The mouldy soil underneath Troy’s feet gracefully took in his thin leather slippers with every step and kissed the sides of his soles with its cold lips. There was something serene about the feeling. It felt more comforting than dirty as the mud elegantly flicked onto his calves. Lush green grass surrounded him on all four sides, and the bright blue sky above him had something very Van Gogh-y about it. The thin dwindling trail he strolled on had no definitive destination, but the Autumn-brown trees that graced the runway made it seem as though it was a pathway to pure bliss.
Troy recognized the irony of it all, though. The painted picture around him was lost on his mind that only saw black and white. He used to enjoy the scene he was experiencing at the moment, but it gradually became a pinprick in his numbed sensations, and Troy couldn’t point out just when it had become so. All he had done was let the stream take him along. Everything the world had to offer to him was black and white now. Somehow, happiness had just flown out the window. His smile, once toothy, hadn’t seen the light of day for what seemed like ages. His laugh not only lost its childlike innocence but had become altogether nonexistent. Days merged together, and time flew by in the banalest way imaginable. No one could point out what it was. He always did well at school. He seemed to have a lovely family. His social life might have been a little quiet, but there was never anything negative about it. There was just a gaping hole in his life that left no clue as to how it was to be filled.
They asked him to try therapy, those who were close to him. They sensed the subtle change in him – his personality seemed more of a facade than naturally conceived. The shrink had nothing to offer to Troy, though. His questions seemed to be going nowhere, and Troy was more comfortable lying than spitting out the truth when it came to uncomfortable questions. The small evening walks like the one he was taking then used to calm him because his thoughts would run free for that brief period. Now his mind was as plain as a baked brick – something that meditators longed for and something that Troy wanted to escape. His eyes aimlessly followed an ant that had taken rest on his forearm while his legs independently took him to the banyan tree that he sat by every evening. The sound around him was just background noise now. He failed to comprehend the happy couples that whispered around him. He had an irrational hatred for the partners that held hands and swayed about with smiles on their faces. He knew it wasn’t the romanticism he was envious of. Perhaps it was the joy he longed for.
Troy’s back felt like it was being prickled by the serrations of the tree trunk he leaned on. His head was haunted by random snippets of music- like Jazz trying to piece itself together but failing miserably. In the staccato that surrounded him, Troy saw two girls sprawled across a thick patch of grass. Their faces were just blurred to him, but he noticed their lips. Vivid pink and moving smoothly. He couldn’t hear them, but he sensed an intriguing conversation. There was something about the way they held themselves that told him they were happy. Content. They didn’t need smiles or laughter to show it. They just radiated a feeling. A feeling that Troy sensed could fill the gaping hole in his heart. Companionship. Not some sort of friendship that was disguised by faux laughter.
Something real. Maybe he had too much on his mind, and he needed something to pour it all onto. Perhaps that would be what brings back the color in his world. Troy got up with a sort of vigor he hadn’t sensed in ages. He had some purpose. A stupid, vague, fragile goal. He knew that but didn’t care because it was a feeling—an abstract sensory engagement.
Troy spent a lot of the coming weeks talking to people. Engaging. Wading through the darkness to find even a shimmer of light. He tried to smile, to enjoy the conversations he had with the people around him, but what he sought was buried so deep in a swarm of negativity and pain that it seemed impossible to find. Slowly, the interactions he had became platitudinous. The faces he saw became mundane. He started retracting again, haunting the same trail he used to frequent alone. The mountain he set out to scale started giving way underneath his feet, and he made no effort to resist. He found himself in a familiar place. Back against a tree, looking for something he wasn’t familiar with. One day, he got up, just like he had a few months ago. With a purpose, maybe not so vague as the last, but certainly a lot more extreme.
Twenty-one stories in the air gave Troy a brand new perspective on the world. Things looked so tiny down below. The cars and the people were just dots. Pointless and insignificant. He was standing on the edge, the cold air hitting him in the face. Troy didn’t feel cold, though. He looked forward to what lay ahead. Troy looked down a bit more, hoping his mind would for once form coherent thoughts rather than muddled noise. He looked straight ahead and saw his mum and dad. The two people he loved the most. Their image inspired a solitary tear to roll down his cheek. Troy sighed and turned around. His back facing what he had set out to do. Troy looked at the sky, wanting to scream out blind obscenities, but nothing came out. He tried to go forward, back to safety, but he felt resistance. So Troy closed his eyes and went the only way his legs let him go. He moved backward and no longer felt the concrete on his feet as he sacrificed his body to oblivion.
– Harry Patel, BTech Sophomore, IIT Guwahati
An avid sports fan, Harry can be found on the football pitch most days of the week. While away, however, he enjoys anything and everything pop-culture, whether it be books, movies, or music. One of his most favorite genres is psychological thrillers- a great way to explore the twisted nature of the human mind. The above piece is a derivative of this genre, demonstrating the perils of someone being trapped in their own mind. You can find him on Facebook and Instagram.
