by Leah Banicki
The room was cold and quiet. No one was willing to break the silence.
The clock on the wall was ticking away and no one said a word.
“So, how much did you get paid? If I may ask.” I said, after a long silence.
“100 grand.” Chrissy blurted out, then had a haughty look.
“So that’s the going rate now, huh?” I thought about losing control of my temper. I was pretty close to the line.
“You mean after you came home from being on the most popular show on television and didn’t tell me you got dumped? It was like I was nothing to you. It felt like it was more important to move away to New York than to stay here. You have always been like a sister to me.” Chrissy was crying and yelling.
“You are delusional. I signed a contract forbidding me to discuss the show with anyone. They could have sued me for talking to you.” I yelled back. “And yes I totally moved to New York to hurt you, only it had nothing to do with my career.”
“This is going well.” My mother said.
“Did you expect it to?” I asked and looked at her. My mother shrugged. I looked back to Chrissy and she was staring at the table.
“Chrissy, I hope you are happy, because I have never felt this low in my life. Even when Anthony dumped me I knew I had my family back home who loved me. I don’t even know what to do with this. You sold my reputation for what, some money?” I started to cry and laid my head on the table again. This was starting to feel familiar.
“I have gotten hate mail. People saying I should die because I aborted a fictitious baby. Which I would never do, but how do I protect myself against slander, when it’s you who started this vicious attack? I love you. Can I sue you?” I asked through my tears. My voice sounded strained and a bit weird to my ears.
“Anthony’s family asked me to muzzle you.” I watched Chrissy’s face react. “You have no idea how this affects him too. Your lies affect people. My God Chrissy, what were you thinking?” I asked in despair.
Chrissy sat there, her eyes were glossy but she seemed unmoved. What did it take to betray your loved ones for money, I wondered? I could not fathom it.
“It’s done. If you want I can stay with a friend for a while. I was tempted to leave tomorrow anyway. I knew you would freak out.” Chrissy sounded cold and distant again.
“Chrissy, I don’t understand you.” My dad piped in. He had tears in his eyes and he spoke very slowly. “I haven’t asked you to leave. I just am trying to reason why you thought this was necessary. We have every reason to be upset with what you did and yet you seem to have no shame in lying about Hannah. Haven’t we all shared enough love in this home to be open enough to talk this out?” My dad reached out to squeeze Chrissy’s shoulder but she scooted away.
After a few minutes of talking in circles I declared I was tired. Everyone eagerly agreed to end the pointless conversation and try to sleep.
Chapter 17
I wouldn’t call it depression, I felt it was a dark time or a heaviness. I had not dressed in anything but pajamas for weeks. I kept trying out different things to cheer myself up but the heaviness lingered. I ate a lot of chocolate but it didn’t taste good anymore. I went a week of eating fast food, forcing my dad and mom out for the most ridiculous things. I stopped eating the fast food when it did bad things to my gut. I made a few good choices by eating better.
I decided to go to church with my parents and got up when my alarm went off. As I showered I felt pain in my stomach. I ended my shower quickly and threw on a robe then I padded through the kitchen and saw Chrissy at the table. My heart jumped and I turned around and walked away. I didn’t need the confrontation just now. She gave me a look with her eyebrows raised, almost daring me to say something. She didn’t have to worry. I had no desire for a scene.
I got to my room and sat on my bed. My heart was pounding and it hurt across my rib cage.
I mean it really hurt . I was freaking out. My heart was racing faster, I was getting concerned. I felt like this on a smaller scale when I was dumped but this was worse. This hurt. What was happening to me?
“Mom!” I yelled out and I was panting. I sat on the floor and grabbed a throw pillow and squeezed it tight. Breathe in, breathe out…oh my chest.
My door opened and my mother ran to me. Her face awash with the same worry I was feeling.
“I can’t breathe, and my chest hurts.” I explained in a choppy voice in between breaths. I realized I was crying but I didn’t care. I was scared.
