THE CRYING STATION
Michael Kaplan
Guidelines
- The Crying Station is a space designed for tears.
- Though the Crying Station is designed for tears, there is no pressure to cry. Embrace whatever thoughts and feelings arise.
- At the Crying Station, we encourage an atmosphere of sincerity and fluidity.
- Partners can be referred to as confidants, because all information revealed in the Crying Station must remain in the Crying Station.
- Confidants should avoid physical contact at all times.
- If your age is an even number, please use the west entrance of the Crying Station. If your age is an odd number, please enter from the east.
- Though there are guidelines, one should not have expectations when entering the Crying Station. There is no winning or losing, no success or failure, no triumph or defeat. One cannot accomplish anything in the Crying Station.
- If you would like to leave the Crying Station in the middle of a session, you may do so at any time.
- Each pair is allowed a maximum of three sessions.
- At the end of Session #3, confidants may exchange contact information. We believe that any space can become a Crying Station, as long as one's intention is to cry.
Session #1
Entering the Crying Station, B was struck by its emptiness. The space was about the size of a high school gymnasium, with bright, fluorescent lights hanging in rows overhead. In the center of the room was a dining table. Two chairs had been placed close together on a corner. B wondered if she was supposed to walk over and sit down.
The door on the opposite wall swung open. A head poked through the doorway. First, a mop of frizzy hair, then, the body below. Lanky. Loose. B's confidant lit up, spotting her across the room. B hoped she could reflect such positivity. She tried flashing a smile, but imagined, from the outside, that it looked forced, and quickly flattened her mouth again. The stranger didn't seem to notice. They strolled with confidence over to the table, sliding into the nearer chair. Without a thought, B's feet followed. The sound of her footsteps bounced up and down from the hardwood floors to the high ceilings, echoing around the room.
(Was she supposed to be speaking already? What should she say?)
Arriving at the table, B discovered that the chairs were bolted to the floor. When she swiveled her head around, she spotted two projectors up on the walls. Was there anything else she hadn't noticed? With the thought came a sudden tickle in her throat. She tried to suppress a cough, but couldn't suppress it, and coughed. The sound reverberated.
"I'm sorry," B said, sitting down. "Maybe it's a little dusty in here. I'm not sick."
"Oh, we're all sick, babe," said the confidant. "No need to apologize."
B half-laughed, but then wondered if the line was actually meant to be a joke. (Maybe she'd laughed inappropriately.)
"What exactly are we supposed do?" B asked. "Did you get any instructions?"
"We're supposed to cry," the stranger replied, with a grin.
"Oh, okay. How do you think we should go about it, then?" B asked.
"You're a special one, aren't you? I'm Z, by the way. I go by she/her."
It took B a moment to realize that this meant she should say her own name and pronouns. "Oh, I'm B. Sorry. She/her too." After another moment of silence, she asked, "Have you done this before?"
"You know the rules. We get three sessions together. Then we're done."
"Oh, yeah. Duh, sorry."
"There you go again."
"Sor—"
Z raised her right hand in the air and snapped all five fingers together, closing B's lips across the table.
One of the projectors began humming in the corner of the room and, on the wall opposite Z, a faded image came into focus. Slowly, B made out a photograph of a family at the Grand Canyon. Two parents, two children.
"Where did you get that?" Z said to the ceiling. She squeezed her right hand into a fist and tucked it under the table. She repeated the question, her voice dropping an octave. "Where did you get that picture?"
The air in the building shifted. B noticed Z's long lashes starting to shine in the fluorescent light. She blinked and blinked. B couldn't tell if this motion was meant to push down the tears, or to bring them up.
"Is that your family?"
Z gritted her teeth and flared her left nostril.
"You can let it out, if you need to," B said.
"Are you inviting me to flip the table or to fall into a puddle on the floor?"
"I think the table's bolted down." The earnestness with which B said this broke Z's sneer into a giggle. "Why did they put that up there?" B asked, turning back to the photograph.
"That was the last day of my life."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't know how they got that picture," Z said, directing the statement both to B and to the ceiling, "but it was taken about a minute before my little brother stepped back and"—Z needed a moment to muster the word—"fell."
"Jesus—I'm so sorry—"
"There you go again with your sorrys."
