File: Milk.outside.a.bag.of.milk.outside.a.bag.... File

She approached the mirror. The face looking back was tired, pale, with eyes that saw the world in high-contrast neon blues and harsh blacks.

The air in the room was thick, like cold yogurt, and smelled faintly of dust and metallic anxiety. She sat on the edge of her bed, her knees drawn up to her chest, starring at a point in space that didn't technically exist. File: Milk.outside.a.bag.of.milk.outside.a.bag....

She reached out and snatched her "medicine"—a handful of small, colorful candies she’d repurposed—and threw them into the air. They scattered like shooting stars over the carpet. She wouldn't take them today. She would create her own medicine, made of memory and quiet, even if it meant feeling the sharp, cold, stinging sensation of "being" more intensely. She approached the mirror

Get up. Take the pills. Do the routine, her mind commanded, a jumble of jagged pixelated thoughts. She sat on the edge of her bed,