Torment (A Novel)_Part one!!

Steele jolted awake, checking for targets in the room with quick glances. When he knew he was safe, he realized his body was tense and his teeth were grinding together. He did so often enough to have ground his k-9 teeth to flat. He made himself relax as much as possible, laying in a prone position still trying to catch his breath. A hand appeared on his back, soothing him as it rubbed his skin.

“Shhh,” she said, leaning close to his ear, “it’s a dream. Here.”

She slowly opened his right hand and placed his inhaler in his palm. As she sat next to him, rubbing her hand in his hair, she reassured him by saying “I’m right here.”

He used is inhaler and took a few deep breaths. After rubbing his eyes for a little while he sat up, aching in his back. He draped his legs over the bed and began massaging his knees, as he did most mornings, to get the blood flowing so standing up wasn’t an unpleasant experience. When he was satisfied, he stood, picked up his cigarettes, and headed for the porch. It was part of his morning ritual. He was trying to make his day routine, as he thought that he performed better with structure.

The morning was crisp, a slight cold biting at his lips as he smoked his morning cigarette. He started to stare at the end of it, admiring the fire. More time than he’d intended. Then, as if he were transported elsewhere, he saw his brother lying on the ground, missing a limb, and a butcher knife moving close to his arm as if being wielded by an invisible individual. He blinked and it was gone. After a long and exasperated sigh, he shook his head, expelling the image, and lit another cigarette.

Eva was still sitting on the bed when he returned.

“Are you ok?”

“Yeah, I just had to clear my head. Had one of those flashes again.”

“Do you want me to get your tablet so you can type it up?” she stood as if already knowing the answer and walked into the office and returned, holding his electronic device. He used it for everything that he could think of.

“Thanks,” he said and kissed her on the cheek, “I’m getting tired of taking these down. I’m the only one that reads the description and it’s shit that I don’t want to remember or think about.”

She held his hands, “This may help you. Maybe there’s a pattern, maybe it will help you find your triggers.”

He took his tablet, let out a sigh and sat to type up a description of what he saw in his mind. He saw it again as he began. His hands were visibly shaky as he typed.

By the time he was done, Eva was dressed and ready to leave for work. She kissed him and left after telling him she loved him. He stared at the door, slightly afraid to approach it. He thought of the things he had to do that day and started to breathe irregularly. Faster and deeper. He felt a pain in his chest and began to massage the spot where it seemed to originate. He took out his inhaler again and used it. His breathing began to slow as he was able to take deeper breaths. The pain subsided as he started to relax. As he did so, he slowly stood and made his way to the couch. After sitting, he began to tell himself about the importance of where he was going and the importance of him pushing himself. It was part of his therapy to force himself out of his house and stay out for as long as possible without breaking down. Prolonged exposure, they called it. He hated it, but even he could tell it was gradually working. Too gradually.

His goal today was to survive without an episode at one of his least favorite places: The bank. Steele was trying to work his way up to staying in the bank for 25 min, but he was stuck at “minute 18”, as he called it. He always spoke that way. “Stuck up mixed with military lingo,” is how she described his speech at times. Admittedly he did speak as if he were still in the service quite often, no matter how many weird looks he got. He would say words like “negative,” “affirmative,” and “roger.” And would give time in 24 hour format. However, his speech wasn’t only affected by his military service. It was also influenced by his chosen career field while serving: Military Intelligence. The title always brought a smile to his face. He’d think back to his favorite highschool teacher saying that the title was an oxymoron.

Steele took a deep breath, gathered himself, and walked calmly to his car.  His breathing began to quicken, but he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and it was normal again.  He put the car in reverse and began to back out of the driveway, looking behind him as best he could.  Suddenly, a mixture of slight pain and intense pressure gathered in the center of his chest.  His head and hands began to sweat.  A cramping feeling came upon his stomach and it began to rumble.  Steele leaned over, opened his door and vomited on the asphalt.  “Dammit,” he said aloud, “almost made it.”  It was another goal of his to increase the time that it took for him to have a vomiting spell after leaving the house.  He started on his porch.    Almost made it to the stop sign.  After glancing around for cars or onlookers, he wiped his face and closed the door.

