The Words That Got Away: A Case for Emotional Containment
If regrets became monsters, what would yours look like?
Content warning: This essay contains references to suicide.
Note: Names and details have been changed to protect privacy.
What’s missing from the world is soap strong enough to scrub memories from beneath fingernails, or fire hot enough to burn the taste of unsaid words from the back of a throat that swallowed them whole
“August 20th,” The Tyrant announced with theatrical precision. “Six hours before your flight. Last-minute shopping. Suitcase packing. Airport check-in. A perfectly planned schedule—until he showed up in the courtyard and threw it all off.”
I did not see that coming. The Tyrant—my anxious mind personified—had been quiet lately. Back in his glory days, he’d liberally add to his collection of invisible furniture—new chairs, side tables, a standing desk treadmill—each piece marking a doubt he’d planted. But ever since I embraced radical acceptance—letting mistakes be without needing to fix them—he’d been reduced to browsing catalogs.
So when he showed up in my bedroom at 3 AM—not with his usual catalog of the DØUBTÏKÅ collection, but holding a photograph pulsing with that familiar shade of regret I thought I’d left behind—I realized browsing catalogs was apparently no longer enough for him.
The photograph showed Jin, my childhood friend, perched on a bench, transfixed by a blue nebula keycap—a collectible piece for his mechanical keyboard that he’d been eyeing for months. As sunlight struck its surface, an enchanting deep blue cast tiny shadows across his palm, shimmering with silver starlight.
Jin and I had shared years of friendship, built on our obsession with mechanical keyboards and terrible puns. He’d spent months on a custom build, collecting artisan keycaps like captured nebulae, each casting its own constellation of shadows.
I still remember the night we stayed up until 3 AM, with him teaching me how to solder switches while making increasingly delirious keyboard puns. “You really need to get your life in ctrl,” he said, grinning as I messed up another joint. Looking back, I should have noticed when those late-night building sessions became less frequent, when his usual ‘ctrl-alt-delete’ jokes took on a darker tone.
On August 20th, with only six hours left before I’d be flying halfway across the globe for college, I only managed a quick hello when I bumped into him. His distracted response and the slight tremor in his fingers would haunt me later, after I learned what happened to him that evening.
In the weeks after, I gave up mechanical keyboards completely. Couldn’t stand the sound of the switches he’d helped me choose. I opted for my laptop’s built-in one.
The photograph on my desk pulsed stronger now, as if feeding off this confession. The blue nebula keycap in Jin’s hands began to writhe, and suddenly the image erupted, transforming into a glowing, one-eyed monster with tendrils.
“Oh, I see how it is, Tyrant,” I managed, trying to sound unimpressed despite my racing heart. “Turning my memories into monsters now? Very dramatic. But sorry to disappoint—I've learned to live with my regrets. I’m basically a radical acceptance buddha now.”
The tendril monster’s eye fixed on me with such intensity that my practiced calm crumbled. Because that’s the thing about regrets like this—they don’t care about your enlightenment. They’ve had years to fester, feeding on quiet moments of doubt, growing fat on those midnight what-ifs.
With a shriek, the monster started projecting scenes across my bedroom walls: Jin on the bench, the nebula keycap casting shadows. Me, hurrying past.
Wait—no. Stop.
The projection wavered, shifting into an alternate reality I’d never lived but always imagined: back at the bench, seeing his trembling fingers with the nebula keycap, I paused and asked, “Jin, is everything okay?” And in this version, we went to the café we frequented, chatting as if time were a luxury we actually had.
“Stop!” I pleaded as the light splintered, shattering reality into jagged shards.
The same scenes replayed. Over and over. Jin’s drifting gaze. My fading steps. The words I wish I said. Again and again. Until the bedroom began to spin, and I couldn’t find my way out of the memories.
“Wait wait wait—” came a familiar voice from deep within, cutting through the swirl of alternate timelines.
That voice…
It was the same firm “Wait wait wait” that had steadied me when The Tyrant almost turned losing two brioche buns into an existential crisis.
I turned to find its source: a woman in a containment suit had materialized from my subconscious into my bedroom, already pulling color-coded instruments from her field kit. Though I should mention—what I called a “containment suit” was more like a rainbow-colored onesie that would make even a circus clown say, “Too much.”
“Dr. Emma Shun Regulator, Department of Conservation and Containment, Museum of Regrets,” she introduced. “Been watching out for you since that first intervention. Sometimes we all need someone in our head to stop us at the right moment—”
Her instruments erupted in a symphony of alerts, screens flashing crimson. “Code Red,” she muttered, checking her color-coded filing system. “Worse than I thought. We need to contain this regretling immediately!”
