Going Out to Dinner
The antidepressants and anxiolytics
stand ready, mixed with vodka.
Bang down with the hammer. It dents
the laptop. Bang harder. Destroy it completely. Leave no trace of my
writing; no trace of myself.
But then I’m cold and in pain,
ensnared in tubes. I call out again and again. I don’t exist in this room
of strangers confined to their beds, all in distress.
“What are you going to do when you walk out of here now?” the hospital psychiatrist asks me.
“All I want to do is go home, take a shower, and go out to dinner.”
I guess that’s what he
wants to hear. All of a sudden I have to come up with a purpose, no matter how
short term, just to get out.
He jots down in his notebook: “Woman
aged sixty, suicide attempt, lucid, focused, and collaborative.”
Depression goes hand in hand with
social anxiety. I’ve never eaten out alone in my life.
Anita Lekic
Anita Lekic holds an M.A. in English and Ph.D. in Slavic Languages and Literatures.
Taught at the State University of New York at Stony Brook as an adjunct
professor and later moved to The Hague, Netherlands to work as a
translator for the UN War Crimes Tribunal. Now living in Portugal. Publications:
articles in Counterpunch and in The Local Germany, and short
stories in The RavensPerch, Streetlight Magazine, The Dark Ink
Press, Typishly, Cagibi, The Bangalore Review and Wanderlust.
One of the short stories was nominated for the Pushcart Prize.
Short, to the point, powerful. Excellent piece.
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