The bank wasn’t very full when he arrived, a fact that he considered to be a good thing. Maybe I’ll do a bit better this time. He rubbed his temples and entered the line. Lines made his anxiety go through the roof. He couldn’t tell if it was the feeling of standing there and waiting to die or if it was standing there, being blocked in, and waiting to die. He very frequently felt a sense of imminent danger.

As he approached the front of the line, Steele realized he could hear things in the silence. He listened close to the sound of the man behind him chewing. Steele pictured a tall bearded man that looked like he could handle himself. He felt for his nice and found it safely in his belt. He turned around slowly acting as if he were looking for something and he saw that the person behind him was a teenage boy, a bit big for his age.

Steele turned back to the front and realized he needed to move forward. After he did so he was on deck to be seen by a teller. He glanced at the tellers, taking not of how they made him feel. One of the male tellers had an evil look on his face. So evil that it spooked Steele to the core. His mind became flooded with pictures of knives cutting skin, pictures that seemed to have a mind of their own and we’re pulling him in a direction. His face? He thought, you want me to cut off his face? He felt again for his knife.

He was called to the next teller, a friendly looking blonde in the booth next to whom we will refer to as “knife in face.” Her smile set him at East as he approached her area of the counter.

“Yes, ma’am,” he began, “I need to deposit this into savings. All except fifty dollars.”

“May I see your ID?”

Steele went through all the motions to accomplish his task and while he was doing so, something in the back of his mind was speaking to him, reminding him of the man next to his teller. Steele looked through the corner of his eye to try to catch a glimpse of his face. He was frowning, wearing a long goatee and an oversized trench coat. The hair on the back of Steele’s neck stood on end. His hands began to shake. He imaged the man’s unfriendly face glaring at him while searching pockets for a knife.

“Drop him,” a voice said from somewhere next to him.

Steel glanced again and reached to the back of his belt, where he kept his knife. It wasn’t there. A few months before, he stopped carrying his knives with him everywhere at the advice of his counselor. He still was in the habit of reaching for it when he felt threatened. Shit, he thought.

“He’s standing parallel to you. Side of the knee, cup the ear as he lowers after the blow to confuse him, well-placed right hook to put him down.” Said he’s thoughts.

It’s not real, he repeated over and over in his mind.

“Twenty, Forty, and fifty, said someone in front of him.”

He opened his eyes. The teller was smiling and handing him the cash that he requested, “Are you ok?” the teller asked.

He wiped his brow and rubbed his eyes, “I’m fine,” he said putting the cash into his wallet, “just a little dizzy.” He smiled at the worker, said “thank you, ma’am,” and walked briskly to the door.

He entered his car and ran all of his fingers though his hair, blowing air from his lungs forcefully through pursed lips. “Its ok,” he repeated to himself. Over and over again until he felt calm. He then lit a cigarette, started his car and headed to his next destination.

As he drove, his mind took over and began showing him memories of times he wasn’t violent when he felt, now, that he should have been. He remembered his childhood friend and next door neighbor, Jason, was being picked on by another one of Steele’s friends from class, Jamal. Jason cried out for help, but Steele did nothing but talk to Jamal. I should have made him bleed. I’d been through some training by then. He was then reminded of a time when his mother told him that he was too weak for military service. At that time, he thought of his retirement lunch when he medically retired from military service. She was probably fucking right.

He slammed on his breaks, seeing a stop sign at the last moment. Steele waited for a car to pass by that was going abnormally slow. The vehicle then entered its left turn Lane.

“You Fuckers,” he said aloud. “they should put a stop sign there for them. The Fuckers. There should be a big stop sign that says ‘stop fuckers’ in huge letters.”

