Hello to All That
Author: John Falk

Copyright © 2005 by John Falk


The next morning it was clear nothing had changed. Almost immediately, I locked in on the ugliness of the dry scales on Underdog's claws. The plastic sea grass in the aquarium seemed cheap and dirty. The rusty hinges on my desk spoke of decay and aging and the futility of trying to fight it. My mind was behaving just as it had for the past week, maybe more so because of the letdown. Everything I looked at still had that sense of otherness to it. Nothing was right. Then came the questions.

Why bother getting up?

What's the point?

What's the fucking point of any of this?

I was more lonely, uncertain, and isolated than ever, but if I stumbled now it would be a sign to the rest of the world that I had a real problem. I literally fought myself for twenty minutes before I got that first foot on the carpet. It was crazy but it was as if my brain needed a definitive answer to Why get up? in order to give my leg the order to move. Only by reminding myself that this was it, that I had to make it work now or else I was going to lose control, was I able to get started.

Gritting my teeth, I got dressed. I was like a boxer just before the bell: all nerves, knees clapping. My job was to simply appear normal, which meant putting one foot in front of the other with a smile on my face. I even clapped my hands before leaving my room to pump myself up. When my parents saw me walk into the kitchen they were stunned. I was up and ready, and Mr. Cooley wasn't even done with the morning papers.

"How ya feelin'?" my dad asked.

"Great," I shot back. "Really, I feel great."

I amazed myself with my acting ability, but my mom was another matter.

"Feel great?" she asked.

"Yeah," I said. "I don't know what it was. Maybe it was school or something, but I feel as good as new. Really."

"Well, if you feel bad at school today, I mean even a little bit, just call and I'll come get you."

I had no intention of calling her, but I told her I would if I needed to. I left the house early because I wanted to get to school before anyone else. My heart was racing, and I knew I needed time to get comfortable before I had to see anyone.

It took me about twice as long to walk to school as usual, primarily because each step was accompanied by a burning dread that I was making the worst mistake of my life. It takes a lot of emotional energy to keep putting one foot in front of the other when you think you're about to walk off a cliff.

By the time I arrived I had only about ten minutes alone to wander the halls. The light green tiled walls, the metal lockers, the huge brown windows with the brass locks, and the sparklingly smooth maroon-and-gray-tiled floors, stuff that I always passed by without a second thought, now sucked the life out of the air. It was so antiseptic and cold. Could these be the same hallways where I flirted with girls, bet on football games, and joked around between classes? Suddenly, I broke into a smile. In a way it was a brief concession to the power of this thing I was fighting. The gulf between how I saw this stuff the last time I was here and how I saw it now was so huge, so alien, that it brought home how fucking weird it all was. I couldn't help but laugh a little. Then the kids came.

Matt Bodden was always a few years ahead as far as I was concerned, although some thought him a decade behind. He grooved at Dead shows, smoked grass, and bar-hopped with high-school kids. He was also a good athlete and student, but still his retro hippy thing rubbed some people the wrong way. I liked his energy and was always proud that he was my buddy, so when I heard him come in that morning I went right for him. Here, I thought, was a safe harbor in which to shake down.

As Matt opened his mouth I knew I was in deep shit. Usually I joked with Matt easily, running on autopilot, trying to get under his skin or listening to him rant against some perceived slight. But that morning, as he rambled on about whatever, I felt like I was watching a movie of the two of us bullshitting; the real me was up in the balcony, alone, studying, critiquing my performance. I was hyperconscious of every word, every movement I made, like I was now a mere witness to my own miserable performance here in the world of the living. What had been involuntary and natural the week before was now an act of will, like getting out of bed, and every word and gesture required a tortuous vetting before it was allowed to proceed out of my brain.

OK, John, I would think. He's about to finish his sentence. jump in with something funny.

