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10
book/content/ally/001.tex
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@ -6,10 +6,12 @@ It doesn't need to be totally true, and maybe some stuff gets pretty floaty, and
That might be neat
\ally{Who are you kidding?}
\begin{ally}
Who are you kidding?
\end{ally}
Myself, I guess.
\ally{Well, have at it, then.}
\begin{ally}
Well, have at it, then.
\end{ally}
\newpage

20
book/content/ally/002.tex
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@ -4,20 +4,24 @@
I'm not ready to share this yet.
\ally{But you want to save it?}
\begin{ally}
But you want to save it?
\end{ally}
I want to save it.
\ally{But you save it like this. You save it in a book. You obscure the meaning, but it's there. It's in the ink. It's on the page. It's in the realm of the physical.}
\begin{ally}
But you save it like this. You save it in a book. You obscure the meaning, but it's there. It's in the ink. It's on the page. It's in the realm of the physical.
\end{ally}
That's not the same as sharing.
\ally{It's exactly the same as sharing.}
\begin{ally}
It's exactly the same as sharing.
\end{ally}
And who asked you?
\ally{Who invoked me?}
\begin{ally}
Who invoked me?
\end{ally}
Well played.
\vfill

75
book/content/ally/003.tex
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@ -1,17 +1,21 @@
\ally{Do you remember when you met me?}
\begin{ally}
Do you remember when you met me?
\end{ally}
When I met you? I don't remember it so much as a meeting as you were just already there.
\ally{I was, yes.}
\begin{ally}
I was, yes.
\end{ally}
After high school, then. That's when you showed up. That's when life began. That's when I started thinking of myself as a person. That's when I started thinking of others as people, with their own motivations, their own desires, their own incentives and failings.
\ally{And you made it through.}
\begin{ally}
And you made it through.
\end{ally}
After a fashion.
\ally{You're here, now. You made it through.}
\begin{ally}
You're here, now. You made it through.
\end{ally}
\begin{verse}
\emph{She never wanted to be\\
\vin What she became;\\
@ -19,18 +23,21 @@ After a fashion.
\vin \vin \vin Is not lost on her.}
\end{verse}
\ally{Touching.}
\begin{ally}
Touching.
\end{ally}
Hey now, don't be rude. Aren't you supposed to be my ally?
\ally{I \textbf{am} your ally. I'm just not your friend.}
\begin{ally}
I \textbf{am} your ally. I'm just not your friend.
\end{ally}
Fair enough.
So you showed up after high school. You showed up after life slid sideways through puberty. I went digging, you know. To find this out.
\ally{Oh?}
\begin{ally}
Oh?
\end{ally}
Yeah. June 2004. There you are. I say,
\begin{quotation}
@ -39,36 +46,44 @@ The navy blue I've been seeing at waist level in front of me and to my left is c
And you replied\ldots{}?
\ally{You're rambling.}
\begin{ally}
You're rambling.
\end{ally}
So pleased you remember.
\ally{You're rambling.}
\begin{ally}
You're rambling.
\end{ally}
I suppose I am. But there you were. You said \emph{You're rambling} to which I replied ``Guilty, conspirator.'' And that was that. That was us. We never greeted each other. Why would we?
I kept digging, too. You stuck around for a year. I saw you off and on until June 2005. In October, 2004, I said that empathy is cooler in person. \emph{Why?} you asked. \emph{So you can verify? Don't you trust your feelings?} I said I didn't know, and then I begged you not to go.
\ally{Everyone always leaves, don't they?}
\begin{ally}
Everyone always leaves, don't they?
\end{ally}
Perhaps. It's good to hear from you again. Even after fourteen years, I've missed you.
\ally{And what was the last thing I said to you?}
\begin{ally}
And what was the last thing I said to you?
\end{ally}
\emph{I was going to call you emo, or suicidal, but no, not goth.} It was when Ash and Shannon and I found a house to move into.
\ally{I believe I also called you a prick.}
\begin{ally}
I believe I also called you a prick.
\end{ally}
Was I?
\ally{Yes.}
\begin{ally}
Yes.
\end{ally}
Am I still?
\ally{Yes, but a different kind.}
\begin{ally}
Yes, but a different kind.
\end{ally}
You're as chipper now as you were then.
\ally{Yes, but a different kind.}
\begin{ally}
Yes, but a different kind.
\end{ally}
\newpage