He was on a mission when he arrived at his apartment. He needed to dispel the shakes and the queasy feeling he was experiencing in the pit of his stomach. He leaned against the wall and slid down, touching down softly on the floor below him. He looked down as he sat and stared at something below but in front of him. He didn't know why it caught his attention but something in the floor reminded him of sitting on the floor in the latrine a few years back. He remembered sitting there for a great deal of time, contemplating what he thought was his mistake.

When Steele was overseas it was his job to help mission planning cells(planned the missions for different aircraft) by giving them mission materials that made it easier for the pilots to talk to the grunts on the ground. He had been assigned a big mission, his sergeant called him a "super star" because of his good performance with complex missions and the fact that he got the commander's attention because of his work. He did that mission to his best abilities, just like he did any other. Later, as the aircraft was launching with his trusted materials, he realized he'd given the wrong coordinates to the pilots for the ground troop's locations of interest. During the mission a firefight ensued in the sector that he missed. There were mix-ups with the mission materials and the troops were under fire for a little longer than they could handle. Five died. At least that was the number he'd heard from his Army friends over beer and cards. He thought back to the shame he felt when proving himself "stupid" in the eyes of his mother after she'd had a rough day and made him put his hands in his pockets and let her slap him because he mixed up the numbers on a receipt. His stomach cramped more, bringing him closer to the floor. Then, without any warning or provocation, he vomited on the tile next to him.

He made the decision to make his way to his favorite and most hated room in his apartment. The smoking room. He was comfortable in the room. It set him at ease. He could freely smoke, watch movies on his tablet, or work on his laptop. However, he was also known to shut himself in there for hours and hours on end sending his depression plummeting.

He sat in his favorite chair and picked up his locked briefcase next to him. He unlocked it, took out its contents and set it on the floor. In his lap were his grinder, his green, and his pipe. His shaking hands packed his bowl as best as they could.

He took his first drag hard and coughed to beat hell for almost a good two minutes. His second drag was easier, he breathed in slowly, held his breath, and breathed out again. He continued at this pace until the bowl was all ash.

His jaw and fists unclenched. His shaking subsided and it felt like some one just flipped a switch in his had that he thought had to have been labeled “Good Mood Switch.” He began to thank God for another day of life and thought about spontaneous things he could do for his girlfriend and about the fact that he hadn't called his parents in a few weeks.

Steele put down his pipe and thought a moment. He thought of food and where he wanted to eat and how he could get there. “I’ll probably just take my car,” he thought. “its all that’s here. For a minute I thought I could take my motorcycle, but I sold it. I wish I hadn’t sold it. I wish I didn’t trade in my Chrysler either. I loved that car. By far, the best car I’ve ever owned. Ok what was I doing?”

He looked around to look for anything to tell him what he was originally doing. He noticed a hopping grasshopper and thought that it was probably the “biggest grasshopper he’s ever freakin seen.”

He glanced down by his feet and noticed the long grass blowing in the wind. “Someone should cut the grass. It looks like it hasn’t been cut in weeks. In reality, it could have been cut yesterday, it grows so fast. Like my hair. My hair grows fast as shit. I wish my facial hair did that. I want a goatee like fu man Chu. All long, and flowing and shit. It looks better to do karate in public when you look like that. Even though fu man Chu is Chinese and karate is Japanese.“

He looked up and looked around him, “what was I doing?”

Steele felt a pang in his stomach. “I’m fuckin hungry.” He paused a moment and scratched his very not-like-fu-man-chu goatee and said aloud, “I feel like I’ve been here before.”

On his way to the restaurant, Steele picked up a few of his friends. After all, it was Saturday, he didn’t have to work, and he needed the distraction. He picked up James, Dan, and Rudy, his usual smoking buddies. He would tell his family that they do other things than smoke together, but he could never think of a single thing.

When he pulled into the drive thru he noticed that the woman ahead of him and line was waving her hands at the drive thru sign and talking to the screen. He watched as she did so, hands flailing about. He wondered, is there anyone she’s actually helping by pointing? Who the fuck is she pointing for?

“James,” Steele called to the back of the van.

