Saber

{WARNING: contains mental health struggles, self harm, and violent gore}

Dear Lucy,

I’m sorry. But I trust this with no one else. I’m starting my life by ending this one. I don’t know if you’ll understand this, but my shoes are not mine. I have no idea where they came from. Someone has stolen my face and swapped it with a new one that’s somehow even uglier. Also, my teeth are rotting despite having done nothing to them.

Anyway, you have always been so nice to me. You're the only person I have ever liked. So no one seems as worthy to tell my story as you. Please take as much creative liberty as you need; just be sure to make me a monster.

I’ll begin where I was most happy. I can’t see any of my skin. I’m in a tiger costume that my mom made for me. My father and everyone else are downstairs waiting. I’m standing in the hallway around the corner of the stairs where I can’t be seen, planning my entrance. That’s when the happiness stops. I can hear them snickering to themselves. My name is repeated. I stay upstairs, listening for a while. Kevin, one of the neighborhood kids, says, “What is his problem?” I see the seesaw for the first time, going up and down, everything and nothing. I consider going into my bedroom and sitting against the shut door. “I can see his shadow,” says another kid. That did it. As I turn and go down the stairs, I notice my father is holding up a camera, recording everything. So I do my best to give a show. I pretend to fall down each step. I get no laughs other than my own. So halfway down, I fall for real. Still nothing. In fact, everyone has already moved onto the porch. I limp over to join them.

In high school, the suit got itchy just as people were coming around to it. Kevin tells everyone that we were best friends growing up and still are. My memory tells a different story, but I keep it to myself. I’m almost happy again. We were the Eagles, but in my sophomore year we changed to the Tigers. Now people are shouting “Saber” in the hallway (a nickname I never chose); even the teachers call me that. The basketball players practically assault me, throwing me in the air after each win and sincerely apologizing after every loss.

It’s madness, and I’m falling for it. I start to believe the whole world knows me. In my town, everyone does. Some punks write my name in graffiti all over the abandoned mill. I would watch it get painted over and then vandalized and painted and vandalized over and over. It hurt every time, worse than if it were just permanent. A message on a building that no one understands despite their confidence. I want to rip them apart. Eat their flesh. And yet I love them. Seesaw.

Why did she choose a tiger? She made me one costume once for one stupid Halloween, which I fell asleep in. And as I grew out of it, she made another and another. I was a victim, and she is a victim. But no one is a victim like Kevin is a victim.

It’s senior year, and we are all at the final game of the season. Everyone is cheering. “Saber! Saber!” Kevin runs onto the court as team captain and points at me. I pounce from the bleachers and attack. I claw and bite and chew the skin of his cheek. I pause. It doesn't taste as I thought it would. Seesaw. Someone tackles me, but I fight back. I’m an animal, clawing and biting. This time I don’t make the mistake of eating. I maul him and another and another. No one can stop me. I am fast and fierce. They are all afraid, and I’m not, finally. Then it goes black, and I’m missing a bit of that time.

The next thing I remember is the white brick, being in my skin for the first time since that fateful Halloween, you looking down at me. I can see the halo you hide, revealed by the sun bleeding through the blinds. I hurt a lot of people, I’m told, but you say it isn’t what makes me, or it doesn’t have to be. It was the only thing you were ever wrong about. You held my hand, and all I did was beg for the suit. I tried scratching my skin off, but someone cut my nails. I soon learn to say yes to everything—to the horrible food, the medicine, the guy claiming to be Jesus who believes he can save me by sucking on my fingers as a sort of baptism. No is a word I no longer know. Yes means release. Yes means Saber. After a few years, I was out. I had my fur again. It’s the last I see of you. That in itself is life-ending.

In my mid-twenties, I started to remember vivid details that turned from freedom to horror. The fur that itched in high school is now well woven into my flesh. I’m living with my parents on my twelfth job. It’s warehouse work for a company everyone knows. The people are friendly, and they call me Simon, but when they wave at me, I think of Kevin. I can feel and taste his cheek in my mouth. At this job, I go to the bathroom once every hour, making it look random. I need the space, even the smell. The fact that fecal matter can be covered over with air freshener and smell pleasant helps. The boss takes notice about a month in. He says it isn’t my only problem. He calls me a nervous wreck. I break down in front of him. He tells me it's alright and to show up tomorrow as I have always done and do my best. I go home and quit over text the next day.

This story happens for a while. Getting a job, leaving a job. I went to live in Utah for a while. My dad thought it was a good idea. He went down there with me to get set up in a studio apartment. I spent half a year there, and I didn’t make a dime. I wasted his money and never paid him back. My parents wanted me to go on disability. I probably should have. But I knew they would use the suit as the reason. And I can’t have that.

Halloween comes around again, and I’m handing out candy. Kids giggle as my hands shake and I stumble over my words. I’m verging catatonic, and everyone knows it. The people in town have bets on when I’ll become a full vegetable, and they are all rooting for it. People don’t forget someone who violently attacked half of a basketball team and a couple of adults, especially when they were dressed in a tiger costume that they are still wearing to this day, blood and all. There is violence even in my stillness, despite how far I push it down. As the night goes on, I see a boy wearing a tiger costume. He jumps up and down, loudly jokes with these kids that I’m pretty sure aren’t his friends. They ignore him. At first, there is a fire in me. I want to shake him, tell him to be careful, beg him to make this only last for Halloween and stop there. But as I watch closer, something levels for the first time. I know he isn’t me. I don’t believe in the self; I can’t.

Lucy, all I want is to say I love you. I want to say it once, even if it is never heard. I love you. I’m killing myself, at least on paper. Tomorrow I’ll be a vegetable filled with violence, but here I get to be with you and existing only as a story.