January was a peeing month. She constantly went to the toilet, urinated and flushed it with water. Again and again. It was like an alarm clock so he had a break from work every time he heard the shutting of the toilet door, and when he heard the flushing, he came back to his computer. During weekdays she was studying, during the weekend she was peeing. He supposed she was also peeing during classes which made him laugh when he pictured her going in and out in the middle of a lecture.
One time she spent more time in the toilet that usually. No flushing. Only running tap water.
He shouted, asking if she was ok.
‘I’m bleeding.’
He felt fear.
‘Should I call an ambulance?’
‘Nose-bleeding!’
‘Still. Should I?’
After five minutes she came back from the bathroom. He saw through the keyhole two cotton tampons stuck in her nose.
‘You can suffocate,’ he suggested.
‘Oh, aren’t you so wise?’, she showed him a fuck-you finger, making sure that he saw it.
He was calmed.
There was one event, though. One single event that made him health-conscious. It was a few years before. He mixed something. Caffeine, sedatives, drugs for flu, painkillers. He had a heavy virus. He didn’t read the drug leaflets. He hadn’t developed a habit. He felt this numbing pain in his heart. He had an adrenaline rush. He thought he was about to explode. He was shaking from the panic attack and he felt that his body wasn’t obeying his commands. He felt helpless. He was afraid. His heart was pounding like crazy.
The ambulance came after a quarter of an hour. They took him for an overnight observation and released him, telling that it was probably a strong attack of neurosis.
This made him think. He stopped drinking caffeine drinks, he stopped taking prescription drugs. He resorted to herbs, trying not to get sick as much as he could. Since that day fear has always been with him. He stopped watching horror films, he stopped reading depressing books, he signed into websites for people with mental problems. He was locked in for barely two years then. He kept every fear causing stimuli at bay. But it circulated around every little event in his seclusion. If there was something worrying, the attacks were stronger and he felt helpless and vulnerable.
When he was 28 he started to be afraid of dying. Fear was with him constantly, even if it was calmed and little like this little hunger monster from Danone commercials.
‘Aren’t you afraid of miscarriage?’ he asked honestly, hearing her in the kitchen.
‘No.’
‘But if you’re bleeding from there, you should go to the doctor. You know, ectopic pregnancy and stuff.’
‘I go to the doctor. I had a nose-bleed. Man, calm down. I’m not dying.’
He was calmed down. He started, however, measuring her time in the toilet in case she spent there too much time or something wasn’t right. Just in case.
‘Can I ask you a question?’ she knocked at his door one morning.
‘Yes?’
‘What do you do with the money? I mean you work, right? And you don’t pay off the flat. And you don’t travel… then what do you spend it on?’
He didn’t say that he bought porn and food. He felt ashamed to share such details.
‘I buy stuff. Books, CDs, films, games, comics.’
‘Can I borrow some?’
He didn’t answer.
The next day a pile of the latest editions was waiting for her in the kitchen. She was reading his books, touching his things and listening to his music. He felt conflicted, allowing her to enter his world, because, in fact, it was his world, to which no one had access. Not one Facebook friend, no one in the digital world. She had this advantage of being materially with him. Tangibly. She was here.
He actually appreciated her for this. Even if she was to be here for a while. Even when she said that he had the worst music taste ever. He could say the same about her. There’s no accounting for tastes, they said.