125
book/content/ally/004.tex
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@ -1,107 +1,132 @@
\ally{Why am I here?}
\begin{ally}
Why am I here?
\end{ally}
Aren't you always?
\ally{With you, sure. Why am I bound to words, though? It's been fourteen years.}
\begin{ally}
With you, sure. Why am I bound to words, though? It's been fourteen years.
\end{ally}
Surely that's not all on me. You must play some role in it. I was talking with my partner about doing something autobiographical for my next project, after all.
\ally{I'm the observer and the mirror. All I can do is reflect your choices back at you. Choice itself is not my department.}
\begin{ally}
I'm the observer and the mirror. All I can do is reflect your choices back at you. Choice itself is not my department.
\end{ally}
After getting \emph{Restless Town} finished, I needed something to do. Some other project that would make me feel like I was being productive.
\ally{Feel, or seem?}
\begin{ally}
Feel, or seem?
\end{ally}
Both. If I sat still, I'd burn up. If I was seen sitting still, clearly I'd be worth less in the eyes of those around me, right?
\ally{Not my department.}
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
\end{ally}
Right.
So I started digging through stuff I'd already done, seeing if any of it could be cleaned up and turned into a new project. I stumbled across \emph{Rum and Coke} and found it mostly clean as it was, so I decided to publish it as a book. Paperback and ebook, I mean, not just the stories online.
\ally{Were you proud of them?}
\begin{ally}
Were you proud of them?
\end{ally}
To an extent. A different me wrote them. A lesser me, in some ways. I was younger, I hadn't quite found my voice and tone. No \emph{Arcana}, no \emph{Disappearance}, no \emph{Getting Lost} or \emph{Post-Self}. All I had was a few scattered tidbits and my mom's words ringing in my ears: "You wrote your own wedding vows, right? I could tell."
A me with a different identity, too. A me that was working on gender through small steps. I hadn't yet picked up the word 'trans' for myself. I was non-binary, presenting male, writing to justify myself. Or maybe to hype myself up. I was writing works about gender and poly problems being worked through to convince myself it was possible.
\ally{They read like parables.}
\begin{ally}
They read like parables.
\end{ally}
They were, to me. Each one came with an internal discussion after the last line, \emph{now, what can we take from this?} Something in a circle. Socratic. A talking stick.
\ally{I know, I was there.}
\begin{ally}
I know, I was there.
\end{ally}
Of course.
\ally{Why didn't I show up then?}
\begin{ally}
Why didn't I show up then?
\end{ally}
I was too\ldots{}something. Too busy, too preoccupied. I was focused too much on identity, too much on The Work, as it were, to reflect. Maybe I was moving too quickly to notice my choices being shown to me.
\ally{You'd mostly stopped [adjective][species] by then, too.}
\begin{ally}
You'd mostly stopped [adjective][species] by then, too.
\end{ally}
Life got weird. I was transitioning--
\ally{A choice.}
\begin{ally}
A choice.
\end{ally}
--I was solidifying my relationship with Judith--
\ally{A choice.}
\begin{ally}
A choice.
\end{ally}
--I was starting to burn out at work--
\ally{Was that a choice?}
\begin{ally}
Was that a choice?
\end{ally}
The result of choices, maybe. The result of the choice to start drinking. It \emph{is} called \emph{Rum and Coke}, after all. The result of the choice to get into computers. The result of the choice to work from home, which itself was the result of a choice to take the previous job so far from home.
\ally{You burned out in part because you burned so hard at the start.}
\begin{ally}
You burned out in part because you burned so hard at the start.
\end{ally}
Was I not supposed to? I had to prove myself.
\ally{To whom?}
\begin{ally}
To whom?
\end{ally}
You?
\ally{Not my department.}
\begin{ally}
Not my department.
\end{ally}
One of your neighbors, perhaps. A cubicle over, a floor above, something like that.
\ally{Do you anthropomorphize me that much?}
\begin{ally}
Do you anthropomorphize me that much?
\end{ally}
No, I suppose, I don't. You're not my therapist, sitting in a chair across from me and talking me through my problems. You're not person shaped. You're the shape of my hands displaced half an inch behind my own, navy blue and trimmed with sea-foam green.
\ally{You haven't used colors in fourteen years, either.}
\begin{ally}
You haven't used colors in fourteen years, either.
\end{ally}
What I'm trying to say is that maybe you're back because of nostalgia. *Restless Town* was done and couldn't be published yet, and a prideful part of me didn't want it to be my first book, so I pulled *Rum and Coke* into shape.
It rubbed my nose in the past. I published it a few weeks ago, and I wasn't done with the past, so I started archiving more data. I dug up my old hard drives. I grabbed stuff from Dreamhost, both files and database backups. I finally unlocked my LJ account and archived that.
\ally{And you work at an archive.}
\begin{ally}
And you work at an archive.
\end{ally}
I go through phases, looking back at the past. I'll spend a few days trying to backdate some log files, or dig through my old scores and publish them --- I did that too, alongside \emph{Rum and Coke}, publish a bunch of my old music --- or resurrect my notes on \emph{Nanon}, or the like.
\ally{You are quite mercurial.}
\begin{ally}
You are quite mercurial.
\end{ally}
A failing. That may play a role in my burnout. I'm only good at something for seven years before it becomes so intolerable that I have to leave. Happened with school.
\ally{So here I am, your ally, twice seven years later.}
\begin{ally}
So here I am, your ally, twice seven years later.
\end{ally}
I hadn't thought of it that way.
\ally{Portentous. The only way it would've been more so is if it were thrice seven years.}
\begin{ally}
Portentous. The only way it would've been more so is if it were thrice seven years.
\end{ally}
I ran away thrice seven years ago. In seventh grade, in 1997, no less.
\ally{Ill omens. What will happen to me in seven years?}
\begin{ally}
Ill omens. What will happen to me in seven years?
\end{ally}
Will you leave me for good?
\ally{Can an ally disinhabit a mind so easily?}
\begin{ally}
Can an ally disinhabit a mind so easily?
\end{ally}
I'm not comfortable with that question. I'm not comfortable with its implications. Either way, the past is important to me because maybe it can help me figure out the present. Those who don't know history are doomed to blah blah blah.
\ally{And have you figured out your present?}
\begin{ally}
And have you figured out your present?
\end{ally}
For me to pull out that trite quote about my own personal history speaks pretty well to my fears of doing things accidentally. I've certainly figured out my present better than twice-seven-years-ago me had figured out his.
\newpage