What is going on?
“Just be calm.” She said to me and yelled for my dad. ”Bring the phone!” she hollered.
Chrissy ran up to my door and stood there and stared at me. For a moment she seemed concerned and the next moment, doubtful. My dad scooted her away from the door and handed my mother the phone.
My mother dialed the phone and my dad sat on the floor next to me. I explained how I felt to him too and tried to catch my breath. My chest was still pounding.
I heard my mother talking, she explained all I had told her a minute ago. My dad was rubbing his hand on my back.
She handed the phone to me.
“Hello” I said, my voice breathy and the pain was shooting through my arms and legs. It was extreme, a new ringing in my ears made it difficult to hear but, I heard a male voice asking me question.
“Do you feel very anxious?” A male voice asked.
“Yes, my heart is pounding so hard in my chest that it hurts.”
“Do you feel feverish?” The voice said.
“No” I answered.
“Have you had any extremely stressful situations lately?”
“Yes, very stressful.” I said and started to tear up even more.
Why did that question make me cry? I am so stupid. I tell myself.
“I am a doctor and I think you are having a panic attack. I go to your mother’s church. Would it be okay if I stop by? I have been to your parents place before. I know your situation and I don’t think we need to have the media follow you to my doctor’s office.” His voice was kind.
* * * * *
The doctor arrived within the hour, using the neighbor’s driveway down the street, and walked through the backyards to avoid gaining attention.
He asked the traditional doctor questions and pulled a stethoscope from the gym bag he carried. After checking my heart, lungs and pulse he put everything away.
“Well Hannah, I think it’s pretty cut and dried. I do believe it’s good old fashioned anxiety.” He patted me on the shoulder.
“Everyone has a certain amount of stress they can handle efficiently. I know your mom has struggled with anxiety and adrenal issues and has learned to combat it with relaxation and gardening. I think this is your cue to find a way to relax and breathe. I have a few samples of Xanax for moments that you get out of control. I want to assure you that no one has ever died from a panic attack but they are painful and scary. There are some great books about anxiety and depression. I will leave you a list. Perhaps you can have a member of your family to get it for you.” The doctor said.
“You believe I am depressed.” I asked softly. I was trying to absorb it all.
“From the questions, your circumstances, and your appearance, yes I do believe you are suffering from depression. My advice is to get some sun. Eat very healthy and try to avoid confrontation for a few days. Get some good books and also start thinking about getting back to things you did before the show. I know you feel shut off from everything and are perhaps afraid to venture out but this will pass soon.” He gave me a few pamphlets about depression and anxiety, info about the Xanax, and a reading list.
The doctor spent a few minutes talking to my mom while I rested. My body felt beat up from the heart palpitations and stress of the morning. My mother joined me after I heard the back door close. The good doctor was leaving.
“I will be going to the store soon, I want you to know that your father and I are with you sweetie. Honestly I am struggling too. This whole situat
ion is more stressful than we ever imagined.” Her hand was stroking my hair absently as I wiggled closer to lean against her. I would always be a girl who sometimes still needed her mother.
* * * * *
It had been a few days and I was pretty sad but trying hard to keep busy. I started a regimen of sleeping, drinking tea, taking vitamins and avoiding the outside world like the plague. I had no idea how the world perceived me at this moment, and I didn’t really care. I had a few more panic attacks since the other day but I learned some slow breathing technique’s to help me through it. Mostly I just wanted to avoid them. They scared me.
My mother bought us each a copy of GET OUT OF THAT PIT by Beth Moore. I was a few chapters in and enjoyed her humor and honesty. My own struggle with being a Christian and having depression didn’t quite add up. The critical part of me repeated in my brain that I should just be happy and get over it, but I was learning that maybe my ideas about being a perfect person had set me up for unrealistic expectations.
