Morphine Ghost

I used to think a morphine ghost was just a name for people who had drifted too far from themselves to come back—eyes fixed on nothing, moving through the world as though it were happening to someone else. I understand it now. It wasn't the drug. It was this place. I noticed it slowly. Conversations became distant, then unnecessary. The rooms seemed to remember me even when I couldn't remember entering them. I stopped feeling the need to leave because leaving implied there was still somewhere else to go. The days no longer pass; they simply accumulate around me like dust. I can still see the world beyond this place, but it reaches me through a kind of gray water. I watch people hurry past as if they belong to another life entirely. They don't see me anymore. Perhaps they never did. If you have found this note, you should leave while you still recognize the difference between standing still and disappearing.

It was inevitable. I cannot understand why everyone speaks of it as though it arrived without warning. It announced itself a thousand different ways, every small omission leaning toward the same conclusion. You stepped over the signs because each one seemed harmless on its own. You laughed at the first mistake, explained away the second, ignored the third, and by then it had already begun. The only surprise is that you still insist you never saw it coming.

The child—that child—was not my responsibility. I told them that from the beginning. They insisted I had been the last to see her, as though that meant anything in a place where people are seen long after they have gone. I heard her laughing behind locked doors for weeks afterward, always just far enough away that I could pretend it came from somewhere else. If you hear her, do not answer. She has become very good at sounding relieved.

You are as responsible as I am. You just had the privilege of walking away before anyone thought to accuse you. Don't pretend there were no warnings. Not every warning is spoken aloud. Some are carried in the way a room falls silent when someone enters. Some live in the glances people exchange when they believe you aren't looking. You saw the way they treated me. You saw how every explanation became another piece of evidence against me, how every plea was mistaken for guilt. You recognized it for what it was, and you decided it was safer to say nothing. By then, it was already inevitable. We are separated only by timing. If events had unfolded a little differently, this note would be yours, and I would be the one insisting I never knew what was coming.