Bubbly is my alias

Author’s note: use of explicit language; 

Trigger warning: depression, anxiety, addiction and suicidal tendencies/ thoughts 

I see my reflection in the mirror, but I don’t see me. 

Jeez, I think to myself, I look like I died and came back to life. To be quite honest, that’s how I felt too. My body ached; I hadn’t left my bed all weekend, even to relieve myself properly. My mom, kind as she is, changed my sheets for me, asking carefully if I would roll over so she could grab the side I lay on. 

This morning she came into my room asking if she should call and report an absence to the high school. I groaned but had decided I would make some effort to get to class today. She smiled at that and closed my door, leaving me to privacy in the darkness of my room. 

I’m depressed. I know it. My mom knows it too. I need help soon, but we’ve been on a waitlist for so long that everything seems so fucking hopeless at this point. 

Anyway, I was looking in the mirror, horrified by my appearance and questioning my decision to go to school. I paced back and forth across the cold tile floor, fidgeting with my stress ball and squeezing it to calm my nerves. 

Finally, I picked up my toothbrush and scrubbed the stains off my teeth. I tried for a smile in the mirror, but it hurt to force myself. Save that for later, I thought. See, here’s the thing, I’m not myself at school. I put on a show. I act like this happy-go-lucky girl, who’s energy literally radiates the colour yellow so that people won’t judge me for being a depressed loser. I mean, I know I’m not actually a loser, but the thought of my friends thinking that I am one scares me. I could lose everything if they found out. 

I’m so good at faking it that people have started calling me Bubbly. You know, like that Colbie Caillat song. You make me smile, please stay for a while now. Yeah, that song. I deserve an Oscar for the performance I’ve been putting on, damn. 

I paint my face to hide the fact that I look dead. Conceal my pimples, Add some blush for colour, mascara to make my eyes pop. I don’t cover up my eye bags, though, because lucky for me, it's actually in fashion to show them. Who’d have thought that would ever happen? Some girls even mix red and blue eyeshadow to make their eye bags look darker. It’s crazy. Next, I throw on my only clean pair of leggings and a hoodie, and I’m ready to go. 

Downstairs, my mom is waiting for me with a brown paper bag. 

“Here honey, I made you a pb and j sandwich, make sure you eat it today okay.” 

“Thanks momma, of course I will.” I toss it into my school bag, knowing it’ll be in the trash can later. 

“I love you, honey,” she says with a kiss on my head.

“Love you too mom, thanks.” And with that, I’m off to school. 

When I get there, I head straight for the water fountain. I pop an Advil and swallow, instantly feeling better. Now, I know what you might be thinking. I have some chronic pain or something. But to tell you the truth, I don’t. The Advil just calms me down, and I know that's not how it works - that I’m feeling a placebo effect - but it helps, so I take them when I get angsty. 

It's a few minutes until first period, law with Mrs. Henry, so I head to my friend's locker. 

“Robbie, hey!” you could notice her fiery red hair from a mile away. Today it was in two dutch braids. 

“What’s up, Jay? Hey, where you been all weekend, you never texted me?” 

“Hey, yeah, I know we were supposed to hang, but my cousins are moving to Port Dover and I was helping them to move stuff in. I didn’t think it was going to take all weekend, sorry.” 

“Don’t even worry about it, how about we catch a movie this weekend?”

“For sure!” I’d successfully lied to her. “You wanna hit my vape before class starts?” I asked, wanting to change the subject.  

She nodded with a smile on her face and I led the way to the girls' washroom. Our school has a strict no electronic vaping rule, so we hide in the last stall and make sure not to blow the vapour out. 

I grabbed my Novo and handed it to her first. I felt bad because her parents found hers and took it away, so she couldn’t enjoy a headrush whenever she needed one. 

“Ahhhh, I’ve got a heady already,” she squealed, handing it back to me.

I took a puff and enjoyed the peppermint flavour as it washed down my throat. I took another and swished it around in my mouth then swallowed the vapour to get a better heady. We were in the middle of practicing some vape tricks when the bell for the start of first period went off. 

“See you at lunch, Bubbly,” Robbie said as she playfully punched my shoulder.  

When I got to Mrs. Henry’s class, I sat in my usual seat and pulled out my tattered notebook. She started a lesson on how deviance affects societal norms or something like that. I don’t know, I zoned out, thinking about how bad I felt for having to lie to Robbie. I knew the same would most likely happen this weekend too. I doubted I would be able to get out of bed, even to go to the movies, which I usually loved.   

“Jay! Jay are you listening?” Mrs. Henry’s voice snapped me away from my daydream.

“Uh… sorry what?” 

“So you weren’t paying attention, hmm?” She said with arms crossed.

