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THE ITCHES START at my scalp and slither down my back. Every inch of my skin is on fire. My foot refuses to budge, as if it’s full of lead.
“Take your time,” Jenny’s high-pitched voice calls through the door. “Use your tools.” She’s been my best friend for years and has helped me through so many ups and downs. She prepared me for high school and held my hand during my parent’s divorce. Even though she’s my aide, we’ve grown close over the years.
I don’t want to get in the shower. I stand on the mat in my comfy robe, trying to break the barrier that’s between me and the ceramic death chamber. I rub individual pieces of yarn on the mat between my toes, and that helps stop the itches.
Our basement bathroom is remodeled, so there’s a door between the actual bathtub and the countertop area.
“Remember what we talked about?” Jenny reminds me unnecessarily.
I know what we talked about. Nearly everyone showers for hygiene reasons. I understand that not everyone is privileged to have running water and some bathe in rivers. Jenny needs to understand that the water pattering on my skin intensifies the itches.
I’ve done it before, plenty of times. Sometimes, I just don’t wanna.
“Breathe…” she adds slowly and softly, trying her best to calm me down.
I breathe the chilly basement air in through my nostrils and out of my mouth, shut my eyes tight, and will my feet to step into the shower. I slide the glass door shut. An invisible force is holding them in place, supergluing them to the mat.
I grip the faucet and turn the handle to the right with instant regret. The high-pitched sound of the shower squeaking is too loud.
My eardrums ring as the pressurized water pounds against the ceramic. I imagine the hard droplets piercing my skin like flaming arrows in a Tolkien book battlefield.
Nope. Not today. Retreating to my happy place in 3… 2… 1…
My brain swells, about to burst through my skull. Intense pain shoots through my shoulder blades as I bend over in agony. My tools of freedom emerge. Spectacular, glossy, feathered wings spread open in the bathroom. They crowd the small space. Bending my knees, I take off, breaking through the basement ceiling and then the main floor’s ceiling, disrupting my mother’s morning coffee.
The cool, brisk wind of liberation soars over my skin and through my wings. They beat the air and carry me off to a kingdom far away where I will rule in peace.
“Dinah?” Jenny’s voice invades my seventeen-year-old senses.
Right. I’m still in the bathroom.
I want to tell Jenny that today isn’t a good day for showering—what pounding water does to me—but the words don’t come. I resort to my usual answer: I can’t.
If only escape were that easy. I’m going to have to run.
I slowly open the door to see Jenny’s arched eyebrow and high blonde ponytail greet me. “No.” Time to find Higgins.
I’m fast. Jenny doesn’t always catch me. I fling the bathroom door open and run down the hallway, careful not to let my robe fall off. I pass Mom in the kitchen, who whips her head around as I race past. I practically fly to my room and slam the door, locking it behind me.
There he is, just lazily lying on the bed, enjoying hogging the covers all to himself. I grab Higgins’ fur and rub it between my fingertips. The soft bristles melt my heart and pump my veins full of calm-down juice. I bury my face into his golden fur, reveling in the swooshes of love it spreads over my skin.
I appreciate that Jenny gives me three minutes to calm down before she knocks on my door. “All right, Dinah. We’ll try showering tomorrow. I’ll draw you a bath because you escaped and locked your door, so I can tell your anxiety is through the roof.”
I pull my face back from Higgins and look into his black eyes. He pants and smiles at me, his teeth showing while he wags his tail enthusiastically. All I have to do is touch his fur and look into his eyes, and I know he’s mine and no one else’s.
“Guess I have to, huh, Higg?” I ask him. His shiny, golden tail pounds against the carpet. I sigh, accept defeat, and open the door to find that Jenny is already down the hall, no doubt on her way to the basement to draw my bath. I catch up and get inside the tub.
Baths are so much better. The water pressure gives me a hug instead of attacking my face at thirty miles an hour. But… I want to learn to take showers so that I can get ready quicker in the morning. Mom agrees and says it’ll prepare me for “life.”
I grumpily wash myself as I hear Jenny going through the vanity drawers on the other side of the door. She pulls out a hair dryer and sets it out on the counter, as well as a brush; I can hear the clunk of both objects.
When I’m finished and robed, I emerge reluctantly into Jenny’s presence.
“Because you decided to run away this morning, I call hair dryer,” she says cheerily.
“You suck.”
Jenny smiles in the mirror, making eye contact with my mirrored self. I’m a little above average height, my pickiness and hyperactivity help me stay around average weight, and my dark hair, eyebrows, and eyelashes don’t require much makeup. I usually gloss my lips and maybe, if I’m feeling wild, throw on a pinch of peachy blush.