"S—Uh. I'm—I just—That's just what people say."
"Oh, trust me: I know. That's what everyone says." And suddenly B felt awful. (She didn't want to say what everyone said.) Wasn't the Crying Station a place to dig beneath banal condolences? B wanted to be more helpful. This person had lost her brother, and she clearly still felt this loss at the core of her being.
"I want to help you," B said, thinking of the guideline about sincerity.
Z turned away from the image on the wall to lock eyes with B. They gazed into one another. This wasn't something B had ever done with someone she'd just met.
"You really mean that, don't you?"
Silence descended again, the fluorescent lights buzzing overhead.
B nodded.
"What are you?" Z asked, suddenly suspicious. "Are you some kind of psychiatrist? Or what? An actor? What are you?"
"Are you asking if I work here?"
"You know what I'm asking."
"I don't work here. I'm just"—B couldn't find the word—"I'm you."
"You're me?" Z asked.
"No, I mean I'm like you. We're both here to try to cry, right?"
"Ok," Z finally said. "It doesn't seem like you're lying." She took a long, audible breath, exhaling with her lips pursed together. "I think it's gonna be harder for you though. You don't cry much, do you?"
"Like it said in the guidelines, I'm not here to accomplish anything. I just thought it'd be nice to try." B couldn't remember the last time she cried. "Why'd you call that the last day of your life, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Well, I guess I am still alive. But life's different now. This is like Life 2.0, but instead of software updates, it just comes with a bunch of bugs."
"What kind of bugs?"
"I drop people like it's nothing cause I don't want them to—" B watched a wave of feeling rise up through Z's throat. She took another deep breath, inhaling the feeling back down to her diaphragm. B turned to the image again. The older sibling had her arm around the younger, their faces the same shape, their hair the same color. "Six months after he"—Z let a moment of silence signify the word—"my parents split up. They just couldn't take it. They saw him in each other. They saw him in the house..."
"And they saw him in you, right?" B asked.
Z's tears spoke for her now. Sniffles filled the space between each sob. B appreciated how quickly Z had opened up. She had the urge to reach over the table and squeeze her confidant's shoulder, but remembered the guideline about avoiding physical contact.
"That's not easy," B said.
"Each of them met someone within a year. They both started new families. New houses, new kids. And there I was, the forgotten child, just an inconvenient reminder." Her tears had turned to shrugs now. B wished she, too, could move so easily between moods.
"Do you talk about him much?"
"With them, or with people I meet?"
"With people you meet."
"I guess I tell the story from time to time, if I get close enough to someone. But that's all. I just tell the story."
"You're saying you just say the same few lines over and over again?"
Z tapped her nose.
"Then what don't you say?"
B watched a few different thoughts move through Z's mind. Some internal crash caused her eyelids to collapse, and Z turned away, began blinking, gasping, laboring to speak.
"I never tell anyone that I'm—I'm mad at him. I'm pissed. You have to respect the dead, so I never get to call him an idiot. But that's how I feel. It was stupid. I mean, how dumb do you have to be to step off a cliff? That's not just your life you're ruining." B wanted to sympathize, but instead felt a vague discomfort. "But you're not allowed to call your dead brother dumb. You're not allowed to be pissed at him for dying, for stepping back off the edge of a—" Z's face fell into her hands. Her shoulders bounced up and down. All of this had been said before. That was it. B could always tell when someone's words had been rehearsed. Z lifted her wet face back into the light. "What's wrong? I thought you wanted me to..."
"I wanted you to say what you don't usually say."
"You don't think that really happened?"
"No, I think it happened. But I think you've said all that a hundred times. Or at least that's what it sounded like. I'm sorry if I'm wrong. I just wanted to hear what you don't usually say. Look where we are," B said, looking around the empty room. "Why not?"
Z's eyes fell to the floor. "I'm sorry," she said. And here came a new set of tears, more of a dribble than a rush. "I don't know why I pretended like that was some big revelation. I just wanted this to feel special."
"If it's special," B said, surprised by the sudden sharpness in her own voice, "we'll both feel it."
