Chapter Two
Rowan
I've felt it my entire life. This unbearable sadness; this intangible longing.
From the moment I was delivered from my mother’s womb, I felt it, as if it wrapped itself around me like some impenetrable shield against the world that welcomed me—barricading me from my peers, from any semblance of normalcy I could have experienced.
I’ve lived buried so deeply inside of this never-ending pit of sorrow and yearning for so long that it feels like a second skin. And I fear if I were ever to shed it, I would find that there is nothing underneath—that I would find that I am no more than this pain.
All that to say, I am quite content to stay nestled in the safety of my misery. It feels familiar; it knows how to hold me.
As the axe smacks down, cracking through the center of the oak log I have propped up, I remind myself of this again.
It splits into two—even and clean. It’s a practiced motion, an easy task.
Fall is starting to settle around me, which means more firewood will need to be stacked onto the back porch.
The later in the evening it gets, the colder the air.
The closer to November it becomes, the worse it’ll get.
Aside from the cracking of wood and the thud of it hitting the dirt as I throw the split pieces to the side, it’s relatively quiet. The position of the sun tells me it’s nearing lunch, and even the birds are silent.
There is mud on my jeans and caked onto my boots. My shirt is tucked into my back pocket, but were it still covering my torso, it would be covered in dirt as well. It rained last night, and I took my camera into the woods this morning. I came up empty, but that’s fine.
I focus on the cool breeze of the upcoming season, on the feel of the axe in my palm, on the quiet that surrounds me. Cicadas humming, leaves rustling, wood splintering.
I enjoy this solitude as much as it suffocates me.
It may be confusing to some—why I isolate myself when I crave human connection, why I relish in this heaviness I carry when I resent it so.
But the simple answer? The one that I keep locked away, for lack of caring what my peers think and the energy to speak: I may want connection, but that does not mean I can handle it.
I may desire release from this emotional burden, but I would be nothing without it.
Though I know deep down—if my brain didn’t work the way it did—I’d be a social butterfly. The biggest extrovert.
I’d attend town events and sit in the restaurants for dinner. I’d take the time to mingle and maybe even care about what others have going on in their lives. I really, truly would. But unfortunately, sitting on top of all of those ifs is the reality: I’m fucking depressed.
No one knows why; I’ve always been this way. I’ve seen a few therapists, tried a few pills—but nothing has worked. The therapists couldn’t find a single thing to talk through, and the pills made me brain-dead. Zombie Rowan.
I have no trauma. I didn’t witness a catastrophic event or a major heartbreak.
I’m just… sad. And it’s the kind of sadness that makes it impossible to be around other people, to smile, or pretend to be interested in their well-being.
So, I stay here—in my little bubble with my darkroom and my pictures of the setting sun and little bluebirds.
Bluebirds that, unlike me, can fly away from their issues whenever they’d like.
Alas, it’s not all bad. I’m not completely alone. Sure, I have my parents, who have spent the last twenty-six years trying to love me from an arm’s length away, and a half-brother who took off overseas as soon as he could. A best friend who comes around when she can.
But more than anything—or rather, anyone—I have him. He has been with me for as long as I can remember—haunting my dreams and invading my waking thoughts. I have never truly been alone, not with him living inside of me and holding me together with his soft, warm embrace.
Benjamin.
He is who I share my thoughts with, who sits at the forefront of my mind and keeps me company. Sure, he doesn’t respond. But the image of him, the moments I have stored away in my brain, leave me ample material to reuse.
I’m unsure if Benjamin was the imaginary friend of a clinically depressed child—one I clung to and turned into something more personal as I grew—or if I’m conjuring a person I met so long ago I don’t recall it, only to place them in false memories of my own making.
Such as lying by the pool, bathing in sunlight. Or playing Monopoly around a dining room table.
But truly, it does not matter to me. I have a friend. Someone who is always with me. And when the night drags on, and I become too frustrated, I dredge up the memories where he becomes more than a friend, and those nights are nice too.
Everyone copes in their own ways—this way is mine. My secret friend, my imaginary lover.
Because in the end, it’s hard to be close to someone who doesn’t want to be close to others, and I can’t expect real people to fight against that constant current. So, it’ll stay me, my camera, and Benjamin.
Just how I like it—or hate it? Depends on when you ask, I guess. I’m still uncertain half of the time. It’s exhausting being me, so I can’t imagine how exhausting it must be knowing me. No wonder the locals hate me—and have hated me since I was little. I make them uncomfortable.
One perk of my life of solitude, though, is my job.
I love photography, and being able to do it for a living is a huge gift.
I get to travel all around the world taking pictures, selling them to magazines and different discovery channels.
I even won a national competition with a pretty fancy payout recently.
It’s a nice setup, my job. Though it did take me a while to get here, and I probably wouldn’t have been able to if I weren’t as much of a hermit as I am. You have to dedicate a lot of time to sitting in silence up in the trees to get the pictures I do.
Just as I did this morning, though the turnout was not optimal.
Gathering the wood I have chopped thus far, I ignore my protesting muscles and head toward the back porch.
I’m aching, which means I forgot to stretch after yesterday’s workout.
I’m good at forgetting to do things that are meant to take care of myself.
If Benjamin were here, he would have reminded me. I made him that way, after all.
He would have also reminded me of the meeting I have in ten minutes—one I am wholly unprepared for, as I’m covered in dirt and sweat. I drop the wood onto its designated pallet and find my way to the bathroom, taking a much-needed, insanely quick shower.
Then I dress and cross the hall to my darkroom, which doubles as my office when it’s not being used to develop photos, taking a seat at my desk and booting up my computer.
Adorning the walls are several of my own photos: various nature shots and a few of some Victorian buildings I’d passed on my many travels. I have none of my family, or even myself, and that, in itself, also makes me feel a bit lonely.
Even as I’m excelling at something, I can’t seem to invite the people I love into it—into my life, or my passions.
In fact, I don’t like taking pictures in front of others at all.
It’s why I don’t take up weddings and family portraits the way my mother used to suggest. Photography is my baby, my one thing.
I don’t like the idea of others intruding.
And as I’m dwelling on those depressing thoughts, and how I’m destined to die alone (if we’re not counting my imaginary friend), a Skype call appears on my desktop, ringing loudly. Right on time.
I answer the call, Casey’s face filling up my screen as she sits at her desk. Casey is in an office somewhere, her dark hair loose around her shoulders and her grey pantsuit bringing out the blue of her eyes.
“Row, good morning,” she greets brightly, folding her hands on the table.
“Morning? It’s lunch.” At my comment, her smile tilts downward into a pointed glare.
“Don’t be a prick. I’m already irritated that I can barely get a hold of you these days.”
I shrug, leaning back in my chair as I watch her. “Fine, fine. What can I do for you?”
Casey is the co-owner of Callie and Casey’s Photography Outlet, the organization that ran the national competition I recently competed in. She’s the agent I spoke with throughout the process, and from the beginning, she’s found herself extremely comfortable with me. How—I do not know.
She’s even continued to contact me after the fact, informing me of contract opportunities and upcoming projects C I cannot make a person. So instead, I continue to daydream.
And fuck, if he isn’t the prettiest vision.