Chapter 18 Free Fall
Free Fall
Theo
Theo
I might have underestimated how much glitter sheds.
Theo
Christ, it’s in the bedroom.
Theo
The BEDROOM, Sage. How?!
Dec 9 4:18 PM
Theo
Buying a new set of pots and pans solely for the purpose of cooking Christmas Lunch is going overboard, right?
Theo
Never mind don’t answer that.
Theo
I already know.
Dec 10 11:11 AM
Theo
Everything all right?
Theo
You haven’t finally driven into a loch, have you?
Dec 10 3:30 PM
Theo
Collins.
Sorry, got caught up in work.
Do NOT buy those pots and pans.
Theo
Theo
I’ll cook you chicken tikka with them?
Dec 12 1:14 PM
Theo
Margot wanted me to send you this:
Blue Light and Its Impact on the Brain
Dec 12 2:35 PM
Theo
She said, “She’s more likely to read it if you send it.”
Theo
I think she’s wrong, but I’m flattered regardless.
Dec 13 9:18 AM
Theo
I’m seriously going to come over and force you to take a break, Collins.
She’s been ignoring Theo’s text messages.
To be fair, she’s been ignoring everyone’s text messages, but Theo seems to be the one who’s caught on, and she doesn’t think he buys the sorry, been buried in work excuse she tries to use.
Sage knows what it means when the static in her head becomes less “hopping frequencies” and more “angry horde of bees.” That frenetic energy that she tends to keep trapped in her mind is readying to wire itself throughout her body and beg to be dispelled, only to reject any possible idea she comes up with to get rid of it.
Emerson calls it Itchy Brain.
Sage calls it hell.
She goes for walks only to turn around at the end of the driveway, sends nonresponse responses to her friends and her agent and her editor, ignores the growing number of DMs from readers she usually tries to stay on top of, rereads the last few chapters she’s written but doesn’t absorb any of it, writes some more only to end up with disjointed sentences and half-formed paragraphs.
Decides to revisit her outline to see if she can’t tackle Marie’s feedback only to delete and reinsert the same bullet five times.
Tries to read for inspiration but can’t focus on the text.
Turns on a movie only to turn it off in the first fifteen minutes.
All while time moves agonizingly slow and far too fast.
Hell.
Complete and utter hell.
She’s been in it for five days.
Today’s version finds her at her laptop, eyes aching from the blue light as she tries to force words from her brain and onto the page.
She’s wasted another day in limbo, hopping from thing to thing to try to satisfy the way her mind itches.
She feels like if she can just finish something, then maybe it’ll be the momentum she needs to eject herself from this never-ending purgatory.
She doesn’t finish anything. She hardly even cracks four hundred words, even though she can feel them buzzing around inside of her, right along with that swell of energy that wants out but refuses to budge.
It would be better if she felt drained. If she felt like she had nothing to give.
But she doesn’t. The energy wants to create, wants to work, wants to lose itself in the frenzy of a hyper-fixation, but it won’t latch on to anything long enough for it to stick.
Sage props her head in her hands, her fingers tangling in her hair by her temples. She tugs until it hurts. Her mind sharpens with the pain, and it’s such a blessed relief, even though it doesn’t last for longer than a few seconds.
The quiet recedes. The buzzing floods in. Sage’s eyes prick with frustrated tears. Her pulse hammers in that point just below the hinge of her jaw, and she swears she can hear it in her ears.
Pound. Pound. Pound.
It takes her a moment to realize the sound isn’t just the blood beating against her eardrums. Someone is at the door.
She feels unsteady on her feet as she walks to it, like her body is half here, half somewhere else entirely.
She tugs it open, a gust of cold air sweeping through and stinging the bare skin of her shoulders and arms, exposed by her tank top.
“Theo?”
He’s standing on her doorstep, hands shoved into the front pocket of a black hoodie. A baseball cap is pulled low on his head, but it’s not enough to hide the concern in his gaze as he looks her over.
“What are you doing here?” she asks hoarsely. She can’t remember the last time she spoke aloud. Yesterday? The day before?
“I’m sorry to just turn up out of the blue, but I …” Theo trails off, his brow furrowing as he scans her face. “Can I come in?”
“Sure.” She nods. “Of course.” She steps aside and he moves past her, the soft cotton of his sweatshirt brushing against the thin fabric of her tank top.
