Cycle I: Coming on Strong
The Hidden Voice
The Nerve · Break (v2.00)
THE HOUSE OF ZAN — Zan

If you have read all twenty-six pieces of Cycle I: The Nerve, you have reached the point of impact.
The Nerve is never the whole story.
It is where the impact is felt most directly.
The order can matter.
Even if it was never followed.
One pressure point can become another.
They bleed into each other.
It can all feel the same, even when every pain is different.
The question changed somewhere.
What do I want?
became
What happens when somebody else wants something too?
It always does.
It.
Always.
Does.
Most certainty gets easier when the other person stays imaginary.
That hardly ever lasts.
Sometimes it never even starts.
If it does, you may find yourself alone.
Safe, but not grateful.
So.
We risk ourselves on something we really don’t know for something we’re still trying to understand.
Ourselves.
Because when the pain is over,
what remains is something harder to pretend didn’t happen.
The pressure stops.
The memory doesn’t.

Opening Arrangement: “Song for El Salvador” — Minutemen