XVII – Bound By My Own Arms

I really don’t know what else to do. I need to get out. I need to see the world. The talks don’t change, they stay the same tone and I remain without perspectives of getting out. Why don’t they give up already, why don’t they just let me go free? Maybe it’s because I’ve already gotten out before. I remember getting out. I remember the sensation of walking through that iron doorway, seeing the trees outside, the cars going by, the people, the first breath of freedom filling my lungs. Yes I did get out, I can remember. But I must be pretty dangerous if here I am again, where time stands still. Do you think they’ll lock me away for good this time? Is thinking that dangerous? To feel the intensity of the world inside your chest? To cross the threshold into a supra-reality, with the wings of an angel which rise above the mediocrity? Yes. It is very dangerous, and the sane are not ready for this. Beings like me do not fall into their scientific categories, their norms. Either we fall into line, or…

I don’t remember how it happened but I remember when they caged me away for the first time… I don’t remember exactly, I feel. It was after that weekend at the farm, not long after I returned from that fatal trip to Juiz de Fora. My house had become a private jail. I couldn’t stand being there anymore. I needed, I wanted and longed to get out, to find the ones who whispered into my ears. The voices had to embody at some point. And in my longing to get out, I yearned to face whatever it was out there waiting for me. I could get out via the veranda, a straight shot down from the eighth floor to the street. That was what I needed, the street, the ocean of people swarming over it.

They barred me from going out. They told me that the voices didn’t exist. They were afraid of the word maybe, but they wanted to say that I was crazy. I saw the despair in their eyes. I saw it, but I couldn’t make them understand, little did they try to. In this explosive conflict, there appeared to be no solution. The days went by and I couldn’t bear it anymore, or them, my family that is. They became my enemies, all except for my brother, Léo. He was above this. But war had been declared and I would not accept the authoritarianism that they imposed on me anymore. I needed to get out, how could they not understand that? …how could they not?

In the middle of all this, the solution came. They made me, don’t ask me how, climb into the back of an ambulance. Lights, nurses in white, someone was accompanying me. I needed to run away, it was my only chance. I needed a plan. Where were they taking me? What were they going to do to me? How could they be going along with this? Of all people, it was the ones who claimed to love me the most. But I didn’t need them anymore, not even Sandra, not Tatiana, and not my girlfriend. I needed to embark within myself, there was a whole ‘I’ waiting for me, a kind of neitszchian superman.

They unloaded me in a strange, gloomy place. It wasn’t a hospital, I was sure of it. I resisted, or tried to, while they carried me to a hallway. I don’t know if I was alone, the three nurses and I, or if someone from my family accompanied me. When we reached this hall, my fullness erupted. The time had come. I inflated my chest and threw a punch that landed squarely on the first male nurse. The others came running after. I punched, bit, grabbed. I got beat, oh how I got beat up! Those damned cowards in white! One grabbed me from behind, by the neck and put me in a head lock. No, they hadn’t gotten the best of me yet. I tried to hit more. I roared, screamed. Sons-of-a-bitch! The bastard squeezed my neck to the point where my voice silenced. But they hadn’t beaten me yet, I would finish off the three of them. The other grabbed my arm. They put me in a chair and tied my arms back, both of them. And the bastard kept squeezing my neck. But I was still breathing, I had life in me yet. I can still feel the pressure on my neck even now, as if that arm never fully ceased to violate me.

They gave me an injection, but that bastard kept on squeezing. I was out of breath. They brought in the strait-jacket and crammed me into it, and this guy was still squeezing. I had to give up. I stopped screaming. I asked, I begged them to let go of me. The guy kept on sqeezing. My voice was totally gone. The guy went on choking me. You can let me go, I can’t move anymore. Then the guy squeezed even more. Let me go, I’m going to faint. Another squeeze. I want my mom, my family, who let you do this to me? He squeezed a little more. Don’t you see that I can’t even speak anymore? One last squeeze… I just barely blacked out.

I caught my breath and, even after being tied down to a chair and held in a strait-jacket, I starting screaming again. These injections don’t work on me! C’mon you cowards! Come one at a time and I’ll finish you all off, bastards! They left me there in that dark room, locked up. I yelled and screamed. Where is everyone? Someone let me go! I was beaten! This is outrageous! I am not crazy!

Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp…!

It was no use, my throat still felt suffocated, it hurt to speak. My screaming yielded no results. No one came. Maybe no one would ever come. All alone. Not even the voices were there to help me. A very claustrophobic feeling began to sink in, bound up in my own arms, which embraced me due to the strait-jacket. That’s it, my own arms imprisoned me, and I didn’t budge. The world was weighing heavily. The voices ceased.

I passed out.