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So what, so what, we all were all afraid.
So this I swear I know, it's not the chemicals.
You are off my mind I finally got away.
You said it's such a life to remember,
So come on, and we'll sleep away December.

 

It was you, bringing your white company.
Bringing the night so it seemed.
And we will never sleep again.
So as you walk through the door,
And yell I'm never coming back here.
It's over we are still nothing.

"December" by Lydia

 

Every so often, the compulsion bubbles to the surface without warning. As time passes, so do the intervals in between. It remains unclear whether there are exacting conditions or settings that must be met, like the night-blooming cereus that unfurls only a single night in the year. Sometimes, it creeps up in the early hours before sunrise, when the only sound is the stereo within muted car windows. Other times, it strikes like a lightning bolt, violent and blinding, leaving you reeling and unkeeled.

Time has been kind to Freya. The faintest edges of fibrosis betray her scars, traceable only with a discerning touch. But this tranquility that comes with age owes much to the callused layer that cocoons the amber of her former self. Where she used to feel the crests and troughs, now there is stillwater. Where there were once bursts of crimson and vermilion and violet and every vibrant hue in between, the color palette has faded to shades of gray.

 

There is the obsession. The intrusive thought. The only way to break is the compulsion.

 

And so, Freya picks up the metaphorical razor. She has her set of blades. You will have your own personal collection. The songs that transport you to that exact memory, that particular moment. For Freya, the purpose of the incision is not to hurt, but to feel. just for an hour, just for a night... slice the cocoon, shatter the amber, let me bleed, hurtle me back to the rustling green leaves, the yellow frisbee on the white beach, back when my highs and lows moved like the tides following your gravitational pull, when my emotions burned like a supernova and collapsed like a dying star, when i told you i wanted to never feel like this again but maybe this was the most alive i ever was and will ever be.

 

When it's over, Freya holds compression until the blood coagulates. The skin will close, the tissue will granulate, and in time, the cocoon and the callus will smooth over once more.