Misery’s visit [in progress]

Misery has been visiting for while, I didn’t answer the door when she rang the bell, she quickly let herself in with a key she’d made for herself a couple of years back, she arrived claiming it was time for our annual check-up. I laughed at her ironic doctor-reference and proceeded to disregard her presence until it grew so large I could no longer effectively ignore her. She drained the fridge, hid my shoes when I wanted to go walking and tormented me at night so I couldn’t go to sleep. Growing tired of my uninvited guest, I asked how long she planned on staying, “I love company” she grinned, her feet laid up on the table, back reclined in the chair, looking right comfortable. “I’ll leave when I’m done, you know the drill,” she twirled a lock of hair with her fingers. I sighed unamused. “You really could work on some new material, that joke is growing stale” I said. “Not as stale as you are about to be!” she playfully retaliated, and the sudden twist in my belly informed me she was right. “Don’t you have better things to do? Or just, other things?” I asked, squinting. She quit twirling, withdrew her smile, jerked her feet off the table and leaned forward, she looked me dead in the eye with a loud and clear four-lettered “nope.” My hands caught my face as my head bobbed down, my elbows resting on the table, my head resting in my hands, I sat like that, breathing, thoughtless. Misery recovered her reclining position and started gesticulating with her hands, “look, it could be a lot worse, at least you know me well enough to be able to sit there sulking in front of me, you’re comfortable around me, you’re not hiding, you’re not masking, at least around me, you can just.. be as you are, is that so bad?” I remained with my cheeks squished by my palms, my eyes imprisoned behind my fingers, I turned my head slightly up to face her, “you’re not wrong” I granted, and grunted.

I’ve known her my whole life. She was around the house a lot when I grew up, initially visiting my mother. After my parents divorced she stuck around for so long I thought she’d moved in permanently. I was rather shocked the day she suddenly took off. When I crossed the threshold of puberty she started hanging out in my room, from then on, however far I went, she’d turn up out of the blue, and leave just as suddenly. Ive tried, she can’t be coerced, bribed or forced to do otherwise. The day she turned up with a freshly cut and pink, because why not, key I produced no reaction. I gave up trying to keep her out a long time ago.

A sub-par house-guest, Misery has no regard for my routines, schedules, desires or even needs. Her ability to make a mess out of nothing is quite frankly astonishing, at times I can’t help but marvel at her. However, her long visits become difficult, with every passing day neuances of colour disappear from my field of vision, replaced by a gradually growing grey cloud that fogs my functioning. One time long ago, we sat together on a sail-boat in Spain, a sunset I knew was breathtaking to look upon unfolding over the horizon, I knew, but I could not see it. She was across from me in all glam and colour, I sat feeling lonely and dim, grasping for the beauty I had become blind to. Of all the ways I’ve tried to make her leave none have worked, whenever she’s finally off, I take no credit, I simply sigh in relief and go looking for the broom to dust what remains of her out the door, or cabin.

The royal Cuntess. She is amused when I am angry, though she well deserves her nick-name. We fight like sisters, and I can’t help but feel love for her, in my strongest despise, her familiar mess feels like home. She must like Norway, for whenever I come back here, she’s never far behind. This time, after two years, it took her nearly two months to show up, I had grown fond of the idea that she might not come, but she did, shiny key in hand, a bulky piece of luggage. One time in 2017 she followed me back here from the other side of the world, she brought a blow-torch and immediately set out to collect fire-wood as we arrived, during spring, fyi. I watched her in bewilderment, “what are you up to?” she turned towards me and winked, “you’ll see.” She does have a flair for the dramatic, and can be rather entertaining, I’ll give her that. I was less entertained when she started torching my life, but that’s a story for another time.