I rubbed my feet, avoiding the calluses because they felt rough and bulbous when touched. Years of walking will do that to feet. The frigid day, along with the cold emanating from the icy water, had initially only grasped my feet, but then crawled up my body to my head. I became aware of my damp hair and the itch it had managed to create on my forehead, the salt from my tears causing the hair to clump. As I tried to push the veins on my hand down, I noticed my hands were terrifyingly pale, nearly iridescent, but tinged slightly blue from the blood pumping just below the surface. Disturbed, I moved my arm upwards so that I could rake my hand through my hair and attempt to wipe my leaky eyes, though this did not make much of a difference as the tears would not stop streaming down my face. I could barely see.
My mind was a jumble. You cannot do this anymore; just give up. The chilling thought was so convincing.
Sitting alone, I tried to focus on the noises around me rather than to the thoughts that pounded in my mind. Though I did not want to admit it, I knew it would only be a matter of time before I was found. My mom, dad, and sister, Stella, would not allow me to be out of their sight much longer. Ten minutes away was still too far for them. Water gurgled. Blood rushed. Footsteps crashed. A terrified voice called out. I need to get a grip. I cannot continue to put them through this.  I licked my cracked lips, tasting salt. A gnat buzzed around me. The trees let out a walloping whoosh.
I jumped. My heart sped up and my stomach plummeted.  A hand rested on my shoulder. As I stood, I heard her say, “You should have told us where you were going. You just disappeared. Stella said she thought she saw you run down here. Come here. Give me a hug.” As she spoke, my tears ceased. She embraced me in a hug that should have made me feel better, but it did not. I wrenched myself away, backing up slightly, creating a gap between us that made the hurt that flashed across her face all the more heart breaking.
I let out a massive sigh. My mom’s face was pained and full of compassion. She tried to look strong for me, but bags under her eyes and her slightly weighted shoulders told me she was barely holding it together. But her standing there, tears perched just inside her lower lid, was enough to tell me I will be here when you need me. My mind switched back to rational. I will get through this and they are why. They need me and I need them. Imagine your future. You want one, right?

Two years later, I stood in my room, enjoying the sickeningly fresh smell of Nivea lotion, telephone precariously hugged between my neck and cheek.
“Not much,” Lou replied to my question about what was going on. I had seen her only a couple of times in the last few months, but that was enough to know that something was definitely up. Four years ago we had been close enough friends that we were able to convince some people we were sisters. Now, we had grown apart and for that reason, I had waited patiently for her to open up, not wanting to press. “I went to the doctor yesterday.” Oh God. She is pregnant. My mind began to race, circling around and around for something, anything that would help. “They think I am bipolar.” My heart sank. This was a hundred times worse than pregnancy.
“Ásta, you there?”
I nodded, but after realizing she could not see me through the phone, I breathed a small, “Yes.” I did not know what to say, so I instead gnawed on my necklace, disgusted at the metallic taste, almost like blood.
“You’re the first person I have told. I am going back in a couple days to be evaluated officially,” she said nonchalantly with just a dash of fear. “I have to go. I just wanted to tell you.”
Just before she hung up, I managed to let my caged voice escape and hoarsely hiss out, “Let me know what happens.” I put the receiver back on its charging station, the beep indicating it had linked up, sounding a million miles away. I sat in silence, the warm taste of fear causing my mouth to fill with spit. I could not help but feel jealous that she had been able to admit her mental health issue to me in under a day, and I, two years since first realizing that I might be depressed, still had a hard time dealing with my own diagnosis and had not told anyone other than my mom and dad.

