In a Hole in the Ground
Charlotte Sherlock
Charlotte Sherlock is a quaint little hobbit with a messy bun, scarf, cardigan, and a permanent mug of tea which she carries with boisterous pride. Most words that come from her mouth are blips, boings and boyish jazz trills that slip out incoherently.
She sits in the kitchen: quaintly sized and crowded with tables, counters, jugs, jars and jams. It’s been a long day for Little Young Charlotte; a day full of responsibilities, human errors and terrible triumphs.
She sits alone, needing to wake up in far too few hours—it is currently 11.42 pm. Right now, her mug of tea is a glass of milk (pronounced ‘mulk’) with some biscuits on the side. Her movements resemble a frog: still, sometimes sudden, with a habit of muttering into the abyss. She’s got a lot on her mind, and she believes that one more Tiny Teddy will fix all her problems. How very.
Right now, she’s talking to herself. It’s going a little bit like this.
‘You know it’s been a while since you’ve had a shower, Ms Sherlock,’ Charlotte says. This Charlotte looks permanently dressed to see the Barbie movie, and is always prepared to go to the opera
‘Every Sunday, we said.’ Little Young Charlotte sips her mulk.
‘Yes, and you’re barely doing that.’
‘I’m doing my best.’ Charlotte eats her bikkies humbly.
‘We should text someone to make sure they know we love them,’ Charlotte says. This Charlotte is a sweater weather gay witch who hasn’t slept in weeks.
‘That’s so…weird. And out of the blue.’ Pink Charlotte says, clutching her pearls.
‘Make it look like a check-in! “Oh, how’s it going with ___?” They’ll never know!’ The witch speaks in a Russian accent, affording Pink Charlotte a groan.
‘Fine. Let’s text Bronte.’
‘Bronte it is!’
But Little Young Charlotte has once again accidentally clicked on the Instagram Explore page and after half an hour, has forgotten why she reached for her phone at all.
Out of the corner springs Charlotte once more. This Charlotte is a mechanical, three-headed dog who is obsessed with the art of musical theatre. It wears a clock on its head that ticks upwards.
‘It’s been 43 minutes and 25 seconds since you last thought about the musical. Should we get understudies? Make another spreadsheet for it and text Jack Linke right now.’ The clock resets to zero.
‘DON’T TEXT JACK LINKE! HE’S HAD ENOUGH OF YOUR BULLSHIT.’ A shadowy figure emerges from the corner of the kitchen; it’s Charlotte! This Charlotte is tall and pale and hates you.
‘The way all of them look at you, Ms Sherlock? The way they snicker, interrupt, nod along to your speech—they’re feigning politeness. That’s all people are—polite.’
Little Young Charlotte feels a knot in her stomach. Is it a cramp? A stomach-ache? An undiagnosed allergy? A fart? Anxiety? Nausea? Stress? Fatigue? Oh, you know which one, little birdie.
Gay Sweater Witch Charlotte is speaking up. ‘How dare you talk to her like that! She’s just a little guy on her first day. She needs something to get through it, perhaps a little treat.’
‘That’s ridiculous. She has so many treats every day; she doesn’t need more.’
‘Stop being so hateful.’
‘Stop being so depressed.’
‘Maybe if you didn’t hate her so much, she wouldn’t be so depressed.’
All this commotion for such a small kitchen is overwhelming Little Young Charlotte and her empty glass of milk. Perhaps she will refill it—although she does believe she has undiagnosed lactose intolerance. And the Charlottes are in the way. They can be so obnoxious.
Little Young Charlotte produces a pen and paper. Opposite her sits Charlotte, early high school age, doodling in her notebook and wearing watermelon headphones. She has covered every inch of her page with writing, to the point that it is incomprehensible. She shows her art teacher. He wants to put it in the school newsletter. 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She looks up at the artwork. It is far larger than her—as encompassing and as jam-packed as the universe itself. It was drawn during lockdown—some of Charlotte’s most isolated yet creative years. This Early High School Charlotte has not made it through that difficult time yet. Has not realised that her dedication to her 52-chaptered Creepypasta Jeff the Killer fan fiction will spark her aspirations to become a writer, to enter a writing course, to meet the most amazing people she’s ever met, and to write about her as she was, then.
Pen and ink on the page mirror her thoughts, dreams and anxieties: her nostalgia and longing for the release of responsibilities; for when she was two and got to spend all her time with Mama. Well, now Mama is back at her job drowning in paperwork, and surmounting mental illnesses manifests in the linework of a gargantuan portrait. Words within the words within the page.
How deep they go.
How most of them are not her own.
