sweetsalome | [Drabble] The Mean Reds

The mean reds are something that everyone gets. It’s that feeling in the pit of your stomach that suggests that something is wrong but you don’t know what. It’s panic without any cause, which leads to more anxiety trying to figure out what’s wrong. What’s the cause of insanity.

Salome didn’t wake up with the mean reds; they hit her shortly after breakfast, while washing dishes. Between Jonba’s bowl and grandma’s plate, she felt her heart starting to race. All of a sudden it was hard to think clearly, what came next after soaping a dish, rinse, wipe, wipe or then rinse? What should she do after setting the dish down, why couldn’t she focus on anything? The hardest thing in the world is to focus something that is completely out of control. Frustration sets in and that just adds to the stress that was caused from lack of focus. Fear follows shortly after because you start to think you might be losing your mind.

She managed to finish the dishes without incident, some sort of innate dish washing skill took over and guided her through the rest of the process, but not before she was almost reduced to tears. Laying down in bed did nothing for her, she could hear the house move, settle around her, every squeak every movement got into her head till they all blended together to form chaotic noise.

Feeling very much like a zombie she went back down stairs and out to the front porch. She stood there for a very long time, until she thought that she had lost at least an hour staring at nothing. This loss of time made her wonder what else she had lost, how else she had screwed up. Every little thought was driving her mad, and she wondered, idly if this was what her mother felt like before being shipped off to the institution. She couldn’t let that happen, because she was stronger then that, better then that, and if she could only just get away. As if the house and the people in it were the cause of her thoughts, not her own brain.

She leapt off the porch and ran for the road, when she hit the road she turned and headed toward town. Her side hurt and her lungs felt heavy, but that didn’t stop her, she didn’t stop until the house was out of sight and she was surrounded by fields filled with cows. The run seemed to calm her down, and with a good three miles to go, she had all the time in the world to figure out what she was doing. That’s what she should have thought, instead she wasted the time day dreaming, retreating to her fantasy world and the future that was so much better then the present.

By the time she reached Main Street the reds had gone away and she was left pondering how she was going to get back home. That and how gum had become a dollar thirty cents a pack.