocking out the hum-drumming of the talk show family. Failure. He lifts his tired form off the edge of the bed and moves it towards the open door. He shuts it. The family fades to black. Victory.

As he passes the full-length mirror on the way back, he turns and stares longingly at his own reflection as if it could save him. He wishes he could recall the time when the demented creature in the mirror ceased to be a monster and became a human being. Could that have been... days ago? He doesn’t know how many. He tries to remember what that person looked like, but every time an image forms in his mind, it dissolves with equal conviction.

Tick. tick. tick.

Fingers reach out, touch the reflective glass, and slide down slowly, delicately, as if the mirror is the tender cheek of a lover.


Make sure he takes no more than the prescribed dose. Overdosing doesn’t advance anything; it has to build up in his system first.


sweet magical candy

Fingers curl and scrape the glass as they come down, creating a dull, unidentifiable pain in his fingernails. Sccrrriittcchhh -

The mirror is unscathed. The person takes steps back to the bed. The Tylenol bottle gleams white and yellow on the dresser.

Tick. tick.


Some patients may experience a slump -


some patients
MAY experience
SLUMP

paint pastel princess

He grabs the Tylenol and twists the cap. Fucking medications, fucking drugs that DON’T WORK, he’s sick of playing games and losing every time. Taking a caplet and placing it on his tongue, the exquisite bitterness surrounds him as he imagines the even sweeter feeling, and instead of one two three it will be one two three four five six seven eight nine ten and around again, and the ache and the pain that are never altered by any motherfucking pain reliever will fade as surely as the faint talk show voices in the next room, as deliciously as the incessant nailing of the clock EXACTLY on each agonizing second TICK

TICK

TICK

Shhh...

Shhh...


But the bottle is not tipped, and the bitter white pills linger for just a moment more before being truly tasted for the first time and retched into the wastebasket.

Somewhere, there is a voice.

A voice he has not heard for some time.

It speaks to him calmly, plainly, in a soothing yet barely audible whisper.

No, it says.

The white and yellow bottle in his hand fades before the commanding tone. His feelings waiver. His thoughts are muddled. His plans falter, catch, and change.

No, not today, not yet.


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