Session #2
A strip of LED lights lined the edges of the floor. B wondered if she'd somehow entered the wrong building today. Session #1 had been bright and empty, but Session #2 started dark, with mysterious objects strewn about the room. Was this normal for the second session? Or had the space been designed specifically for Z and B?
"Are you in here?" Z asked.
"Yeah, but I can't see anything. Where are you?"
"Let's follow each other's voices."
"Okay."
Then came a moment of silence. (Was it her turn to speak or Z's?)
"I feel like you're not fully grasping the concept of following each other's voices," Z said.
"Oh, sorry. I'm over here. I'm walking closer to you, I think. You say something now."
"God, the acoustics in here are messing with my head. First I think you're standing right next to me, and then you're on the other side of the room. Are you near your door?"
"Which door?"
Z laughed and B did her best to follow the sound as it echoed. Without warning, she bumped into Z from behind, her face sprung back by Z's big curls. "Oh, sorry," B said. "There you are."
"Somebody forget to turn the lights on today?" Z said to the ceiling.
"I think it's on purpose."
Z rolled her eyes. "It's a joke, babe."
"Oh, sor—" This time B caught herself.
Z clapped her hands together. "Oh my god," she said, "we're learning."
B felt her face get flush. (Thank god for the dim lighting.)
"I got you a present," Z said.
"Oh, I didn't realize. Should I have—?"
"No, I'm not expecting anything in return. I just appreciated you calling me on my bullshit last time, so I got you a present. Don't make it into a whole thing, okay?"
B wished everyone spoke to her this way: clear, concise demands. She would not make it into a whole thing. "Okay. What's the present?"
"Well, I used to love getting people flowers, and then I realized that flowers just die, so they have nothing to remember you by." Z grabbed the gift from her back pocket and presented it to B. It looked like a rose. "So now I buy people fake flowers, which never die."
"That's nice of you," B said. She didn't know what else to say. She hadn't received a present in years. (Did people do this often? Give each other spontaneous gifts?) She put the fake flower in her back pocket.
"Do you feel, like, dizzy in here?" Z asked. "There's something about the lighting."
"Or lack of lighting."
"Yeah." Z took a step back, spread her arms wide, and spun around, nearly disappearing into the darkness. "Am I crazy, or is there playground equipment everywhere?"
"I'm not sure. Should we explore?"
B approached the closest object. It was, in fact, the sort of structure one might find on a playground, a climbable geometric dome, the LEDs reflected faintly in its steel bars. Z squeezed through one of the triangular openings and sat cross-legged in the center, looking up. B climbed the dome rung by rung, lying down on top, about five feet in the air.
"Is this supposed to be some kind of metaphor or something?" Z said, with a hint of sarcasm. She lay back onto the ground and stretched out. Now their torsos were parallel, with B's body bent into a crescent moon. "Why aren't they projecting your trauma onto the walls today? I thought it'd be my turn to dig into you."
"What do you want to know?"
"Why are you so quiet?"
"I don't know. My dad was pretty quiet, I guess."
"Tell me about him."
"He was severe. And stern. But he was also surprisingly"—B could never find the right word when she needed it—"competent, I guess. Like, for example, his dinners were always delicious, but we wouldn't really talk while we ate. I only learned from movies that families talk at the dinner table. But if, like, the sink was broken, he didn't have to call anyone to fix it. And then— I don't know." Z brought her hands back behind her head and crossed one leg over the other, her gaze bouncing around B's body, as if it were a constellation. "He just never really opened up. Never made space for that. When I first got to school, I felt like I knew about half as many words as my classmates. Other kids had just been raised talking more. And talking about their feelings more. I think it was that simple."
"What about mom? She didn't talk much either?"
(Wasn't the implication obvious enough? Was Z just being negligent, or forcing her to say it out loud?)
"I—uh—I don't have a mom."
"Hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but everyone has a mom."
"I'm not stupid. I know everyone has a mom. That's not what I meant."
"Jesus, I'm just kidding. I know you know that. I just—I'm sorry. I'm being annoying. Please, tell me more. What happened to your mom?"
"It's okay. To be honest, I don't know exactly what happened to her." B could barely make out Z's face in the low light, but when she said this, there was a visible wince on the floor, an outline of emotion. "I asked him once, but never got a straight answer. More of a shrug."
