Who are you? I'm you.
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- 15 minutes ago
- 8 min read
Quinn Friend writes Who are you? I'm you. An introspective journey.
It makes me feel crazy sometimes to think about how ordinary and yet how completely world altering that moment was. I accidentally caught my own reflection and now here I am…
It’s been a year since I moved in, sixteen months since moving to Melbourne. My journey has been completely jarring and heartbreaking… and yet so totally mundane and invisible. Nothing changed and yet everything did. There wasn’t anything special that happened, rather the basic things became special.
It no longer feels like home is thousands of kilometres away and I’m in stasis waiting to go back but rather that I have two homes. I can exist in both, and they aren’t separate lives but rather two aspects of a whole. I started this journey in one of the darkest places of my life and now I feel the brightest I’ve ever felt. I see things so much more clearly than before and things aren’t perfect by any means, but they don’t need to be.
What do I mean? Let me start from the beginning…
“…Still don’t understand why you can’t just go to university here?” This was the fourth time the girl had explained it to her mother and she didn’t understand why her mother couldn’t support her.
“Because mum, Melbourne has the best uni for the degree I want! Plus, with him being there I’ll have a place to stay while I get on my feet! It’s not gonna be a repeat of us going homeless again, I’ll actually have a place to stay I promise. Also, you already know I can take care of myself since I tend to look after this place!” Shit. The girl hadn’t meant to say that last part. Now the girl would get another lecture about how they don’t force her to do all the cooking and cleaning. Just ignore the fact that the girl’s hands were literally pruned from having just done the dishes, she supposed. It wasn’t the mother’s fault. She had to bear in mind her mother was busy looking after dad since… obviously… he was literally disabled.
“-Well? Have you considered that?!” Oh no, the girl’s mother was saying something… what was it? Ugh it was about the girl’s grades again. One would think going homeless would impact a girl’s grades and it would be understandable… not lead to lectures about ‘ending up a flop just as her brothers had.’ Oh, but the girl’s mother had never said that… sure. Whatever. When the girl moved; things were gonna be great!
She had no idea how wrong she was of course, fuelled by hopes and dreams.
She moved to Melbourne and believe you me, She had not thought that one through. It was a half-baked plan at best, complete and utter whim at worst and everything fell apart. No friends, no family, new job, new degree, new location. Oh, and then her only support system that she did find here ditched her, gave up. Yeah nah, that was great, loved to see it.
“I love you, but I just can’t do this anymore.” What? That wasn’t part of the plan. That wasn’t meant to happen. The girl knew they’d been struggling, and that she hadn’t been perfect but was he seriously fucking giving up?? For fucks sake had he even fucking thought about the girl’s situation or was it all about him not being fucked dealing with her again. He was the one not communicating after he claimed he would and now he wasn’t even giving the girl the chance to fix it?? That was it. She had nothing now. Oh god what was that awful noise, why was the girl’s throat sore… oh was it her? She was going to be sick, fuck, where was the bathroom. Gods, please stop screaming it was a horrid sound please please just breathe again, fuck everything hurt. Was this how the girl was going to go; screaming, crying, and throwing up so much she suffocated? Fuck, the girl was moving in three days to a house with strangers, no money coming in because Centrelink sucked, and $@#&%’s cancer had just come back… and the last thing the girl had left… he just fucking… gods fucking damn everything.
I don’t really remember the day she moved in, or I guess a better description would be moved out. I don’t think she really saw it as moving in at the time, more like the last steps of being abandoned and moving out.
A box… plus that bag- “That the last of your stuff?”
Oh right, the girl was supposed to reply…
The parking lot was full, seemed right for the day. The cold felt right too. If it even was cold, the girl couldn’t tell anymore if it was herself or the weather.
“…Was thinking we would get you a…” The girl wished @%&$@%$ would shut the fuck up. If @%&$@%$ was going to ditch the girl like her son had, would she just fucking do it, stop dragging it out…
“G’day! Welcome to your new room, it’s a bit cold today. Let me know if you need any help settling in.” Wow. The girl thought she seemed nice, maybe staying there wouldn’t be too bad. $@#$&% wasn’t it?
“Heya, thanks for letting me stay here.”