65
book/content/ally/005.tex
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@ -2,60 +2,73 @@ When 2007 rolled around, I turned 21. \emph{What if,} I thought to myself. \emph
By that point, alcohol was this nebulous thing. I'd roped a few people into getting me alcohol now and then, and it was fine. I'd started brewing and it was whatever. I had beer and it was alright. I went through a mead phase--
\ally{You went through several.}
\begin{ally}
You went through several.
\end{ally}
--I went through a wine phase, and an absinthe phase--
\ally{Don't sell yourself short. You wrote an essay on absinthe.}
\begin{ally}
Don't sell yourself short. You wrote an essay on absinthe.
\end{ally}
--and a gin phase. That's the one that got me. I had a bottle of Beefeater's, what was to become my gin of choice, and I had an inch of it poured over ice and I was standing in the kitchen. Such a wide open space. The kitchen at that apartment was larger than my bedroom now, and it opened onto a living room the size of what we have now. I was standing tall in that vast plain of a room, staring down into my glass and watching the way the ice melting into the gin created swirls of two different kinds of transparent. I was thinking how it was probably due to the different ways the two liquids refracted light, and then I was laughing, because I was staring down into my drink like something out of a bar.
*What if I decided to see what it feels like to be addicted to something?* I thought. I drank every night that week.
\ally{Why ruin your life on accident when you can do it on purpose?}
\begin{ally}
Why ruin your life on accident when you can do it on purpose?
\end{ally}
I don't think I was thinking in those terms at that point.
\ally{Are you now?}
\begin{ally}
Are you now?
\end{ally}
Perhaps.
\ally{Maybe you're just afraid of doing anything by accident.}
\begin{ally}
Maybe you're just afraid of doing anything by accident.
\end{ally}
Perhaps.
\ally{You're sounding like me more by the day.}
\begin{ally}
You're sounding like me more by the day.
\end{ally}
Learn from the best.
\ally{And so you set about with a will.}
\begin{ally}
And so you set about with a will.
\end{ally}
Like magic. I set forth my will with a stated goal and made it happen. My spell was spoken and washed down with liquor. I drank nearly every day from then on out. I spent thousands of dollars on alcohol over the next ten years. I went through more mead phases and more beer phases. I went through a distillation phase. Magic is empowerment through attention to detail.
\ally{The MEAD principle. Cute.}
\begin{ally}
The MEAD principle. Cute.
\end{ally}
I drank hard with the choir, and then I left school and drank hard with the programmers. If there's one thing that most programmers do better than computers, it's drinking, after all.
I did some work at a bar, even. Just making their menu and website for them in exchange for free drinks.
\ally{You mastered \LaTeX that way. A very you thing to do.}
\begin{ally}
You mastered \LaTeX that way. A very you thing to do.
\end{ally}
I did well at it. I still have one of the menus and some of the paper laying around somewhere. I did that until the bartender left and, when I asked for my next payment from the owner, he flipped out at me and threatened to sue me for impersonating him. I don't think I realized Raffi, the bar manager who hired me, was already on his way out.
I drank my way out of one job and through a good chunk of another. I drank until I got better at it than I was at software. I drank myself into burnout. I drank until I collapsed.
\ally{You used up your spell slots. You ran out of will. You had to quit by accident.}
\begin{ally}
You used up your spell slots. You ran out of will. You had to quit by accident.
\end{ally}
I worked to quit, I'll have you know. It wasn't easy. It took meds and some rough nights.
\ally{You were less of a person then than you were when you started drinking. The you who started drinking by focusing on \textbf{starting drinking} was more real than the you who collapsed in the kitchen from a PNES and stopped drinking because she was completely empty of intention.}
\begin{ally}
You were less of a person then than you were when you started drinking. The you who started drinking by focusing on \textbf{starting drinking} was more real than the you who collapsed in the kitchen from a PNES and stopped drinking because she was completely empty of intention.
\end{ally}
Should I start the daily drinking again, then?
\ally{You're more of a person now than you were when you started drinking.}
\begin{ally}
You're more of a person now than you were when you started drinking.
\end{ally}
That, coming from you, is a glowing endorsement.
\ally{You may have been more of a person when you started than when you stopped, but you weren't much of one, even then.}
\begin{ally}
You may have been more of a person when you started than when you stopped, but you weren't much of one, even then.
\end{ally}
\newpage