"I'm sorry to hear that. That's—Actually, I can't imagine what that's like."
B felt as if she was floating right above Z now, face to face. Even from five feet away, she wondered if she could reach down and touch Z's cheek.
"This is really nice," B said, "but I don't feel any closer to crying."
"Don't think about it."
"Okay. I'll try not to."
"Do you resent him? Do you wish he'd been more open?"
"Sometimes. I don't know. Sometimes I get it, but maybe that's just because I am him. I don't know. Something must have happened to him. Either she ran off or—or died in childbirth, right? What else could it be? Either way, it's my—"
"Don't say that," Z interrupted.
B felt an unfamiliar tightness in her chest. Was it simply the sustained force of the metal bar against her sternum? Or was it another kind of pain? Before B could put a finger on it, the feeling evolved, hardened, as if her lungs had turned to stone.
"Were you jealous of him, growing up?" B asked.
"What do you mean? Are you saying, like—"
"I mean after. I assume that, after it happened, he was just perfect, right? Like the most perfect person who'd ever lived, right?"
Z rested her hands over her eyes. She didn't say anything. B heard a few labored breaths move through the room, the sound curling around the faint structures that filled the Crying Station.
"I was definitely jealous of her," B said. "Sure, he was quiet, but I felt like I knew exactly what he was thinking. I don't know why I felt like I knew, but I knew. He was thinking about her."
Z's hands, still cupping her face, started to shake.
"Maybe she did die," B continued. "I get that that's devastating. Trading a wife for a daughter. But still. I just got so mad some days. I didn't care if she was dead. I wanted to kill her again. I wanted to kill her in his head. But I knew I couldn't, because I was her. You know what I mean? You and your brother looked exactly alike in that picture. That's just—It's just the worst feeling in the world. I wanted to zap her out of existence." B didn't know when it happened—she hadn't been paying attention to her body—but at some point the rock in her chest had softened. "I'm sorry." Z hadn't removed her hands from her face. B wanted confirmation that she was okay. "You know," she said, "if you were up here and I was down there, your tears would be falling down onto my face. Maybe it would finally feel like I was crying."
Z's breath shook. "Would you like that? Do you want to switch places?"
"Yeah, I think I do."
B slid her body down the side of the structure. Z exited through one of the triangles on the other side and crawled up the dome like a toddler, lying face down on top in the same crescent shape. B, directly below, oriented her body to mirror Z's.
"You know you're like him?" Z finally said, with new life in her voice. "I guess you said that already."
"Yeah, but I wish you wouldn't have said it again," B said, smiling. At this angle, all B could make out was a tiny gleam of LED light shining in Z's eyes.
"The truth isn't always fun, is it?"
"I'm not super like him." (This wasn't true. B didn't know why she'd said it.)
"You're quiet."
"Plenty of people are quiet."
"Your mind is always elsewhere."
"What do you mean? You don't think I'm here with you?"
"You wear it on your face. Sometimes you're here. Sometimes you go away."
"That's not true. I'm always listening to you."
"That's not what I'm saying. I know you're listening, but sometimes I just see you go away."
And then it hit B, why Z had brought this up. Suddenly, she felt so sad for her confidant that she wanted to cry on her behalf.
"I get it," B said. "You must do this a lot, don't you?"
"Huh? What must I do a lot?"
"You're literally jealous of my thoughts now. You don't want me abandoning you for even just a second, like, even in the privacy of my mind."
"What? No, that's not it. That's not it at all," Z said in a voice B hadn't heard before, then leapt off the edge of the dome, disappearing into the darkness. Her words bounced around the room, hitting B from every angle. "This isn't about me! We were talking about you!"
"I'm sorry!" B shouted, not knowing where to shout. She crawled out from under the dome and started walking toward the echoey steps. Z seemed to be both in front and behind her. B couldn't make sense of the sounds. "Slow down! Where are you?" she said. Her head turned in every direction. "Goddamnit, your footsteps are all over the place. Where are you?"
B weaved between the tables and chairs she hadn't noticed upon arrival, set up like a dining room. A few feet further, she found a series of monkey bars and swing sets, the chain links still swaying. Z must have been close.