“No, I’m sorry I wasn’t, it won’t happen again,” I said shamefully. A few of the popular girls started giggling and whispering behind my back. I felt like such an idiot. I could feel my heartbeat starting to race and my face going red as a tomato. I put my head on the desk and turned it sideways so that only Mrs. Henry would be able to see my blushing face. I reached down into my school bag for my stress ball, but it wasn’t there. Shit, I left it at home. I tap my toes on the floor as a distraction instead. That doesn’t work, so I bite the insides of my cheeks, then my fingernails. 

I lift my head up off the desk and look around, wondering if anyone was watching me. Rachel, the popular blond, jock-obsessed girl sitting directly behind me, gives a threatening smirk. She must’ve seen the unease plastered to my face because then she gives me a sad look of sympathy like awe baby, what’s wrong? Fuck her. I turn around and slump back down on my desk.

Now I can feel my body sweating, but I’m cold and starting to shake. Ugh, this can’t be happening. I can feel a panic attack rising up inside me. No, no, no, no, no. This has never happened at school before. Why today? 

Tears start welling up in my eyes. I get up and run right out of class without a moment's hesitation. 

I make my way to the girls' bathroom and hope it's empty now that class has started. It is. I sit in the back corner and put my head between my knees as I reach for the pocket with my Advil. I pop one, and then another. The bottle is full. Would it really be that bad if I took all of them right now, I think. Maybe, if I overdosed, I'd get taken to the hospital, and they’d finally help me. I need some goddamn help.  

I’ve been thinking of death for a while, but I can't follow through with it because I’m scared of pain. But… this might not be painful. Maybe it would knock me out. That would be easiest. I was already starting to feel lightheaded and dizzy, so how much worse could it really be? 

I lifted the bottle up close to my face and stared at the contents inside, contemplating. 

That’s when Mrs. Henry found me. 

… 

What happened next is fuzzy in my mind. I remember crying so much that my eyes stung because mascara was pooling in them. I remember talking to a nice lady in the guidance office. I remember sitting in a fancy car or truck of some sort with friendly people helping me. I remember a white bed and white walls. And then things went black. 

… 

“Jay, how are you feeling?” In a chair across the room sat a tall man with salt and pepper hair. He had a clipboard and was already taking notes before I even answered. 

“I… Um… I feel okay. Where am I?”

“It seems as though you’ve had a panic attack at school yesterday. They called an ambulance that brought you here to North Valley Hospital. You’ve been asleep all night. Your mom is waiting outside, would you like to see her?”

I nodded, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, “yes please.”

My mom came into the room, crying, of course, and squeezed the breath out of me in a hug. 

After she finished suffocating me with love, the doctor said, “Mrs. Bernier, I’m going to refer Jay to a therapist who specializes in cognitive behavioural therapy for youth. She’s the best I know and I can tell her and Jay will get along great. Stacy, will call you sometime next week to set up an appointment.”

Relief washed over me. Finally, I would get the help I needed. 

We left the hospital, and my mom treated me to a Starbucks: a grande white mocha with extra caramel, drizzle for being so brave. I didn’t consider having a mental breakdown and wanting to die, being brave, but I didn’t complain. 

I was already feeling better the next few days. I started brushing my hair again, instead of leaving it in a matted bun all the time and took out my painting supplies, which I hadn’t done in months. 

Stacy called us three days later, and my mom set up an appointment for next Monday. I was nervous but also excited to see how she would help. 

Our first few sessions went great. I felt really comfortable opening up to her about everything. I told her about the thoughts I’d been having, and she gave me some alternatives to replace the negative ones. I told her that I was acting like someone else at school, and she told me that was perfectly normal. She also told me that many kids go through similar experiences like mine, but it's just not talked about enough. 

She ended up convincing me to tell Robbie the truth. I did, and she took it so well! She didn’t ditch me like I thought she would. 

Today, I was seeing Stacy, and we were going to work on finding a way to express my emotions.   

“Jay, I think I have the perfect thing for you. I know you’re super creative and I’m hoping this will help to spark some of that genius inside you.” She reached behind her chair, grabbing a worn ukulele and handed it to me. 

“Here,” she said gently, “this belongs to you now. I’m hoping in our next few sessions I can teach you a few simple songs and we’ll see how it goes from there.”

I took it tentatively, not sure what to say. 

“No need to thank me,” she’d read my mind “it's yours now, try it out.”

I sat the instrument on my lap, and it felt comfortable, almost as if it was a missing piece that had once belonged to my body. It was out of tune, I was sure, but I would learn how to fix that later. 

I spread my fingers and strummed my thumb along the strings slowly and was surprised at the beautiful noise it made. It sounded like the end of winter when buds start growing, and bird song fills the air. The musical note that came from the ukulele sounded like a spring awakening. I guess you could even say this was my awakening from a long slumber of depressive hibernation.