25
book/content/ally/006.tex
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@ -2,8 +2,9 @@ When I was young, back before I knew what mental health entailed, what anxiety a
This was before LiveJournal, of course. This was before I was writing on the internet, or even really on the internet at all. This was before you.
\ally{No, it wasn't.}
\begin{ally}
No, it wasn't.
\end{ally}
Right.
When I ran away, my dad found my paper journal. I had kept it infrequently, as something about daily journaling to a seventh-grader felt dishonest, stupid. What could I possibly write about?
@ -12,20 +13,24 @@ In the journal, I mentioned on a few occasions that I'd had a mental breakdown.
I told him no. I whispered it. I murmured it. I wasn't crazy. I didn't need to go to an asylum. I just felt like time stopped for me and the world around me sped up. I just felt like I was holding on by the barest amount of friction on my fingertips. The whorls of my fingerprints providing my only grasp on reality.
\ally{That was me saying hi.}
\begin{ally}
That was me saying hi.
\end{ally}
Blunt-force greeting?
\ally{I was quiet as a mouse.}
\begin{ally}
I was quiet as a mouse.
\end{ally}
I have the words now. I have the vocabulary. I can say derealization, depersonalization, dissociation. I can say panic attack and anxiety and depression and hypomania. I can say \emph{ah, \textbf{this} is what is happening now}.
\ally{You have emotions now, is what you have. Those were your mental breakdowns.}
\begin{ally}
You have emotions now, is what you have. Those were your mental breakdowns.
\end{ally}
Dad didn't believe in those. Not for boys. \emph{Mood's a thing for cattle and loveplay}, right? Emotions are for women.
\ally{He was half-right.}
\begin{ally}
He was half-right.
\end{ally}
I suppose he was.
\newpage

25
book/content/ally/007.tex
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@ -1,7 +1,8 @@
I think of myself as a trans woman, not a woman. I think of past me as male, not female. To an extent, I think of past me as cisgender. I was a guy. I was that gay guy who tumbled out the other side of puberty and was left to figure out what the fuck. I am not who I was.
\ally{You have ship-of-Theseus'd yourself into what you are.}
\begin{ally}
You have ship-of-Theseus'd yourself into what you are.
\end{ally}
I was not Madison. I am not Matthew. I can't deny his existence, though. He was him, and to erase that, to toe the party line and say I've always known that I was Madison, would do a disservice to him.
He got in all those relationships. He loved so hard it hurt. He dreamed of being held. He struggled with the words.
@ -12,22 +13,26 @@ He rode the same crests of hypomania and crashed just as hard after. Once, he tr
He was just as mercurial, too. The brewing phase--
\ally{Phases. Plural.}
\begin{ally}
Phases. Plural.
\end{ally}
--the gun phase, the photography phase and all its subphases: digital, film, cross-processing, rangefinders.
\ally{Yeah, he was a prick.}
\begin{ally}
Yeah, he was a prick.
\end{ally}
You said I still am, but a different kind.
\ally{In all fondness.}
\begin{ally}
In all fondness.
\end{ally}
How kind.
All this to say, I have not always known I was trans. To pretend such would be to erase a real, actual person who tried his best more often than not.
\ally{Have you answered Theseus' question?}
\begin{ally}
Have you answered Theseus' question?
\end{ally}
I don't know.
\newpage