B weaved between the tables and chairs she hadn't noticed upon arrival, set up like a dining room. A few feet further, she found a series of monkey bars and swing sets, the chain links still swaying. Z must have been close.
Suddenly B heard a loud thump and felt a terrible pain in her septum. What had happened? Z's body hit the floor, but somehow B had been punched in the face. Her eyes started to water. Her nostrils dripped. Before she could wipe herself clean, she found Z, lying supine beside a bookcase near the center of the room, far from any of the LEDs.
"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! Jesus, I didn't mean to hurt you." B stood over Z's sprawled-out body. She could see rivulets of blood trickling down her cheeks.
B shouted at the ceiling, "This doesn't count as physical contact. It's an emergency. I'm not breaking the rules." Frantic, she removed her hoodie and dabbed at the blood with both sleeves, trying to stop the flow.
"You're not telling me anything new, you know?" B said, catching her breath. "I know the worst parts of myself are all him."
"I know you know. But doesn't it help a little to hear someone else say it?"
Session #3
Today the entire space was filled with thick, white fog. B couldn't see three feet ahead.
"What is this, a middle school dance?" Z asked from the far corner of the room. "Hello? Are you there? I thought I heard your door."
"Yeah, sorry. I'm just a little lost."
"Do you think there's random furniture and playground equipment in here again? I would prefer not to slam my face into anything today."
B's lips broke into a smile. She wished Z could see her reaction. "If we take things slow, I think we can avoid major injuries."
"This is the Crying Station, babe. We don't take anything slow in here."
That line brought audible laughter out of B. (She hoped Z could tell it was sincere.)
B saw a dark figure sliding through the fog. Its gait was uncanny, out of rhythm with the sound of Z's footfalls. But before B could make sense of it, the figure had faded. "Was that you?"
"I thought it was you?"
"What? Are you messing with me?"
"No, I swear. I thought— This is weird."
"Hello?" B said to the fog. "Is there someone else in here?"
The two stood still a moment, listening to the silence.
"I'm kind of, uh, spooked," Z said. "Say something. I wanna make sure you're still alive out there."
"I'm alive," B said, approaching what she imagined was the center of the room. No table today. No play structures. "I don't think there's anything in here this time. Try to follow my voice."
After a few uneasy steps, Z found B and sat down cross-legged, their torsos perpendicular. Even at this distance, they could barely make out each other's faces.
"So are you finally gonna cry today?" Z asked. "You know that's what this place is for, right?"
"Shut up," B said, trying to match Z's playfulness. "Maybe I will, maybe I won't. I mean, I don't think I can, but I'll try. That's what we're here for."
Z let the conversation rest, rather than striking back with a quip. She looked more comfortable than ever this week. B wondered if they would exchange numbers after this session. She had been hoping they would. She had been worrying. (There was always the possibility that B enjoyed Z's company ten times more than the reverse. B might have mistaken her confidant's social grace for chemistry.)
Without warning, Z jolted from knee to shoulder, bracing for some sort of impact. B, confused, mirrored the motion and ducked her head. But nothing came.
"Another shadow," Z said. "Right behind you."
"Are you scared?"
"I don't know. It's probably just the projectors again. That wouldn't be too expensive."
"Yeah, that makes sense. But how is that supposed to help us cry?"
Z lowered down to her elbows, ruminating. "Well, who can you feel out there in the fog?"
What caught B off-guard was not the question but rather the fact that Z clearly had an answer in mind. She wasn't asking; she was forcing a conversation.
"You know who," B said.
"If you had the chance to talk to her, like hypothetically, what would you say?"
B sat for a moment. Finally, she let the question out: "I'd ask, what do you hate about yourself?"
"You'd ask her that?"
"Yeah."
"Why?"
"I don't know. I want to know her faults, or at least what she thinks they are. I know all my dad's faults, and I know mine. If I could talk to her, maybe I'd get a clearer sense of what I picked up on my own. Maybe the problems that aren't genetic would be easier to get rid of."
"Why are you so focused on your faults?"
"I guess I just hate myself," B said. She paused, let the words hang in the air. "Jesus, it's true. I hate myself, and I think I just want what's wrong with me to be someone else's fault."
"What do you hate about yourself?"
