Passenger

Ever since I was a little girl, there has been something growing inside of me. Something foreign, something dark, something evil. It whispers things to me and, no matter how hard I try, I can’t shake It off. It has Its claws stuck in my brain, and sometimes It takes control. I am the husk, and It becomes the leader, wearing my face and using my hands. It commands my tongue, and I watch it happen. I watch It ruin. Sometimes I fight back, but sometimes I would rather be the passenger. It’s easier that way. Easier to cope with whatever it is that triggers the splits in the first place. Regret will sometimes follow, but it’s never been anything I couldn’t live with.

I return home from work, tossing my keys on the side table next to the door. I got fired today. The consequences of a split that happened recently. Apparently, I had punched a coworker in the face after months of nasty comments to my face and behind my back. Personally, I see that as justified and It is proud of me for thinking so. But in the corporate world, some good old-fashioned justice was not the acceptable way to handle such matters. What can I say? I’m a non-confrontational person and It was more than happy to help.

My fiancé is home. I can tell because his jacket is haphazardly slung over the couch. I make my way to the bedroom, twisting my ring. Things have been good between us, but something feels…odd. I think it’s because of my splits. They’ve been more frequent lately, and arguably worse. He just doesn’t seem to understand them. He thinks they need to be eradicated, either through pharmaceuticals or other methods. But It tells me they’re meant to protect me. But I’d be lying if I said It didn’t create Its fair share of problems.

“Marcus?” I say with barely more weight than a whisper, pushing the door open. “I’m home.”

He’s folding laundry, making neat stacks on the bed. “You’re home early,” was all he said. We were not about to have a fun conversation.

“Uh, yeah. About that…” I chew on my bottom lip. “I got let go today.”

He sighs, rubbing his eyes. “Because of the thing with Andy?”

“Yeah,” I say. “They weren’t too happy about it.”

“Obviously,” he leans on the edge of the bed. “Winona, you assaulted her. Are we not gonna talk about that?”

“We did,” I protest. “I told you; it was…” the look on his face causes my voice to trail off.

He is judging us, It murmurs in the back of my mind.

“Right, yeah, your little friend inside your head or whatever,” he waves a hand in exasperation.

“You’re judging me!” I cry out.

“Yeah, a little!” He cried back. He takes a deep breath and runs his hands through his brown hair. “Listen, Winona. You need help, alright? This isn’t normal.”

He wants to separate us. He wants to kill me. A part of you.

Shut up and let me think, I snap. “I’m okay,” I say to my fiancé. “I promise, I just, I was under a lot of stress, and she was just being so awful to me, I—” I sigh, defeated. “I just don’t know what happened.” Feigning dumb has always seemed to work in the past.

“Winona…” he takes my arm. “Let’s sit.”

I slowly sink down into the desk chair he pulls out for me. He sits on the edge of the bed. The air feels like winter, and you could hear a pin drop onto my fluffy white pillow.

Call it intuition or anxiety, but I can feel my entire world caving in right here and now. It manifests in the way that my ribcage begins to crumble in the center. My skin pulls apart and reveals a chasm, my heart’s rapid thrumming exposed. I sit before my fiancé and watch helplessly as he reaches into my gaping chest and pulls out my heart, splitting it in two before my eyes. Blood from my tattered chest dribbles to the floor, and his hands are covered in it. He looks down at the two pieces of my heart and sighs. “I’m sorry. I love you, but I can’t do this anymore.”

It’s okay, I’ll be okay. I grip the edge of my seat, knuckles white as It begins to tighten Its grip on my brain.

Is it? This is how it starts, how It takes hold. Doubt is a powerful weapon, and It drives it deep, deep into my head. Because I can never be absolutely sure about anything, can I?

My stomach drops and I begin to feel sick. I look into his eyes, and I see how serious he is. He is leaving me. I can’t do this alone. Help me, help me, help me.

I’ll protect you. Its voice feels like a warm hug now, the only safe space I think I’ve ever known. I want to go there. I don’t want to be in this moment anymore.