“Fuck you.” James answered.

“Your mom sucks cock. Check out this chick ahead of us.”

James crawled to the front of the van and looked through the windshied. “Yup. Idiot. Hey man, do gyros spoil?”

“Yeah, they have a cream based sauce…”

“Cream based sauce? All I get is meat and vegetables.”

“No dude, whenever I get a gyro, it has a thin white sauce on it.”

“Dude, I think you should switch restaurants.”

“Can I help you?” said the speaker.

“Yes ma’am,” Steele turned, “dude, sit the fuck down. Yes ma’am can I have four gyro combo meals please?”

“What to drink?”

“Mt. Dew for all of them. Large please.”

“That’ll be 25.27, please pull around.”

They pooled their money together, paid and went home for their normal festivities.

As they started to have their pre-meal smoke, James picked up Steele’s journal and began to page through it. It didn’t bother him, to him, his present company was the equivalent of family. Only less judgmental and more supportive. Steele chuckled as the thought crossed his mind.

James passed the pipe to his left after taking a hit. It went around twice before any of them said anything, James still browsing the journal.

Rudy poured out the pipe’s burnt contents and lit a cigarette. The rest followed suit.

“Dude,” Rudy said to Dan.

“Whats up?”

“What were we talking about the other day that I said we should tell James and Steele?”

Dan thought for a moment, a look on his face that conveyed both confusion and concentration. “Dude!” He exclaimed, a little louder than the rest of the group liked. “Nazi time travel. It’s a thing, dude.”

“Nazi time travel?” Steele asked.

“Yeah man. I think they created a time machine. They go around through time changing shit.”

“Wouldn’t they have stopped themselves from losing the war?” Dan asked.

“I’d like to think they would stop Hitler from being an asshole.” Answered Rudy.

“Hey Steele, do you have an electric blanket?” asked Dan, “I’m cold as shit.”

“Yeah I have a couple.” Steele left the room for a moment and returned with a thick blanket, a chord hanging from the bottom.

“I know about electric blankets because, when I was little, my mom said ‘I’m gonna save money on heating and… spend it on meth.” Dan said, looking very happy to have an electric blanket.

“See, this is why I think you’re a genius, man,” James said pointing to a page, “did you proofread or edit this?”

“No, dude. It’s a journal entry.”

“Can I read it to these guys?”

“Sure.”

James began,

“Something just came to me as I had a cigarette and, as I often do (not on purpose), started wallowing in the darkest recesses of my mind. I thought of what my thoughts were about, as per the direction of one of my counselors. I was thinking about the things I couldn’t do, can’t do, or haven’t done and it was one of those times when my thoughts are particularly potent. Often times, I think of things I need to do and I make plans of how to accomplish what I want. However other times, the thoughts are very powerful reminders of how I’ve failed myself and my family. They repeat themselves and seem to get louder with each repetition until it’s too much for me to handle and I either smoke, drink, or do something stupid. Do something that others would consider drastic to break the cycle of self-loathing that’s taken over my mind at the time. Things that I don’t even want to admit that I’ve done.

I thought about this and it occurred to me that I was doing it to myself. Even if I have a chemical imbalance or a disrupted past that was making it easier to get into this state of mind, I was still doing it to myself. So what was causing it? I’ve learned that when my mood changes and I have no idea why, there’s still a reason. There’s always a reason. Then, I had a thought that I was pretty sure I’d read before. “The Buddha discovered that the direct causes of suffering are desire or craving, and ignorance.” Then, it started echoing in my head, “to want is to suffer.” And not meaning I can’t want a cheese burger or ice cream. But desire, to want more than anything to have or to attain, so much that it takes all of my focus and all of my being can cause suffering. Suffering when I don’t have or can’t do. Experiencing a powerful want for something that can be seen as impossible to attain. For me, with my brain being the way it is for whatever reason, it turned into self-hatred, anger and depression. With the other diagnoses, I rapidly got worse. The anger made me an asshole. I got more and more rage-full. I started hating people for being happy, at least on the outside, including people very close to me. I declined and got worse until finally I broke. I lost the life that I had because of it

My counselor says that the saying “you can want but you can never have” is very accurate. We’ll always want. And we’ll want what we don’t have. So what am I really wanting? More money? That seems kinda shallow for me. A better job? No.