"Everything, I guess. I don't know. I mean, this is definitely part of it."
"What do you mean?"
"That I can't cry. It makes me feel like a robot. People should be able to cry with each other. I have plenty to cry about. Yeah, I guess that's one of the things that's wrong with me."
"Nothing's wrong with you," Z said, her face swallowed by the fog, lips disembodied.
"But it's not just that I can't cry. I just feel completely...disconnected sometimes. From myself. From everybody."
"What about now? Do you feel disconnected from me?"
"Do you ever think thoughts in between your thoughts?"
"Maybe. What do you mean?"
"Like, at the front of my mind, there's this inner monologue, just constantly running. And it mostly feels like I'm steering it, almost like I'm talking to myself. That's the me in my head. But then when I listen closely and the monologue slows down, there are all these other little thoughts crammed in the spaces between the monologue. And I'm not saying they're, like, other voices in my head. It's still me. But it's more of a— a whisper. Like a quieter me is saying things that the louder me in front is too scared to say."
"Does she ever speak in the space between?"
"No, no, that's not what I mean. It's not another voice. Or— I guess it depends what you mean. She does pop up, but only if the quiet me is thinking about her, if that makes sense. It's never her voice. No, it's more like me reminding myself both that I am her and that I'm not her. It's sort of torturous, now that I say it out loud, this tiny uncontrollable voice just berating me throughout the day. Does he ever pop up like that?"
"We've talked enough about me. I can't be the only one breaking down in here."
"I'm trying. Can't you see I'm trying?
"Hello?
"Are you there?
"What happened? Where'd you go?
"Fine. I'll talk. The more I think about it, the more I realize that the quiet voice between my thoughts is the same voice that always tells me that everything is my fault. Maybe I was too big, and she died in childbirth. Maybe my dad can't bear the sight of my broad shoulders. And, sure, I know that's crazy, but I had to sit at the dinner table growing up wondering these things because he was so quiet. These were the thoughts I couldn't help but think. You know how I said earlier that when I asked my dad about her, he just shrugged?
"I lied. It's worse. I don't know why I didn't tell you last time. When I asked what happened, all he said was, 'I loved her very much and she loved me, too.' And somehow, the way he said it, I knew he wouldn't be taking any follow-up questions. Can you believe he said that? 'I loved her very much and she loved me, too.' It's like he was trying to defend himself against some accusation I wasn't even making. I was eight, for God's sake. I had no idea what to say. Listen to it: 'I loved her very much and she loved me, too.' He was making sure I knew he hadn't scared her away, or abused her, or anything like that. But I was eight. I wasn't old enough to wonder if she'd left because of something he'd done. And still that line echoes in my head. Because if it wasn't his fault, it must have been mine. Why couldn't he have just lied? Why couldn't he have told me that she adored me? Or that she valiantly gave her life for me in the hospital? Why not make up a story to make it easier on me? He's my dad. Is that so much to ask for? A different story. Any story. It wouldn't have changed anything for him. But clearly it was my fault somehow, or he at least thought it was, so he wanted to make sure I thought it was, too. Everything stems from that. It's his voice echoing underneath everything all the time, constantly popping up in the space between. It's his pain. When my mom slipped through his fingers, he slipped, too. It's not the dead who slip—it's the living. He tried his best to raise me, but when I came into this world, he had just fallen. There was no way I could catch him at that age. I was too frail. I was too fresh to it all. It's just so ugly. It's all just so ugly. Why can't I get all these ugly thoughts out of my head? Why can't I control them? Sometimes I worry that my parents thought I wanted him gone, that I was jealous of the attention he got, so I pushed him off the edge. I know that sounds crazy but I've probably had that thought ten thousand times. Because I know they've had it. You know why? God, I can't believe I'm saying this. I didn't cry right away. When it happened—I'm sorry I wasn't screaming and crying like you were, Mom. I was in shock. I didn't know what was going on. I didn't understand what had happened. That's why I wasn't sobbing—not because I didn't care. I'm not some kind of psychopath. I just couldn't process it. One moment I had my arm around him. The next moment he was gone. What did you want me to do, Dad? Tell me, what I was supposed to do? I was a child. Do you have any idea the strength it takes to snatch someone straight out of the air?"