56
book/content/ally/008.tex
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@ -16,7 +16,8 @@ Current mood: Bright blue with a tinge of purple, but mostly off white and hazy.
\newpage
\null
\vfill
\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/blue_flag.jpg}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/blue_flag.jpg}
\vfill
\newpage
@ -31,25 +32,29 @@ Greens covering my chest and shoulders warmly are happiness.
\end{paracol}
\begin{center}
\noindent\includegraphics[width=4in]{../static/color/green_door.jpg}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=4in]{../static/color/green_door.jpg}
\end{center}
\begin{paracol}{2}
\begin{leftcolumn}
\ally{And that's when I showed up, yes?}
\begin{ally}
And that's when I showed up, yes?
\end{ally}
Yeah, later that day.
\begin{quotation}
The navy blue I've been seeing at waist level in front of me and to my left is contentment. I'm not entirely sure that it being omnipresent is a good thing, however, considering the colors it's mixed with. Am I really content with longing and hopelessness? It's not out of the question, I suppose that it could just be another aspect of my personality. But that just brings up the question of whether or not it's something I ingrained into myself through habit, something where I just kinda accepted that feeling such things is normal, okay, and what I want; or is it something I was born with, or that we're all born with? Is it a side effect of love, expecting impossible desires and the blind hopelessness that follows the end of a four year undertaking?
\ally{Whatever, you're rambling.}
\begin{ally}
Whatever, you're rambling.
\end{ally}
Guilty, conspirator.
\end{quotation}
\ally{And these pictures?}
\begin{ally}
And these pictures?
\end{ally}
All from years later. The color thing comes and goes, like you.
\end{leftcolumn}
\begin{rightcolumn*}
@ -89,24 +94,30 @@ It soothes.
Sometimes I'm overcome by the numinous. Sometimes it's colors, sometimes it's you, sometimes it's a silence swelling within my chest, stealing breath.
\ally{He would be riding on the subway or writing formulas on the blackboard or having a meal or (as now) sitting and talking to someone across a table, and it would envelop him like a soundless tsunami.}
\begin{ally}
He would be riding on the subway or writing formulas on the blackboard or having a meal or (as now) sitting and talking to someone across a table, and it would envelop him like a soundless tsunami.
\end{ally}
That's a post-rock song title.
\ally{Is it wrong?}
\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/orange_eyes.jpg}
\begin{ally}
Is it wrong?
\end{ally}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/orange_eyes.jpg}
I'll take a picture, lasso a color, and desaturate everything else. Sometimes, it's fun. I do it to Falcon's eyes a lot because they're so pretty.
\ally{And sometimes it's something more.}
\begin{ally}
And sometimes it's something more.
\end{ally}
Yeah. Sometimes it's a compulsion. Sometimes a picture will latch onto me and never let me go. Sometimes I'll remove all color.
\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/bw1.jpg}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/bw1.jpg}
\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/bw2.jpg}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=4.35in]{../static/color/bw2.jpg}
\newpage
@ -115,7 +126,8 @@ Sometimes I'll blow out the background because the foreground is so completely o
\end{paracol}
\vfill
\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/bw3.jpg}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/bw3.jpg}
\vfill
\newpage
@ -123,7 +135,8 @@ Sometimes I'll blow out the background because the foreground is so completely o
Sometimes I'll skew colors all in one direction.
\vfill
\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/window_view.png}
% XXX
%\noindent\includegraphics[width=7in]{../static/color/window_view.png}
\vfill
\newpage
@ -165,6 +178,7 @@ Unmoving and always changing.
A sigil need not just be lines and curves.
\ally{Or maybe it's just mania.}
\begin{ally}
Or maybe it's just mania.
\end{ally}
It may be.