“Contain it?” I shot her a look. “Can’t we just accept it?”
“Not when regrets have turned into mutants like this. Fed by years of what-ifs, these mutants resist acceptance,” Dr. Regulator said, before activating the containment device.
The device emitted a low hum, a shimmering barrier forming around the regretling. “That’s why they need to be contained. Quarantined. Until they’re tame enough to approach.”
“Well, well, well...” The Tyrant’s voice sliced through the air. “Getting good at containing, are we?”
He circled the regretling like a proud parent, each word stoking its glow. “Tell me,” he said, “when you lock away this regret, will you label it ‘Failed Friend’ or ‘Coward’s Exit’?”
The regretling burst free from the containment field, warping reality until I couldn’t trust my own memories.
Was that actually how Jin looked that day?
Did his hands really shake that much?
Did I really walk by that quickly?
“You had one job,” The Tyrant prowled closer. “One simple task. See the signs. Ask the question. Stay.”
I wanted to correct him—technically, that was three tasks—but the regretling’s glow flared brighter with each word, and I figured this wasn’t the best time for a numeracy intervention.
“But noooooo,” he purred, each syllable a blade. “You were too busy with your precious schedule. Your perfect little plan.”
The regretling convulsed like a nebula collapsing in on itself. Projections fractured—Jin, me, memories trapped in endless loops. The blue keycap flared in desperate bursts, its starlight splintering, static building like approaching thunder.
“Wait wait wait—” Dr. Regulator cut through the chaos. “What’s the real regret here?”
“Everything!” I gasped. “The rush! Not—seeing the signs! Not—”
“No, focus!” she snapped. “What’s the core regret? The one you can’t let go?”
“I…” The truth bubbled up. Hot and raw. “I regret being too busy with my life to see someone else slipping away from theirs.”
The regretling’s glow flickered. “Keep going!” she demanded.
“It wasn’t about saying the right thing,” I choked out. “It was about being there. Seeing. Staying. Just… for one moment. One damn moment.”
The mutant regret shuddered. Its glow dimmed. Veins receded like a retreating tide.
“Now!” she barked. We forced the regretling into the containment unit. Its tendrils coiled inward one last time before fading to a faint, steady blue. The door clanged shut—final as a judge’s gavel.
The room fell silent.
“There, everything’s back in the green zone,” Dr. Regulator said, breaking the silence.
I glanced at the very blue display, then at her very confident face, and decided this wasn’t the hill to die on. Somewhere in her color-coded filing system, there was probably a 27-page thesis explaining why this particular blue was, in fact, green.
That night, watching my reflection in the containment glass, I felt something like progress. Days blended into weeks, weeks into months, until containing regrets became second nature. Like breathing. Like muscle memory. Like tying your shoelaces or forgetting people’s names right after they introduce themselves.
So life’s been pretty good, really. No more existential crises over lost brioche buns. No more spiraling thoughts. No more messy feelings disrupting my carefully ordered mind.
I even started using mechanical keyboards again—the clicks don’t hurt anymore. The sound is just sound. Dr. Regulator would be proud of how well I’ve maintained the containment protocols.
It’s just that some days, I catch myself staring at the containment case for hours. Then more hours. Then days. The creature inside pulses faintly, casting that same enchanting blue as Jin’s keycap once did, its glow washing over the room. It’s comforting, in a way. Familiar. Almost like it’s all I need.
And there are moments when I wonder if I’ve forgotten how the world looks beyond midnight blue. The other colors seem muted, tinged with blue. Like they’re submerged in deep water. Like half-remembered dreams. Like trying to recall a friend’s laugh after too many years of silence.
The blue glow reaches further into the room each time I stand here, casting long shadows that stretch across the floor like yearning fingers.
Even The Tyrant’s carefully curated collection of invisible furniture seems to dissolve in the overwhelming blue.
The Tyrant and I don’t bicker anymore; we just sit here, side by side, in the glow. Sometimes he adjusts his invisible tie, more out of habit than necessity. Sometimes I pretend not to notice when he glances at me with what might be concern.
We watch as something else—something I can’t quite name—slowly slips away.
I’m starting to think it might be me.
Credits
You guys are my literary Dr. Regulators, who helped quarantine my worst writing habits. Unlike the real Dr. Regulator, they know the difference between blue and green.
The language is so vivid that I can practically see the regretling being contained. It reminded me of my childhood watching and being terrified of the movie Gremlins. Beautiful. Almost involuntarily, my lips muttered a prayer for Jin in whichever realm he's in.
?
?This is what showed up? I am lost for words. Impressed, sad, happy, proud. I'm sure it was not easy. But it is beautiful.