To be me again instead of what I’ve let myself turn into.”

They all looked at him for a moment, looking around at eachother, not knowing what to say.

“You’ll get it back, man.” James said.

“I don’t need sympathy. But thanks man.”

Steele attempted to turn the door knob to the bathroom but it wouldn’t turn. A voice came softly from inside. “Don’t touch me…”

“God dammit, James, hurry up, I gotta piss.”

“I said don't touch me, dude!” Said James from the bathroom in a normal and irritated tone. Silence for a moment; Almost enough to make it awkward. “...fine, I'm just sittin' here anyway. I'll be out in a sec.”

Steele returned to his seat next to Dan. As he sat, he looked at the TV to keep watching the show that they'd picked out as a group. “Hey. I thought that guy was winning.”

“He was,” answered Dan.

“Yeah, dude,” Rudy followed, “He start kicking the androgynous dude's ass when he started to use his lasers.”

Steele thought he seemed a little too happy about what was happening on the screen and even more eager to share his opinion. “Good word. I see you've been reading. He has lasers?”

Rudy sat back, “YOU fuckin read...”

“I told him what it means. We were talking about Prince.” Whispered Dan.

“But,” interrupted James from behind, rolling his eyes. “If I had lasers, I'd fuckin' lead with that.”

Steele made his way to the bathroom and began to use it. He could hear the other three laughing in the other room and chuckled to himself. He repeatedly came to the conclusion that he and his friends were idiots. He, as always, came to the conclusion that he was fine with that. He felt he was allowed to enjoy his time away from the work force. He didn't exactly have an easy time for the last few years of his life.

As he finished, he heard knocking on the door upstairs and James running down the hallway shouting “I got it, I got it, I got it, I got it…” After a few moments, Steele could hear muffled talking but was unable to under what they were saying. He came out of the door and walked up the stairs to see who had paid him a visit.

He saw a familiar woman standing in he door way with his favorite animal in the world. His dog Damien. His ex-wife was returning him as she was always closed to the pet and wanted to take him to the dog park.

“Damien...” Steele said in a low grumble.

Damien barked and wagged his tail his whole body shook.

“He seemed to have a good time.” She said.

“Good. I don't get to take him to the dog park very often.”

“I know. How's that girl you were seeing?”

“Jesus, Sabrina. I don't want to talk about this again.” Steele snapped.

“Well what do you want me to do? I want to tell your mom you've moved on. She's been emailing me and you're not talking to anyone but these assholes.” She snapped pointing at James.

“Damien.” Steele said with in a low, quick burst and snapped his fingers. Damien trotted to his side. “I'll call her. Did you bring my guitar?”

“I left it in my car. I'll bring it by tomorrow after work.”

Damien looked to the road to see her mode of transportation. “John has a nice car. He didn't want to come up?”

“He's...” she shifted and put her hand on her hip,” ...he said he's uncomfortable around you. I told him you can be a little jealous and you're a pretty big guy. He doesn't want to start shit.”

Steele looked at her, irritated. “He's fine. He can come up. I'll give him a beer or something.” He lightly shrugged and paused. Then “But after he finishes it, he has to get the fuck out of my house.”

“Whatever.” she turned and left.

Steel and James stood at the door as they drove away.

“Did he move in yet?” asked James.

“Yes.” answered Steele. He closed the door as they drove away. “That's what her brother said.”

They both paused. Steele ran his fingers through his hair.

“You have Eva, though man.”

“Yeah, dude.” He took his glasses off and began to clean them. “I'm cool.”

“Fuck her.” James said after more silence, “its 4:20, anyway, dude.”

“Yeah.”