Her friend Jakob Schuster wrote ‘people are like … lichen. Give them the most barren concrete, and they’ll grow in the space between’. And Will Wood, the music man said ‘at most a couple generations will remember the way in which your life never mattered so who cares if it’s a waste?’ and I’m looking at these people in my kitchen in my home and I’m wondering where it all went wrong.
They’re still arguing. Poor Little Young Charlotte. Let’s see what they’re up to!
‘How can someone so selfless who loves so much hate herself for it?’ the Shadowy Pale Charlotte yells from the toaster. He is clanging together pots and pans, blocking out the noise of the Gay Sweater Charlotte wallowing in the sink.
The Early High School Charlotte is sobbing—she doesn’t know what overstimulation is yet.
The cringe geek atop the fridge has started ranting about Minecraft—or Dungeons & Dragons—or Be More Chill—or film theory or fucking anything really but no-one’s paying attention. She’s been told to shut up multiple times yet never does—not for long.
There is so much noise everywhere consuming everything
making everything sos much worse
please maek it shtop
maske it astop
mkae
ti
sotp
its hurdsgts me akll oveg
my syomack hruts
ffrohm nsaaurseaau
Hey guys, welcome back to Hyiermitcwaft!! :33
andg I reakally vvandt to thfrow urpp
inn
mae schtaomch
Guilt, regret, anxiety, things we dare not name!
myi thafrot
my hraeat ists ingsdide
my rhthraot
Me n who?
lememe ftrhow it out
Is it really worth the complete and utter hassle to retrieve a medical certificate declaring my anxiety disorder so I can complete assignments without destroying myself in the process?
mlet e sqaeaf
lemte asapek
let em sqeak
let me speak
‘Let me speak,’ Little Young Charlotte says. What will she say? Tune in after this quick ad break brought to you by Unbridled Guilt
C : hey guy, what’s up! welcome back to video today i just wanted to say thank you all so much for reading
this far into my piece im really grateful that anyone would take the time to actually
read through this whole fucking thing it’s a bit of a mess ill be realwe can all be realsorry for beating myself up so much i do that a lot haha thats kind of the point this entire little ad read bit is so i can make myself feel better for burdening
others with the daily deplorable task of knowing me as i go through the mortifying
yet euphoric experience of being known™ (warning: comes with inexplicable side
effects)sorry for being self-deprecatingim working on itknow that i love you a lot for this and i know love is thrown around a lot and feels
hollow and empty especially if you barely or don’t at all know me but if you know one
thing about me know that i do actually mean it‘i love you’ is such a common phrase that when we hear people on the internet say it
to us its completely detached from its original meaning because thats how language
works but know that i do mean it even if this monologue is repetitive and it too loses
its meaning and there is no actual feasible way to know that you know that i love you
without having met you in real life and confirming it myself but know that i do love you
because you’re reading this. because youre here with me. because were holding
hands, at the edge of a cliff. and we’re about to climb down safely and have a picnic on
the beach because what is life without a little love, you know?‘Let me speak,’ Little Young Charlotte says. ‘Stop calling me Little Young. I am little and I am young, but I don’t appreciate how much you speak down to me. I am who I am and that sucks, but it’s also all I have. Me and this huge fucking artwork.’
The Charlottes stare in silence. The artwork billows—75 sheets of paper in the wind. The Shadowy Pale Charlotte pauses, holding the toaster. The Geek Charlotte freezes atop the fridge. The Sweater Gay Charlotte climbs out of the sink and sits atop the counter. Pink Charlotte and Mechanical Dog Charlotte take a step back. Charlotte clears her throat.
‘You made her cry.’ She looks at Little Young Charlotte; the High School Charlotte. She is using a much overused handkerchief for her tears; it was a gift.
‘She is you,’ the Shadowy Pale Charlotte says.
‘Exactly.’ Charlotte sighs. ’I am who I am now, but I am also me at age two and age six and age fourteen and eighteen and nineteen and everything in between. We humans are factorials, we are not a standalone number. And we are in this together.’ She holds hands with Little Young Charlotte, who is proud of her older self.
‘It’s going to be okay,’ says the Geek Charlotte, hopping off the fridge and leaving the room.
One by one, they leave Charlotte alone in the kitchen, the last one to go being the Shadowy Pale Charlotte.
‘I’ll see you in the morning,’ Charlotte says.
‘See you in the morning.’ A wicked grin fades into a dark corner.
And so, Charlotte was by herself, and had nothing to do but put her dishes in the dishwasher. Brush her teeth. Go to bed. The Charlottes would be back to wake her up in the morning, but there are voices other than Charlotte to help her throughout the day.