Lost, Lost, Lost

"Towel, please," I told the nurse. She was in the laundry room folding people's scrubs, towels, and personal clothes. The nurse smiled at me then handed me a towel. Suddenly the girl inside of me started speaking.

Kill her, she said, sending me images of her death. I winced and ran away as fast as I could. I needed to get away, I needed to be alone. But I didn't want to be alone, because I wouldn't be able to trust myself to keep anybody alive. I felt like one of those homicidal freaks who kill people just for the pleasure of watching them die in sick ways. Was I one of them?

I stood in the shower, crying silently to myself. The girl inside me tried coaxing me into drowning. I couldn't take it anymore! I jumped out of the shower, wrapped myself in a towel then hurried off across the hall to the nurses' station. One of the nurses opened the door, shocked that I would arrive in only a towel. The other patients around me were staring.

"She keeps talking to me," I cried. "I can't do this anymore! Help me, I just want to be normal!" My sobs began to rise and I couldn't help myself. I fell to the floor in a squat, one hand holding onto a bar. My breathing was rugged and felt almost hollow, my short hair falling into my eyes. "She just... won't leave me alone..."

Nurses swarmed me and tried to pull me together, but my seams had snapped. I was going crazy locked up, with Seth here and this girl telling me to kill others and myself. I couldn't help myself, I was screaming in horror as the girl inside of me sent more images of death. It was the awful, torturous kind of death. Pinning people to the walls by their eyeballs, ripping them apart with my bare hands, crushing their bones and tearing their hearts with my teeth. I cried and cried, aware that everyone around me would be talking about this for a few more days.

Why did this have to happen to me?

*****

I woke up in the seclusion room, very groggy and tired. I was wearing the light blue scrubs that patients on precautions wore. I had finally gotten off precautions a few days before this incident, and now I was back in these awful scrubs.

I jumped to the sound of somebody unlocking the door and peeking in. "Oh, you're awake now," the nurse said. "Well, good. Come to group now," she said in a cheery yet tense tone, which wasn't very pleasing.

I slowly got out of the bed and walked through the door to the empty hallway. I looked into the group room and saw Seth sitting in his usual seat, snickering at something somebody said. I knocked on the door and saw everyone stare at me in unison. Somebody opened the door for me and I sat in the first seat I saw, across the room from Chris.

Somebody grunted and another person laughed. I hid my sadness and looked down at the desk. Somewhere on it had a purple marker stain. I looked up again to hear Chris talking about using and how cool it was, and then Trace complaining about how since she used to be a heroin addict nobody should be talking about how "cool" drugs are. A lot of people nodded but half of them were lying and didn't agree with her, including Chris, obviously.

I saw Seth looking at me, then looking away when my eyes shifted towards his. He slowly turned his head back to me and raised an eyebrow. I tried raising one of my eyebrows but I didn't have the eyebrow muscle to do it. He laughed at my attempt and raised his eyebrow again.

I sighed. This hospital stay was going to seem so long.