Damages

Sometimes I feel sorry for myself. Not in the way that most people would think. Not from grievance or resentment. Nothing passionate there. No flashes of feeling, burning red-hot. But coolly, calmly. Even remote. Like it's all happening to someone else.
And now there are two sides to me. The one with the flayed skin, the flesh wounds, struggling hard to hold on to some modicum of control. The other, the spectator. So rational in the midst of a personal storm.
It'll be fine, I can hear me telling myself. It'll pass, it always does. In a hour or two, the tears will stop and then you need to think of tomorrow, cold compress to help with the puffiness round the eyes and a strategy, to look and sound normal. How about reading that book now, a little distraction? You'll forget then. Oblivion, while there are still pages to turn.
Horrifying, that little voice. A clean split. I'm no longer who I used to be last year or the year before, the good years. Instead I'm six again. A terrified six. Or thirteen. Fifteen and lying in bed, feeling all the horrors of a forgotten dream, deliberating on the damages.
Now the headaches are starting again. Once more, my body is turning against itself. It must suffer because in my head is a clean split. And the calm me? It is not concerned with scars, nor with splits. Even the self-damage, even that, remains remote. And for that, I'm sorry.