There are goose bumps on her arms from the cold, and she runs her hands over them as she nudges the door shut and follows Theo into the kitchen.
He’s standing at the bar, one hand resting on the counter.
She blinks as she takes in the various sheets of paper and mugs that are littered across it, wincing when she notices the empty bag of chips that sits on the far corner.
“Um.” She scoots forward and shuts her laptop, her hands tingling as she shuffles the papers together into a hastily formed stack. “Is everything—”
“Are you okay?” Theo interjects. She turns to find him frowning at her.
“What?”
“Are you okay?” he repeats, enunciating each word.
His gaze sweeps over her again, and it takes a moment, but Sage’s brain finally processes what she must look like, standing barefoot in a pair of baggy sweats and a tank top, hair messy and piled in a bun on her head.
She tucks a few loose strands behind her ear and shifts her weight, her arms folding across her chest.
“Yeah,” she assures him, something itchy and hot crawling up her skin. “I’m fine.”
Theo’s frown deepens. “It’s just …” He wets his lips as he sucks in a long breath through his nose. “I thought maybe it was the whole Christmas-decorating thing, but now I’m wondering if there’s something else going on.”
Guilt unfurls in Sage’s gut, but it’s muted beneath that buzzing that has her shifting her weight again.
“No,” she says with a shake of her head.
“I mean, no, it wasn’t … Decorating for Christmas was great.
It’s not … I’m fine. It’s just been a weird couple of days.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to redo this draft after some feedback from my editor and it’s not really budging, and there’s this thing with Noah, but it’s not …
I just think I’m …” Sage trails off as she clocks she’s rambling and has no idea what she’s actually trying to get at.
“I’m fine,” she finishes.
Theo steps closer to her, his touch gentle as he places a hand on top of hers and pulls. Sage glances down. She’s gripping her arm so tightly that her skin flushes red in the shape of fingertips when she allows him to pull her hand away.
“Can we sit?” he asks, his chin jutting toward the couch. Sage’s antsy body screams its resistance, but she nods and allows Theo to steer her to the couch. He sits opposite her, perched on the edge of the coffee table, elbows braced on knees that bracket hers.
“What’s going on?” he murmurs.
“Nothing.”
“Sage—”
“No,” she cuts him off with a shake of her head.
“I mean … that’s just it. Nothing is actively happening.
I’m not … I’m not feeling weird about decorating the other day, or upset …
I mean, Marie’s feedback was disappointing, and there’s shit going on with my family, but this isn’t that.
It’s …” Sage tangles her fingers together on her lap, her knee bouncing as she searches for the words to explain.
It’s like she’s stuck in fucking Mario Kart, spinning wildly with no idea how to right herself so she can cross the finish line. She can feel the yearning to keep racing forward, to move, but no matter how hard her thumb presses the toggle, she’s just spinning, spinning, spinning.
“Emerson calls it Itchy Brain?” she finally says.
“It’s like all of the energy gets tangled in my body and everything buzzes but nothing helps.
I can’t get it out, and I’m really tired but also really antsy and I want to do things but I can’t so I get agitated and restless and my brain itches but … ”
She trails off again, swallowing down some of that energy that wants out and is trying to get there through her words.
“Nothing can scratch it,” Theo fills in for her.
Sage glances down at where her forefinger digs into the cuticle of her thumb. “Yeah,” she says. “Exactly.”
It’s rare that Sage allows herself to be seen like this—all jittery parts and restless energy and that relentless buzzing in her veins.
People see it, but not really. They see the outcome of it.
The work accomplished. They see it when she can channel it, when she can harness that endless rush inside of her and force it into something that shines so brightly they can’t see the imperfections that got her there.
They don’t see it like this. Bouncing leg, shredded cuticles, exhaustion that she can’t shake because she can’t stop but nothing will satisfy the way her brain itches.
No matter what she throws herself into—work, a movie, a puzzle, a book—nothing helps, and it has her wanting to peel back her skin and step out of her body for a while, if only to get a break.
“It happens from time to time,” she mutters. “Sometimes without a trigger, but sometimes when things throw me for a loop? When I don’t … deal with them.”
Theo places a hand on her thigh, his touch warm through her sweatpants, and the pressure is enough to still her leg. His eyes trace the panes of her face, like her features hold the map he needs to navigate this—to navigate her.