Beth Moore’s book made me cry quite a bit but in a soul searching therapeutic way. Like a great song can wash through you. It left me emotional but satisfied and clean inside. I was writing a lot of notes in the margins and sharing parts of it with my mom as we read separately. We would come together and discuss it. We made a good team.
Today was the third of April. I had been home for two months exactly. I spent the morning reading and decided do some exercises to get the blood pumping. I glanced out the window and saw the severe grey clouds overhead and checked my laptop for weather conditions. I had no plans of leaving, but I hoped that Spring’s warmth would hit our part of the world. So far there was not much luck with that. It had been dreary, rainy, cold and blustery all week. “Get some sunshine,” had been on the doctor’s list. I half-heartedly snickered. Sure…
My mother came home from her Bible study and we got a call soon after. My brother wanted to stop by. I actually found myself smiling at the thought.
I helped my mother for a bit in the kitchen, we prepared a salad and sandwiches for lunch. I chopped some apples for one of my mother’s impromptu pies. My brother arrived with impeccable timing, as the pie came out of the oven.
“Oh my heavens!” Joe said as he walked in and feigned a faint against the door frame. “I am not sure there is a smell as good as that this side of heaven.” He came all the way in and shuddered out of his winter coat. He hugged my mother first then embraced me. It felt very nice so I held on for an extra few seconds and got misty. Love was nice, even from a brother.
“The chill outside is nasty today. It is starting to rain again but it’s coo-old.” He shivered for emphasis and grabbed a few plates and helped set the table.
I was quiet and enjoyed the friendly chatter, as Joe filled us in on the goings on at his house. Kids suffered with cabin fever this time of year as they longed to be outside and free. They were probably driving Anne up the walls.
“I can babysit some night for you guys so you could have a date.” I offered. That felt like a reasonable activity. I loved the girls, and I would be a contributing member of society.
“That sounds great! We accept. The girls would adore having you all to themselves.” My brother grinned and it warmed my heart.
The sky outside got a little darker and my mother got up from the table and turned on the kitchen light. We all glanced outside and saw the rain coming down in sheets. The lights flickered a second and we suddenly became very interested in the weather. It was the human condition.
We opened the door, peeked out and heard the rain hitting the earth with loud plops and also, the nearly imperceptible squeaking that we all have come to fear in states where freezing rain has hit. I could see the patches of ice forming on Joe’s car.
“We are having such a pleasant spring don’tcha think?” I said with a cheesy grin. We backed away from the door and went back to our lunches. The rain continued to pour and we all kept on eye on it as we visited.
My mom was cutting the pie just as we lost power. Like any good mid-west mom she had emergency candles nearby and lit them. My dad called a few minutes later to say he would be staying at work, he had heard the roads were treacherous.
The pie was delicious as we heard the crackling freezing rain. It was such a strange phenomenon when it happened, the perfect conditions had to come into play, it was a deadly science.
The visit went well and the lights flickered then stayed off for good after the pie plates were cleared. We waited for the rain to stop and actually enjoyed the quiet without the power running. It was really amazing how quiet a house gets when there was truly nothing turned on. My parents had a generator and would use it later if they needed to turn on the water pump and keep the freezer going. Oh the mess Mother Nature could leave if the freezer defrosted.
After the rain had stopped and the salt trucks came by we decided to help get Joe’s car de-iced. We bundled up and headed out with any ice chipping devices we could find. I stole my dad’s long heavy wool coat from the mud-room and the ice scraper from my mom’s car in the garage. She had another one on the workbench, too. We marched out together on the treacherous driveway then slid and skidded our way to the car. My mother brought some table salt in a big round black cardboard canister and sprinkled salt as we walked out. The ice hissed and crackled as she moved along. I started chipping away near the door handles to get them out of the half-inch ice encasement. We talked about the ominous sound from the nearby trees as they creaked and groaned under the weight of the ice. The quiet neighborhood was noticeably without power as we heard a few generator engines started and the general hum they created. I was making a little progress on my door handle and only fell twice when I heard the sound of cameras clicking near me.