Maybe I should have seen it coming, but I just wasn't ready to find that even joking around with my friends had become a form of torture. I was close to losing it. I patted Matt on the shoulder mid-sentence and told him I had to run. And that's just what I did, heading straight for the boy's locker room in the basement. I paced the floor down there, taking deep deliberate breaths, until the homeroom bell rang. I was just trying to get from one second to the next. I had to, but it wasn't easy.

The day only got worse. With all the people I talked to--friends, teachers, coaches--I had to think about every word that came out of my mouth. Ease and spontaneity were things of the past. Nothing happened without deliberate effort. And it was humiliating to watch myself blunder through each exchange. I was so consumed with myself and how I appeared that I rarely had any idea what the person before me was saying.

Actors sometimes speak of forgetting lines onstage and breaking the bond between themselves and the audience. I learned that to pull my performance off, to convince everyone that nothing had changed, I not only had to remember the lines but I also had to stay two steps ahead of the conversation, writing the script even with my best friends. It was grueling, exhausting work, so much so that by the time I made it home that afternoon I went right to sleep. And not just because it had become my drug of choice. I was genuinely that tired. I didn't wake up until the next morning, when I felt the cold air come down the hallway and forced myself out of bed, only to do it all again with that fucking smile on my face.

The amazing thing was I pulled it off. No one figured out what was going on. To everyone at school, I was the same guy I was before. No one picked up on the fact I was now acting the part of me. But by Thursday of that first week back, I had had it. I couldn't handle one more exchange where I was simultaneously trying to keep a conversation going and look like I cared. I had to stay home and refuel in the isolation of my room. I faked a stomachache, going so far as to pretend I was barfing in the bathroom.

My mother didn't buy any of it. This was the crack in the façade she had been waiting for, and she got right to the point when she found me still in bed, holding my stomach like I had been gut shot.

"Listen to me," she said. "I can help you."

"I don't need it," I said, realizing in an instant what we were really talking about.

"I think I know how you must feel," she continued.

"Trust me, Ma. It's not that easy. I just need a little time."

"Why won't you let me help you?"

"Because I don't fucking need help," I yelled. Then I pleaded. "Please, just leave me alone. Why can't you do that? It will be all right, I swear."

I never used curse words around my mother, but she didn't even seem to have noticed.

"Tell me if you can't understand what I'm about to say. Do you feel like before you were in some kind of parade, and now you're there on the sidelines watching it go by?"

I didn't say anything, but I knew exactly what the hell she was talking about, the sense of watching my life go by from the side- lines, of being an outsider, unable to join in.

"John, I'm asking you to listen to me," she said, her voice now cracking. "John, if you won't let me help you there is nothing I can do."

"I don't need help, Ma. Please, I just need to be alone for a little while."

"There are doctors who can help, you know," she told me. "It's no big deal. A lot of people go. It's just like getting your knee checked or getting your teeth cleaned."

There was no way.

"John, dear. Please, you have to really talk to me. I won't leave until you do."

"I feel fine. Just tired."

"That's no reason not to go to school. I know it's something more. Please, talk to me."

She wasn't going to leave until I did. I had to make a good show of it to get her off my back.

"Ma, I'm OK," I insisted. "I would tell you if I wasn't.

Avoiding eye contact until then, I really took her in now for the first time: her mouth was turned down, her hands clasped in her
lap. She looked smaller, hurt.

"Trust me," I said, sitting up to put a good show on. "It's school. Homework. I just need a little break. Today's it, though, I
swear."
"I don't believe you," she said.
I put out a smile because I wanted her to feel better, but more than anything I wanted to be alone. It felt best when I was alone.

"I'll be fine, Ma," I told her. "Don't worry. I know what I'm doing. Please, you gotta trust me."

For More information, visit www.henryholt.com









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Among psychologists today, John Falk is known as patient X, and the story of his recovery from chronic depression is used to inspire hope in other patients. He is also a law school graduate and freelance journalist who survived the rough-and-tumble of reporting from the front in Sarajevo. An article he wrote for Details magazine, entitled "Shot Through the Heart," became an HBO movie and won a Peabody Award for Best Cable Movie of the Year.

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