Work Text:
Carmen doesn’t believe in anxiety
It’s a stupid excuse, really
A label that allows someone to act like a baby, to hide behind pills and therapy and breathing exercises
It’s a cop out,
Carmen knows this
But he can’t shake the irking sense
That his anxiety is going to kill him
It’s easy to ignore most of the time, everyone has their own problems, why should he believe that his are special?
But his stomach really, really hurts
He knows he’s hungry
Logically,
He knows he’s hungry
He ate three days ago, big family dinner, Donna slaved tirelessly over the stove for hours while he cut onions with a dull knife, just barely missing the thin skin over his finger pads
Once he had entered the dining room, aunts had pinched at his cheek and said,
“Carmy, you look like a skeleton!”
And he doesn’t want to look like a skeleton, and he hates being perceived, so really, he needs to stop losing weight so people would shut the fuck up
So he ate, he ate so, so fucking much
He had filled up his plate three different times,
piling on pasta and fish and bread and he even ate when dessert came out
Like a starved man
Shoveling cannoli into his mouth
and his mouth hurt from chewing, and the pale skin around his stomach was stretched thin, and his head ached, and his teeth shook- he’s pretty sure he has a cavity
And worst of all, his hands trembled
He had to squeeze his fork to stop it from spilling out of his hand
And everyone was talking so fucking much
And then the familiar turn in his stomach
The burn of everything rotten in his belly, a fire in his chest, acid in his throat
he could feel all his sins, all the shitty things he’s ever said, all the meals he’s skipped, all the people he’s made mad
all the times he’s made his brother mad
And he muttered an,
“Excuse me”
And tried his best not to sprint from the table
he didn’t even notice that his chair almost fell from behind him
And finally, finally
He slipped into the bathroom
Or more like tumbled into the bathroom
And like a little bitch
he slammed into the floor, groped for the toilet aimlessly
And let that horrible, horrible feeling take over
The feeling of all your insides
Running up your throat, clawing along the way
Bursting through your yellowed, deteriorated teeth
Past your chapped lips
and into the bowl.
And he was no longer nineteen-year-old Carmy, with thick hair and a big smile
He was no longer the young man who drove him and his brother to work, who lit up around his friends, who laughed like it was easy
He was eight again
Big eyed and big headed, and so so
fucking terrified
Biting his hands
hitting his head
pulling his hair out in chunks
and throwing up.
He ate three days ago and threw it up, So logically,
He knows he’s hungry.
but his hunger isn’t like Mikey’s, Mikey whose stomach grumbles and then he laughs and says,
“Damn, whose up for sandwiches?”
And his hunger isn’t like Richie's, who rubs at his chest and responds with,
“I could eat.”
His hunger shakes his bones, his hunger twists and turns and makes him dizzy, lightheaded,
nauseous
And how could he possibly eat when he’s dizzy, lightheaded, and nauseous?
When Carmy’s hungry, he vibrates, he picks at his skin, he bites the inside of his cheek and says,
“I’m good, you guys go without me.”
He had to go to therapy for a month, two years ago, when he had stupidly let it slip that the half healed-half picked at cut on his arm was because Mikey had thrown a knife at him when they were arguing
Mikey didn’t get in trouble, but he was pissed
everyone was pissed
Carmen hated himself, and his stupid therapist, and he didn’t talk to her,
except when he did talk to her
Except when he had ten minutes left of his last session and had stupidly said,
“Um, why, why can’t I eat?”
And his therapist had frowned and responded with,
“Sometimes our anxiety gets so bad, that we can’t perform tasks that seem easy, or even essential to our survival.”
So essentially,
Carmy cannot shake the irking sense
That his anxiety is going to kill him.