Are You Okay?

She thought she was okay yesterday. And then today, okay was a whole three universes away. She had forgotten that okay was a very temporary thing. Okay didn't like to stay; to hang around and catch up on the not-so-okay that it missed in absence. It left before things got not-so-okay and then showed up again right on cue.

So how could she forget just how temporary it was?

Okay was heartless. Okay was cowardly. Why did she want to be okay in the first place? She couldn't remember. She couldn't remember, and that was precisely why. After she forgot, okay looked like the picture of perfection; the image of redemption; her only aspiration of any value anymore. Okay was the plain that she needed to be on, and she was leagues below in the less-than-okay, less-than-happy, and far less than where she needed to be. She was always looking up, looking on, at the trail of claw marks and scratches, and blood and sweat and tears, trailing after okay in its treacherous wake.

She thought she was okay yesterday and then okay abandoned her and left her drowning under the crushing waves of reality. There is up and there is down, and then there is a state of stagnant limbo smack in between, and the only state that is worth staying in is up. But that is impossible. Up requires down. Down requires up. Limbo is just a phase that happens somewhere in the middle, when up and down are slow in coming. Limbo is almost worse than down.

Limbo is hollow and empty, like a pair of lungs holding their breath at one stable level. Limbo doesn't move up or down; limbo doesn't breathe. If there's anything she fears more than falling down, it's staying still and giving up on breathing for a day. Giving up on moving. Giving up on living. She cannot deal with the feeling that there is nothing in a day worth doing; nothing in an hour worth trying; nothing in a minute worth thinking; nothing in a second worth seeing. She does not want to feel nothing; she does not want to feel like she cannot move because her body and her mind tell her that there is no point. She cannot stand the feeling when her own consciousness and subconsciousness alike turn against her and freeze her in place for what feels like an unfeeling eternity.

The better the up, the better. The worse the down, the better. Because nothing is worse than floating in a suffocating pool of nothingness, knowing that there is more than this; knowing that there is less; and feeling like there is no reason to fight for or against either anymore.

She thought she was okay yesterday, and then okay slowly dissolved into nothingness and she couldn't even claw for it back anymore, because nothing was worth it. And there are few things less okay than worthlessness.