39
book/content/ally/009.tex
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@ -1,19 +1,23 @@
\ally{Tell me about mania.}
\begin{ally}
Tell me about mania.
\end{ally}
No.
Wait, what? Why are you asking? Weren't you there?
\ally{I was. I\ldots{}am?}
\begin{ally}
I was. I\ldots{}am?
\end{ally}
I don't think I'm hypomanic now. On my way, perhaps. I can't sleep.
\ally{I may be, then. Tell me about mania.}
\begin{ally}
I may be, then. Tell me about mania.
\end{ally}
No, tell me why you're asking.
\ally{I'm more of a liminal creature, myself. It's hard to keep an ally around when depression slowly shuts down avenue after avenue of reaching one. You, as a reflection of me, become distorted while manic. Fun-house mirrors and blind-spots. I want to hear about it.}
\begin{ally}
I'm more of a liminal creature, myself. It's hard to keep an ally around when depression slowly shuts down avenue after avenue of reaching one. You, as a reflection of me, become distorted while manic. Fun-house mirrors and blind-spots. I want to hear about it.
\end{ally}
No.
Later.
@ -22,20 +26,25 @@ I took a sleep aid. I'm not getting into this now. I was all prepped to write ab
Read what I've already written. % birds
\ally{I was there when you wrote those.}
\begin{ally}
I was there when you wrote those.
\end{ally}
So? Does that not clarify it?
\ally{Will anything?}
\begin{ally}
Will anything?
\end{ally}
Likely not.
I will say, though, that I missed some stuff in my investigation earlier. You did come back for three brief days in November, 2013. It was at a liminal time, but you didn't stick around.
\ally{I'll remind you that you ignored me for one of those posts.}
\begin{ally}
I'll remind you that you ignored me for one of those posts.
\end{ally}
Point.
Let's get into mania later. We owe each other that. For now, bed. And tomorrow, something a little less harrowing.
\ally{Ah yes. Polyamory. Known for being easy peasy, lemon squeezy.}
\begin{ally}
Ah yes. Polyamory. Known for being easy peasy, lemon squeezy.
\end{ally}

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The first time I remember thinking about polyamory--
\ally{And here I was hoping you'd cave and talk more about mania.}
\begin{ally}
And here I was hoping you'd cave and talk more about mania.
\end{ally}
Why are you so hung up on that? I told you I wouldn't, and you seemed to accept that.
\ally{`Seemed to'? `Accept'? Are those things something like me can do?}
\begin{ally}
`Seemed to'? `Accept'? Are those things something like me can do?
\end{ally}
Well, if \emph{I} can\ldots{}
\ally{Conceded. No mania, then?}
\begin{ally}
Conceded. No mania, then?
\end{ally}
It's not a comfortable topic.
\ally{Granted. Tell me why, at least.}
It's not a good feeling. Not from the inside, not from the outside. From the inside I've only caught glimpses of it, even. Glimpses caught through the haze of medication or withdrawal or the mass of ineffable ecstasy comes crashing down upon me. I get all wrapped up in hypomania. Something less. Something just beneath. That thin meniscus between this world and...something else.
\begin{ally}
Granted. Tell me why, at least.
\end{ally}
It's not a good feeling. Not from the inside, not from the outside. From the inside I've only caught glimpses of it, even. Glimpses caught through the haze of medication or withdrawal or the mass of ineffable ecstasy comes crashing down upon me. I get all wrapped up in hypomania. Something less. Something just beneath. That thin meniscus between this world and\ldots{}something else.
But in others I've watched --- in some cases, been caught up in --- the frenzy as their world slowly slides out of alignment with consensus reality. They turn from\ldots{}
\ally{What?}
\begin{ally}
What?
\end{ally}
You got me talking about it.
\ally{I'm pleased you think so highly of me.}
\begin{ally}
I'm pleased you think so highly of me.
\end{ally}
I \emph{will} talk about it. It's not off the table. I just need something not that for a bit.
\ally{To poly?}
\begin{ally}
To poly?
\end{ally}
To poly.
\newpage

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\null
\vfill
\begin{ally}
Let's talk about mania.
\end{ally}
Fine.
\vfill
\newpage

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\null
\vfill
\begin{ally}
Thank you.
\end{ally}
\vfill
\newpage

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\null
\vfill
Can we talk about something else? Please?
\begin{ally}
Something lighter?
\end{ally}
Something softer.
\vfill
\newpage

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\null
\vfill
And so we find ourselves in a place between.
\vfill
\newpage

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\null
\vfill
\begin{ally}
Do you feel better, now?
\end{ally}
Not really. Just a different kind of melancholy.
\begin{ally}
Ain't that just the way of things?
\end{ally}
\vfill
\newpage