I gasp out loud in pain as I feel Its claws slide into me even further, tighter than ever before, and my love jumps off of the bed, dropping the pieces of my heart to the floor with two wet, squelching thumps.

“Winona?” He cries out in alarm. “Are you okay?”

I grow sicker, my eyes falling to my heart on the ground. His doing. His carelessness. He’s hurting me, is all I can think, like a broken record in my brain.

One of Its claws slips into my amygdala, stirring it like a pot. He’s doing this to hurt you. He wants to see you bleed.

My prefrontal cortex is soup. And the claws are still stirring. I look at Marcus and I don’t know who I am anymore. All I know now is the two halves of my heart on the ground. All I want is to watch him suture them together. “Please,” I whisper. “Please don’t leave me.”

Let me fix it for you, It pleads.

He sighs and, to my sanity’s demise, he turns his back to me and starts to walk away. The moment is drenched in finality. And I cannot handle that.

Fix me, the thought crosses my mind like a prayer to a god. Perhaps that’s always been what It is to me. I accept the splitting pain in my head, the loss of control of my limbs, and the eventual loss of consciousness.

I become the passenger.

***

When I wake up, I am lying on my back on my apartment floor, unable to move, and I am terrified. I’ve never awoken while still playing the passenger before. What’s going on, I call out in my mind. What did we do? My head is in blistering pain, and my hair feels wet. The regret of letting go always comes the morning after, like a hangover.

It chuckles and slowly begins to sit up. It’s still not fully comfortable possessing a human body, and it shows. There’s a mirror in front of us and I see my freshly stitched and stapled chest. I am covered in blood. I don’t have time to wonder whether it’s all mine, because then I see what’s on my head.

The tight, territorial grip and tensely violent claws I constantly feel are here, fully realized, and holding on to my head in this moment. It’s managed to split through my skull, pinkish and scaly flesh, like a chicken’s foot, bare to the world. The entire thing is covered in my blood, and I can see that Its claws are buried deep, deep into my brain. I try to scream but, of course, I am no longer in control of my body. My screams remain as empty echoes in my corner of the brain.

It smiles at me in the mirror and lifts an arm, performing a crude wave with jerky motions. “Don’t be afraid, I’ve been inside your head this entire time. I thought it was finally time to show myself off. Time for you to see how beautiful we are together.”

Please, just tell me what we did. If I could, I would be sobbing in anguish, wailing to whatever other god wanted to listen to me. I had lost myself to my passenger. Perhaps a part of me always knew this would happen. I just wasn’t prepared like I thought I was. In the aftermath, in the irreversible consequences, maybe Marcus leaving wasn’t so bad. Maybe I would’ve overcome it. It would’ve been painful, but did I really ever need my passenger?

“Why don’t I just show you?” It says, excitedly jumping up from the floor. “We made sure he got exactly what he deserved.” It takes me into the bedroom, a trail of blood marking the way. Our gait is odd as we walk, It moves like a puppet in my body, knock-kneed and with poor posture. We stop at the doorway, bloody handprints covering the knob. All I can do is watch as It pushes it open.

While I drown in silent screams, It cackles, screeches and hoots, like a monkey. It crouches down and scuttles over to the bed, making sure I get a good long look at Its handiwork.

My sweet boy, the one who tried to leave me all alone to mend the heart that he broke, lays across the bed, spread like a star. His hands and feet are bound at the posts, but he is fighting. Both his chest and his mouth are agape. His chest is empty, but his mouth, oh that mouth that used to kiss me so sweetly, is stuffed full of his heart.

He is blindfolded and it is probably better this way. Better that he cannot see me, or rather, It. He grunts and gurgles around his heart as It climbs up onto the bed and straddles him, leaning down until their faces were only an inch apart. I use every last ounce of will I have to try to regain even the smallest semblance of control over my body. But there is nothing. I can only watch as It begins to kiss his heart.

“Now he can never leave us,” It murmurs. “His heart is ours.”