Dan took the first hit off of Rudy's favorite bong that he brought as a treat for the others. It was their favorite bong too. Rudy packed the bowl for him previously.

“Thanks for greens.” Dan said through an exhale of smoke. He passed the piece to Steele to have a turn.

Steele only just began enjoying the herb when he was discharged from the service. He didn't want to at first, as he hadn't his entire life before, but his medicine wasn't working well enough for him to feel as though he could make it through the day with no problems. He remembered the day he made the decision to start, He'd told himself that he'd only smoke while the doctors were figuring out an appropriate medical combination for him.

He was sitting on his couch, after having a panic attack. His breathing was still rapid and he was sweating from his forehead and back. He opened the pill bottle that contained the medicine he was supposed to take in times like this. He looked on the side of it to read the instructions to make sure it said what he already knew without question. Take up to 3 times a day. He had already taken it twice. His wife left that morning and he tried to leave to go to the gym. He began having difficulty breathing. His hands were shaking so much that he would have had trouble opening the pill bottle if he had it in his hands. Panting, he got to his medicine box and was able to have a dose followed by the breathing techniques he learned from the Mental health staff at the Department of Veterans Affairs Hospital that was only a 20 min drive from his house. He had another one two hours later when writing his Resumé.

It was one in the afternoon, and he'd already taken his doses of clonazepam for the day. He wondered if he should stay home and stay inside for the rest of the day to avoid having another episode. He thought about the possible implications of taking his medicine so often and was reminded of his wife telling him that marijuana doesn't react with most, if not all, prescription drugs. He had also read reports and seen documentaries that it was able to help patients with high levels of anxiety. He thought, maybe it'll help the anger episodes that I've been having for a while. His definition of “a while”, in this instance, is about three years, increasing in strength and frequency daily, it seemed.

When he later found out that his doctors weren't sure of how to help him medicinally, he decided to start using the herb. The side effects of the medicine at the dose the he need that helped him most caused him to shake so much that he, sometimes, would be unable to eat with a with a fork. He didn't come to the decision easily, but eventually thought it was the best course of action.

The bong had gotten back to Rudy, now, and he was asking if the rest of them thought he could clear the bowl.

“Nah dude,” James said, “give the last hit to Steele, man. He's had a bad day.”

Rudy handed over the piece. Steele wouldn't take it. “Its ok, man. We got more.”

Rudy accepted and cleared the bowl.

Steele opened his laptop to check his email. He'd been waiting for a response from companies that he'd applied to two weeks prior. He was very pleased to see that he had a reply from one company, in which he was greeted very professionally. It read:

Mr. Redman,

I was very delighted to see your resume and contact your references. You are a very good fit for a position we have here at the company. However, our security manager found an incident in your history. There is no description or report, it seems like the information is closed. We are unable to hire anyone with a current incident. When you have cleared his incident from your record, please give me a call or send me an email and we'll see if we can get you in.

Thank you for your interest in our company,

“Sincerely,” Steele read aloud and then added his own, “Mr. Go-fuck yourself-because-the-war-messed-you-too-bad…Jones.”

Steele held the letter over a lit lighter and placed it in the fireplace that they were all seated around. Steele had gotten into the habit of disposing of sensitive things so they could never be seen again, so he often burned credit card applications, appointment letters, anything with any bit of sensitive information about him.

“What incident they talkin' 'bout?” Asked Rudy.

James was the only one of the group that knew of a lot of the events with Steele because they lived together.

“Don't worry about it, man.” James snapped.

Rudy looked down, realizing that he may have asked a question with an answer that was too sensitive for Steele to share. He was the newest addition to the group that began with Steele and Dan in their first job as young adults – Pizza delivery. James was a friend of Dan that was added when he moved into town in their thirties, a little after Steele left active duty, and was quickly accepted. They all spent that year and the next stuck in a routine of work, exercise, a little bit of family time, and large quantities of alcoholic beverages. All had jobs that they were satisfied with and the people closest to them often wondered how they were able to maintain work.