“Fine, but I have to pet Higg,” I answer, testing the waters for striking a bargain.
Higgins helps me through my morning as I clutch the fur between his shoulders. I rub it between my thumb and fingers in a clockwise motion, trying to ignore Jenny drying and styling my hair. The hair dryer screeches a horrific tone, like a banshee. I grit my teeth to try making the experience pass faster. My hair isn’t too frizzy when Jenny is done. It’s naturally straight.
“Get dressed and get on up to breakfast.” Jenny smiles. “Then we’ll go over the proposed schedule for the day.”
I choose a smooth and itch-free lavender bra. All my bras are the same, but at least they’re different colors. Underwire bras feel like I’m suffocating in a corset. I choose a jersey-knit T-shirt—my favorite because of the silky touch. Leggings are always a must because jeans are too painful, and dresses don’t work because I want my thighs to be hugged. I top it with the softest thing I can wear to school—a pink hoodie.
Someone’s in the kitchen with Di-nah.
Someone’s in the kitchen I know.
Someone’s in the kitchen with Di-nah,
Strummin’ that old banjo.
Every time I go into the kitchen, I have to sing that song. Maybe because my dad used to sing it when I was young. He loves my name. After all, he convinced Mom to give it to me.
I have to sing it every time because if I don’t, something doesn’t seem right. It can throw my entire day off. I have to or else my body gets the itches, and I implode from my pinky toe up to my neck. Every part of me goes insane.
When I was ten, my mom took me to a psychologist, where I had a few behavioral tests. She was concerned with how emotional I became when something wasn’t going my way. It turned out I was on the spectrum. Not only do I have OCD but also anxiety, auditory processing disorder, and sensory integration disorder.
This basically means that I need to have control over everything to make sure I’m comfortable, and I overthink everything. I process sounds at a higher rate than others, my taste buds are stronger, and I feel things so much deeper. I also love to read. A lot. I reached a twelfth-grade reading level in the sixth grade.
I have to wear cotton sweaters. Khaki, denim, wool, and pretty much every other material under the sun feels like I’m wearing cactus needles.
Jenny glances up at me from the table, where she’s typing on her laptop. My mom is seated next to her, clutching her second or third
cup of coffee. Higgins is on my heels, as usual, as I grab a mixed-berry yogurt and apple juice from the refrigerator.
My mom exhales slowly through her nostrils before she pleasantly greets me with, “Good morning, Dinah.”
“Morning, Mom… Someone’s in the kitchen I know, I know,” I sing, pretending to tolerate the day ahead. As I pour my glass of apple juice, Jenny mutters something to my mom, and they do that grown-up mumble laugh.
“Okay, I ran away this morning,” I admit.
Jenny’s blonde ponytail flips around so fast that I swear she cracks her neck. She smiles at me like she always does. I’m positive it’s required in her job description.
“We weren’t talking about you, Dinah, but that’s okay. Did you take your anxiety meds?” Mom says between sips. Her glasses slip down the bridge of her nose a bit, but she doesn’t slide them up.
I try to focus on my yogurt, but I can’t. Glasses. Glasses. Glasses. Glassesglassesglassessssss…
I step over to my mom, tap the bridge of her glasses and slide them up to her eyes.
“Sorry,” I whisper as I step back to my yogurt on the counter.
My mom takes a noticeable deep breath, takes a large gulp of her cooling coffee, and sighs. “Thank you, dear.”
Jenny has told me that keeping my hands to myself is polite. I try to do it, but sometimes the urge is too great to ignore.
Higg puts his head on the counter and stares longingly at me for a taste of my yogurt. I let him finish the rest.
A muffled high screech sound comes from Nattie’s room. My fifteen-year-old sister likes to scream into her pillow for dramatic effect when she can’t find something, like her favorite tank top or tacky anime backpack. It’ll be a minute before she comes down. I’ll be long gone before that because I like to take my time walking to school. Besides, she’s too cool to walk with me. She and her friends carpool together.
“Time to put Higgins’ harness on,” Mom reminds me, even though I would never forget something for Higgins. He wags his tail
and sits up obediently, waiting for his duty to begin.
I drape and fasten his service dog harness around him. It has a giant enamel pin shaped like a rainbow that reads: AUTISM DOG DO NOT SEPARATE FROM HANDLER. I give him a kiss on his fur and grab my backpack from the granite counter.
“Love you, Mom. Bye, Jenny,” I call as I head out the door...