The sun shone brighter than it should have as I looked morosely out the window above the sink where the faucet still ran, filling my grimy dish. Darn, now I have to go and take care of my neighbor Meg’s stupid chickens. What I really wanted to do was get into my nest of electrically heated blankets and drift off, letting the weight of now two depressions, mine and Lou’s, float away. I relished those brief moments before the vivid dreams would set in.
I walked without enthusiasm, oblivious to my surroundings, to the chicken coop and let the door bang open before reaching to close it shut with a small thud.  As I went in, I counted the chickens. I must have missed one. I proceeded to count again. It was with horror that as I did so, my eyes came to rest on the speckled black and white chicken lying limply below its perch. The wind caught its feathers making it look almost as if it was ruffling itself up. I ran over. What have I done? I killed it. Just another thing dead. First your happiness. Now a real life gone, in an instant.  I shook it, noticing that it was cool on top. As I slid my hand under to pick it up, I felt the warmth that still resided under its breast. I felt the tears pushing to break free and let a single solitary one slide down my face, managing to keep them from taking off full. Running, I made it back to my house within a minute, puffing to get enough air.
My dad lifted the chicken’s swaying head up and let it fall back, creating a nasty tugging sensation on my outstretched arms.
“It is dead. It must has fallen and broken its neck. See how it is unattached?” The chicken’s musty smell wafted up, causing me to move the chicken even farther away from myself. “These things happen. Just toss it in the garbage.” I clenched my jaw, trying to keep my mouth from spitting something vicious out.
Since receiving Lou’s news, I had maintained a defense against the onslaught of emotions I knew would come if I let myself think about what her diagnosis meant. It would mean that I too, would have to once again face my own depression. After that initial breakdown in the forest, life had quickly returned to its humdrum nature, and the clarity that I had come across in those final moments in the woods had soon left. Now I was back to keeping my emotions all bottled up, denying that I had a problem. Lou’s news had not changed that. Yet.
Standing in Meg’s yard after wrapping the chicken up and leaving it and a scribbled note of apology for Meg, my eyes brimmed again with tears and this time there was no stopping them. Within a minute, I was sobbing, chest rising and falling as I tried to catch my breath. All my pent up feelings boiled over. Over and over, I whispered, “She can’t go through what I went through. I hope it is not true. Nobody deserves that. Nobody. She can’t be. No. No. No.” I began walking up the road to the black spiked gate that would mark that I was home, all the while making crying sounds.  I was able to see just enough through the haze of tears so that I did not walk into the middle of the road or off into the ditch to my left.  I hoped with all my might that the doctors were mistaken about Lou’s diagnosis, but deep down, I knew that was not the case.
I mourned for the dead chicken. I mourned for Lou. I mourned for me. For our lost happiness, which had been displayed back in the chicken’s muddy eyes. I tried to imagine the experience she would have, but decided it best not to make comparisons. A memory trailed by: that of another day when I sobbed uncontrollably and felt the refreshment of cool air as I sat alone by a creek. The memory faded; I let out a huff of air in an attempt to reduce the puffiness around my eyes and whisk away any residual red blotches. I knew that I could never fool my mom, but I could at least try. After all, I had been hiding how bad my depression really was, the dull ache of sadness with occasional stabs of outright pain. Later, explaining my tears, I would attribute them to the dead chicken. Why did that dumb bird have to die? Maybe my feelings could have remained buried, hoarded away, until they could spill out in the confines of my room, late at night.
Second breakdown: check. How many times are you going to do this? Maybe this time you will actually take your own advice and start doing the work we know you need to do to get back to a good place. It was not for another year that I began to give into my mom’s pleas. I resentfully went to see a therapist, seagulls screeching in the background as I did the best thing that I have ever done for myself or for my family.  After another year, I finally admitted to Lou that I had had some of my own mental health issues. Shortly thereafter our bond was resolidified.

I sit with my face reflected back at me on the computer screen. I hear the Skype call ring and wait for her to answer. When she appears in front of me, her hair is a new shade of brown and the weight she lost so quickly last year is still gone. She smiles and I do too.  Lou and I are reunited. We make small talk, her light voice not disguising the topic we both know one of us will eventually broach. When I finally ask how she is really doing, she brushes off the question. I let her. She knows me and I know her, but still we do not know anything. That is how she had made it. That is how I made it. Nobody could know.
No longer.