“Seriously, if someone is taking my picture right now I have to wonder at the sanity of it.” I looked over and my mother was shaking her head.
I turned to see a short guy near my neighbor’s tree. I had seen him before. He was very persistent.
“How were you able to stay out of the rain?” I asked the cameraman. He was silent. He took a few more pictures and checked his viewfinder. I had a sudden twinge, the thought that Mr. Paparazzi had taken more pictures lately than I had. I needed to remedy that!
I felt my heart getting jumpy and I took more calming breaths. I turned back to the car, decided to ignore the rest of the world, and just focused on the ice. It took me a few minutes but I worked the handle loose and chipped along the edge of the door and got it to open slowly and with a lot of ice crunching.
Joe tossed me the keys and I crawled in and started his car. I got the heat and defroster going full blast and we all kept working on the problem until my dad arrived. His car was not so badly covered. His employer had a building for them to park in. Joe left after we got his car de-iced and called when he arrived home safely. They already had their power back on. We only had to wait a few hours and ours came back on too. It felt like normal life drama, the little things in life to fuss about. I liked it. Small town life was warming back up for me.
It was two days later when Chrissy approached my dad with a tabloid paper with showing my picture on the front. He showed it to me later. Mr. Paparazzi from the driveway had gotten a nice shot of me in my father’s baggy coat. With his work gloves in the pockets and the angle I was standing, it looked very much like a pregnancy picture. In bold letters it read, HANNAH STILL CARRIES ANTHONY’S BABY.
I had a panic attack that lasted almost an hour. I was shaking, sweating in bed for a while, and trying to tune everything out. My mom made me take the Xanax the doctor had given me and it sent me into a deep sleep. When I woke up the next day I had an itchy rash on my arms. The doctor explained the side effect and told me not to take it anymore. I eagerly agreed. I was chugging tea and water to get the dry mouth sensation to go away. It took awhile. I tried not to think about the rumors and innuendo, I blocked out the things the tabloids were saying. I asked my parents very nicely to stop telling me anything about t
he news or the show.
I wanted to hide and that’s exactly what I did.
Chapter 18
I was trying to get the gears back into motion. Feeling sorry for myself was becoming an easy habit and I wanted out of it. My personal pep talk for the day was, get yourself up and moving forward.
I flipped open my laptop after a full night’s sleep. My laptop had become dear to me since coming back from the show. It was a good distraction tool. I usually used it for work but had dedicated those few months to romantic self-discovery, I grumbled under my breath at the thought of what those months had done to me.
No more pity parties! I told myself, and then started the process of clicking myself back into life.
I checked my work email. I had one account set up for specific job agencies that hired me for freelance photography. I knew it was going to be a long day as I saw I had over 300 emails in that account alone. I checked my facebook page and saw that it was bombarded. My last status update was ‘Leaving for the show “Soulmate” so excited.’ Everything came back to remind me.
I closed out my current Facebook page with thousands of friend requests from fans and started a new one. I tweaked the privacy settings to match my new rule of trust-no-one and proceeded to add all my relatives, including Chrissy, with friend requests. I changed my name to protect my – sanity – and posted a picture of me as a 10 year old with my first camera. It was never on the show or in the media, but my family would recognize it.
First status…’Climbing out of the pit, bruised but determined to keep breathing.’ It was as optimistic as I could make it. I got over the hard part and switched the status to single.
Nothing that anyone doesn’t know.
How many people know my relationship status? It felt global to me, living in my own little fishbowl, but perhaps there was a place in this world that didn’t care what Hannah Parker was doing today.
I started digging through the emails, starting with the oldest first and realized that was a mistake. Every job I had done involved a client who had this email. They all wanted to email me about the show. Blah blah blah. After deleting 50 emails about Soulmate from clients, I jumped to the other end of the list and saw a few listed for this week.
