I.

The only thing separating us is the sound barrier, which doesn’t stop feelings. Vibrations at low frequencies slow until: stillness. I am screaming on the other side, you can’t hear me yet you know I am there. Feeling is being; but you can’t hear me. The only thing that differentiates me from a monster is remorse. Remorse: to be angry at oneself. This isn’t the official definition, but it works for me. Remorse, followed by penance. Fourteen Hail Mary’s aren’t doing the trick, so I have taken to doling out my own punishments. Tears race each other like rain down the car window. Penance is the easy part, now try reconciliation.

II.

It is important to note right away that penance can be a passive action. Sometimes your body creates its own punishment if you’re unable to reign in your impulses. This is what a hangover is.

III.

That winter, the raccoons in the city started to act strangely. For awhile, no one knew if they were being poisoned or if they had rabies. What everyone did know was that they were roaming the city during the day; their eyes, milk white, looking without seeing. I felt a weird allure towards these sick creatures, a pull. I would stop and watch them from the sidewalk, taken with how out of place it was to see something meant for the dark in the daytime.

IV.

Something weird happened to me as well that winter, I stopped sleeping. The absence of sleep lent itself to other odd occurrences, as the extended hours of consciousness came with a surplus of hours to observe. There wasn’t more that I could do than watch: the television; myself in the mirror; the television becoming a mirror; the number of lights on in the apartment complex across from my window. The light at 4pm and 4am were identical to each other, both hovering between darkness and an artificial glow of florescent lamps. The apartment three rows from the top on the south side never turned off their lights. Somedays I couldn’t locate where my own eyes were in the mirror.

V.

All the information my doctor would give me was that this was a phase, and that it would pass. She recommended I leave the house at least three times a week and to lie in bed and pretend to sleep during the time I usually would sleep. I was referred to three different therapists. I left my apartment, only to end up looking at the trains, unsure how I got there. The doctor’s advice was as helpful as the therapist’s recommendation to scream silently into a pillow. The point of screaming is for someone to hear you. I stopped going to see the therapists, and put their roles onto the person I was seeing at the time. Three therapists rolled into one, a personalized support team found in one person.

VI.

You are walking beside me but you can’t hear me, because I am not talking. I want to talk and make things better, but thoughts do not become vibrations. This is part of the penance, you can not ask for forgiveness for mortal sins. My punishment is not having you. For you, not having me, a reward.

VII.

I cried a lot during this time. I began collecting sunglasses that I carried with me wherever I went. The velocity of my tears corresponded to the opaqueness of the lens. Most often, I wore a pair that completely blocked access to my eyes, and while people still knew I was crying, it provided a level of privacy to not care. At night a spittle of red wine fell out of my mouth and down my chin. You looked away, either to save me from embarrassment or in disgust. If you did so to save me from embarrassment, it had the opposite effect. If you did so in disgust, at least we could agree on one thing. With the back of my hand I wiped my chin, raised the edge to my mouth and extending my neck, finished the glass. Sediments remained glued to the hip of the glass and the corners of my mouth. I threw out every lipstick in my house, preferring the stain of merlot.

IX.

When I attempted to sleep beside you I would play a game. Intertwining my limbs with yours, I would pretend we were a tree that had grown braiding itself through the electrical wire. You had to move very carefully to play this game, for one day the electrical wire might turn on you, burning the limbs of the tree to a crisp. I lost a lot during that winter. Time slowed down to such a painstaking crawl that it ended up not moving at all. Days could go by before I realized I hadn’t so much as eaten. Time wasn’t the only thing that I lost. I mourned with an intensity that shocked me.

X.

For five days I had not spoken to you, figuring you were better off without me. Your silence confirmed this, but still I picked up the phone to call. The line dialled into your voicemail. I didn’t bother hanging up. There is no such thing as true silence, the hum of the mind a constant refrain of noise.

XI.

Two memories. In the middle of the night my father turned on the tap provided by the campsite, and filled up a bucket which he overturned on the racoon that was creating elongated shadows onto the tent. I imagined the racoon shivering in the night, just as I stood soaked by the side of the pool waiting for one of my parents to bring me a towel. A trespassing racoon on the second floor balcony in the townhouse I stayed at every other weekend. I could never decipher if the noise was originating from a crepuscular creature or from a fight taking place
downstairs. There were two times I could tell the difference. When my father turned on the hose and sprayed a racoon until he fearfully retreated back into the ravine. And when I woke in the morning to a carpet full of broken glass and a puddle of red wine. It is probably frowned upon to hose down racoons, but it is even more frowned upon to poison them.

XII.

This is not a love story.

XIII.

Just as the weather was beginning to turn and the light was no longer parallel day and night, I threw out a bag of clothing instead of the garbage. When I realized my mistake I attempted to make amends by retrieving the bag from the curb. As it went, the bag was gone. I started seeing the diurnal racoons prowling the sidewalks, wearing my clothes.

XIV.

On my first venture out of my apartment in over a week, I came across a racoon with a blue scarf on. The scarf was a gift from my mother on my 20th birthday. I was never that fond of the scarf, it didn’t suit me. Seeing it on the racoon I felt a pang of guilt for disregarding the scarf as tacky. I could have swore that the racoon looked right at me before turning and heading to the tracks. It became imperative for me to retrieve my scarf and so, for the first time, I crossed over the tracks in search of the racoon. A car alarm and the train’s horn blared simultaneously. I turned to watch the train pass by and lost track of the raccoon. There was no where for me to go from here. Train on one side, sound barrier on the other: limbo. During the 15 minutes that I sat inside the belly of the CN rail I realized that the sound barrier was only built on one side of the tracks, the side opposite from where I lived. As if the houses south of the tracks were deemed more sensitive to auditory disturbances. Of course, the houses were also more expensive on that side.

XV.

A racoon on my roof stared in my window with a brown leather belt draped around its waist. Although it was still the winter I opened the window, tempting the creature to enter my room. We looked at each other, siblings in a staring contest, until the racoon hissed and ran in the other direction. Snow began to dance in drifts into my room and around my feet. I stood there until the lights in the apartment buildings started turning on, people beginning their pursuit into the day.

XVI.

After seeing the racoon on the roof I slept for the entire morning. This was the first time I had slept continuously for months. I thought things were going to start looking up.

XVII.

It was determined that the racoons had rabies, and the Humane Society began to round them up and euthanize them. I started seeing the racoons less often, though through my peripheral vision I would catch glimpses of balls of fur adjourned with pieces of clothing. There is no cure for rabies, just as the doctors could not cure me. The difference being, one you can live with, the other you cannot.

XVIII.

Maybe my penance was fulfilled, for I started sleeping again. Except now in slumber, nightmares awaited me. I would roam the rooms of my apartment in my sleep, looking for someone who was not there. My alarm clock: a scream.

XIX.

A total of 28 racoons were found with rabies that winter and killed.

XX.

I entered the local Humane Society and asked the girl at the front desk if they found any clothing attached to the raccoons they put down. She asked if I was interested in adoption.

Originally published in White Wall Review 41 (2017)