I am Not Who You Think I am, and I am Not Who I Think I am
I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion.
Kerouac, Jack. (1957). On the Road. The Viking Press.
__________
Hmm? mumbled Jamie.
Ms. Smith? I asked if you're okay. You don't look well. Do you want to me to call Mr. Hutchinson for you? Emily asked, her face pinched with worry and concern for the older woman who'd long been neighbor, babysitter, role model, and now student-teacher for her.
I
I don't know who I am, Jamie stuttered.
She was struggling to shake her mind from the thick, amnesic fog that had so rapidly descended upon her. Yet clearing her head was like herding cats so chaotic, nimble, numerous, and uncontrollable were the stream of vivid, conflicting thoughts.
My name is Ms. Jamie Smith, she whispered to herself. I'm a twenty-five year old woman.
Except that wasn't right
that wasn't even what she had wanted to say
she'd wanted to reassert that she was
was
a lonely, fat, teenage boy nursing a secret crush on Emily?!
Ridiculous!
Jamie was thoroughly heterosexual. She'd never been interested in other girls. And she was seriously devoted to her husband. She'd never have seriously entertained the notion of ever cheating on Hutch!
But why couldn't Jamie shake the awful, eerie, dreadful certainty that she was a fifteen-year old boy named Jacob?
Ms. Smith? Should I call an ambulance or something? Emily asked in a panic, her naturally fair complexion turning ghastly white.
N-N-No, said Jamie. I
I don't know what's wrong with me, Emily. I can't explain it. I just feel
like I've seen a ghost, I guess. I'll be fine, though.
Are you sure? asked Emily, her voice replete with doubt at the older woman's attempts to be reassuring.
I promise you, Emily, Jamie said, forcing a weak smile. I really will be fine. I think I just need to take a walk around the block and clear my head.
Emily watched dubiously as Jamie said her good-byes and took off on foot, heading north up a long, straight sidewalk. The concrete path, perfectly parallel with the road, provided comforting encouragement that the world was properly square and upright
not the anomic disarray of absurdity and paradox that had seized Jamie's imagination only moments ago. She flexed her fingers wide, then pulled them tightly into balled-up fists, and repeated the exercise as she walked along, pursing her lips to exhale stress every so many steps. This is what he always did to relieve tension
correction: this is what she always did.
Why do I keep thinking I'm a teenage boy?! Jamie sighed with exasperation. Am I going insane? Do I need professional help? I've never had a history of mental illness, but all of a sudden this afternoon, out of the blue, I can't stop imagining that I'm a fifteen-year old boy named Jacob
and now I'm talking to myself.
Jamie shut her mouth, but quickened the pace of her walk. Her inner debate continued unabated. She was a grown woman. She remembered her wedding day
her wedding dress
her wedding night with Max Hutchinson. All of that was decidedly womanly and completely inconsistent with being either male or adolescent.
So why do I also remember reading comic books, playing video games with Matt, or thinking Emily Johnson is the most beautiful creature on the planet? Jamie thought to herself. If only she knew I existed. But I'm just the ugly, nerd boy from next door. She'd never go out with an overweight loser like me.
Jamie stopped dead in her tracks and looked down at herself, blinking several times in amazement.
She was actually fairly thin. Curvy in all the right places. She'd been a skinny, gawky stick of a girl at first, but around her junior year in high school, she'd filled out nicely. And although she put on a few pounds in college (all of which seemed to go pretty much straight to her hips and thighs), Jamie knew realistically she wasn't the slightest bit overweight. She was healthy, attractive, adult woman happily married to a wonderful, caring man.
That was reality
this Jacob is nothing but a dreamlike figment of her imagination
nothing but the ghost of what-if world that had never been
right?
I really need help, sighed Jamie.