She put all her stuff in the room but the first thing I really remember is the books. See the room had these shelves built in, and books was one of the only things we had in common. So, we made a plan together to get a thousand and fill all the shelves.
She was a mess quite frankly. Always behind on her washing, always leaving dishes piled up. Rubbish everywhere, books strewn about. Except when we would tidy the books, put them back on the shelf by genre. She had given up on her classes that semester and I remember the only time She wanted to leave our bed was when she took us to look at books.
Nothing was happening. Nothing at all. Every day. The girl woke up, went to class or work, went back to the house. If she was lucky, she would remember to eat but otherwise just went back to bed. The books helped, but they didn’t get the room clean, or the washing done, or complete the girl’s assignments. Every day was the same monotonous shit. Why was the girl there? Why was she even trying? Fuck. Maybe if she just tidied the books, just placed a couple on the shelf. What genre was that one? Fantasy? Shelf four. Next? Oh that looked interesting, maybe just a couple of pages…
I think it was about two months later that she seemed to feel real excitement for the first time. We had a trip home planned, see everyone in Adelaide. Just for a week but it was a week where things wouldn’t feel so repetitive. It was the first time in a long time I think she let me come to life, take the lead. It was the best week in a long time.
It had been four hours on the bus… how were the children still screaming…
…Thirteen hours… was that? They really came to meet her! The girl knew $@#&% was going to pick her up, but she didn’t think her dad would be able to make it given his hip. What was on her face? Was it raining? No… the girl was crying…
Home… wait… where was her room? Why did it feel like the girl had been cropped out of a picture or something… they were all right there talking to her, yet it didn’t feel the same. Couldn’t they see the girl?! What happened to her place in their lives? Was this how the girl’s friends would be as well?
Wow, the gang had actually put effort into making sure they could all meet up. They had never done that when the girl lived there, maybe they did miss her. Ayyy they still had the same inside jokes! It felt like almost no time had passed, their dynamic still felt the same. The girl had missed this, missed the gang…
What a great week! The girl didn’t think she was ready to leave, it was gonna be so long before she could see everyone again..
It’s hazy but after that week was when I really woke up. Still with the bleary consciousness of someone who had yet to find their bearings, but She let me come out a little more. The cage I was locked in, more like a room to seek shelter.
My house began to feel like a home, my housemates more like a cohesive group. Conversations smooth and frequent.
They were almost there! The girl could finally show her friends where she had been the whole time! Hard to believe it was already her birthday!! The girl wondered if they would like it there…
The thing you have to understand here is that until that point, she hadn’t let me take charge of regular life. When I say she let me lead my nineteenth I mean She actually took a backstep and let me be me. She wasn’t just co-existing with me, She went away for a little while. My friends flew down, we had a fantastic week together as I showed them around the place and we partied just a little too hard but hey, what are birthdays for?
Stretches? Done. Breakfast? Eaten. Washing? Up to date! Wow… the girl’s head felt so clear. It felt like the girl could breathe. Could she not before? Wait why did she feel so… awake? The girl swore her eyes were open before… every day… for weeks…. But now it was like she could see colours that just weren’t there before…
Mornings felt smoother, the days brighter. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but I could feel something had shifted. Honestly it was a little scary. I wasn’t sure if this was just another moment of calm before yet another storm, and I didn’t know if I could survive another. The last one had nearly been the end of me. I wasn’t sure what to make of it. One morning though… It was a Thursday I remember, and I was sitting on uni campus writing ideas for a story. I looked down at my blackened phone screen and… it clicked. Everything. Clicked.
Who was that? The girl recognised her. It had been so long since the girl had last seen her and yet they’d never met. So long since she had been her. Hello me. Hi.
Sixteen months since I moved to Melbourne and what a wild ride it’s been. My family is back home, I visited for a month the next time I went and yeah, the dynamic was different but that didn’t make it bad. It wasn’t that they were cutting me out of anything, but rather they were adapting to me leaving in their own way. My friends are still my friends, but I also have friends here now, I’m not alone. Oh, and that library She and I agreed on? It’s 346 books so far and still going strong.
So, believe me when I tell you: this darkness you’re walking in? Ends. The light you get told about but can’t see? It’s there alright. You’re in there. One day you’re going to look in the mirror… remember to say hello.