Steele was working as a software developer, Dan was an auto mechanic, and James was a starving photographer, always looking for work. Four years after Steele left service, he began to have symptoms of mental illness such as agoraphobia, paranoia, rage, depression, and severe mood instability. The first to present was agoraphobia.

Steele began to avoid the gym, to which he would go four days a week, because of all the people that would be there when at the times he would go. He started to go at times that he thought no one would be there. He tried going at five thirty in the morning and found that there were others that had the same idea that he had – and lots of others. Next, he tried to go at five in the morning and do a quicker, harder workout that he had designed specifically to use the least amount of time as possible that he would then do again later in the day. This worked for him for almost 5 months before there was a class that had just the same idea in mind that started 15 min before he got there. There was a man in the class that Steele thought had been staring at him every time he squatted.

His knee had been hurting from “over use” (that's what the doctor called it) that resulted in an injury that made it a little difficult to do certain things. He started having trouble with stairs and exiting and entering cars and activities of the like. Then he began to limp and use a cane, after which his wife gave him what she later called “a light suggestion” to go to the doctor. He referred Steele to physical therapy where he learned that a pain that he'd been having since he was twenty four should not have been ignored for the sake of duty. He'd been told that the idea may seem silly to civilians. He, however, saw nothing silly about it. He, somehow, hadn't thought about the possibility of the pain getting worse in the future. By the time he went to the hospital for treatment, the therapist told him that if he'd waited longer, he'd have to wear a split.

As a result, he couldn't squat as much as he once could, and his knees would slightly buckle if he tried to push it farther. Again, a silly idea. But it was how Steele had gotten the injury in the first place. He'd keep pushing himself until he began to have pain in different parts of his body. Shortly after his knee issue had been diagnosed, he began to have pain between the outside of his shoulder and the start of his collar bone. He later found out, he had strained a muscle.

He buckled while squatting and quickly set the bar on the rack. He turned, in a great deal of pain, and it seemed like the man was staring at him once again. He looked closer and thought he recognized him from a fugitive list that he'd seen pass his desk at work. He looked again and became almost certain that the man from the list was not far away from him. He looked over at his bag where he knew there was a knife. He looked at the rack for weights that he could throw easily and still damage his target. He estimated the steps between him and the man and stood. He began to get this pain in his chest which seemed to affect his breathing. A bead of sweat dripped in his eye and shook his attention. He realized his hands were wrapped around the power rack, gripping as tight as possible. He looked again and saw that the man was too tall, had a different hair color, and a longer wing span. He released his hold and thought of the things that were going through his mind and thought, Oh my God, I wanted to kill that guy. What is wrong with me?”

The next day, he went in and told his psychiatrist. He began to avoid the gym all together. A deep depression seemed to take hold of him at that time and he began to drink more and gain weight. He started to avoid busy stores and stadiums. The more he shut himself in, the more afraid he became which led to him to isolate more. Eventually, going to work was very difficult for him. He started to have panic attacks that would take him away from his work, seemingly out of the blue. After almost three years of those symptoms, he lost his job due to suspicion of instability. He'd told friend, in private, that he thought he should go to the doctor because he felt like harming people passing by in the commons. The friend told their supervisor. He was asked to not come back to work.

Now it was the only blemish on an otherwise impeccable and impressive record. His willingness to go to therapy and participation in therapy didn't seem to matter because the blemish big enough to make future employers apprehensive about hiring him.

“It's ok, man,” Steele said, extending his arm half way, “he can know too.”

“It's cool, man.” Rudy answered, “I didn't know it was a thing like that.”

“It's ok. Last year, I started having these episodes. And I told a friend that, during these episodes, I sometimes have violent thoughts about hurting myself or others.”

The all went quiet for what felt like ten years.

“That why you smoke?” Asked Rudy.

“Yeah. The rage and shit is a bitch.” Steele chuckled, apparently giving them permission to laugh as well.

Rudy smiled and tilted his head back slightly. “I can help you wit' that.”