DIGGER

It burrows itself into the gray matter. It gets deep and is hard, nearly impossible, to dig out. Like a chigger under the skin, it gets itself inside the brain and can’t be reached. Alcohol can sometimes act like clear nail polish painted over the skin to cut off a chigger from air, suffocating it. A few well-timed and spaced out shots can’t draw it out of the mind completely, but they can cover it up for a bit. Make the laughs come easier. Drown it out for a while.
It’s not possible to know for sure where it came from. Or how much of it was caused by the \"real\" outside world and the actions of others, and how much of it has always been there. Just looking for something to latch onto. Something to feed off of. Something to make it stronger. Make it grow. Make it more and more difficult to forget. To destroy.
Even if it has always been there-- if it’s a part of the fatty tissue, living off thoughts like a symbiote-- something has made it start itching much more than ever before. At this point, it may very well be impossible to remove. Maybe it will always be there, as it’s probably always been. If it can’t be stopped-- if it can’t be eradicated, suffocated like the chigger-- hopefully it can, at the very least, be kept in check. Controlled. But how?
The alcohol, though a temporary cover, a simple bandage, can’t be overused. Cheaper than some type of therapy, but it can’t always be counted on. Sometimes it actually makes the itching even worse. So dangerously unpredictable.
So, what now?
The answer might not be out there. Like the problem, now so deep in the gray matter, perhaps it’s on the inside. Perhaps it’s been there all along, coexisting with the itch. Can it be reached?
Or maybe there’s not even a pat answer. Maybe that troublesome itch can only be scratched, but never completely relieved. Only dulled once in a while, with the knowledge that it’ll eventually flare up again.
It digs deeper. Maybe it’ll dig so deep, it’ll fade away. Get lost with everything else in the mind. Maybe one day the itch won’t need to be scratched. Maybe one day it won’t even be noticeable.
Until then, scratch and scratch and scratch until it’s raw and red. Until it burns. Until it bleeds. Can’t stop tearing at it. Tearing, clawing, but never really reaching it... it’s dug so deep.