Death is Black and White

Five days is a lot of time. It’s one hundred and twenty hours. Seven thousand, two hundred minutes. Four hundred and thirty two thousand seconds. A lot of time. In five days, the average high school student goes to maybe forty classes, goes through about 275 minutes of note taking, worksheets, and tests. They probably change their shoes around ten times and eat fifteen meals. They see hundreds of familiar people, all in five days.

But in five days, the average high school student in a rehab/ mental hospital who is being followed around by a demonic ghost child goes to about twelve therapy sessions, three group self-harm meetings, and watches about seven minutes of Toddlers and Tiaras before leaving the lounge. She sees her parents a total of zero times, even though they had an appointment to see her over the weekend. She talks on the phone for the allotted twenty minutes allowed weekly. Ten minutes with Josh, ten minutes with Sam. Click. End of conversation.

I think about all this while sitting in the lounge , simultaneously counting ceiling tiles and blocking out the drone of the television. The lounge is the second to last place I’d like to be right now, with my room being the first. Any normal person would feel like they’re being watched in my room, probably because there are drawings all over the walls staring you down. The custodians tried cleaning it up, but the drawings won’t budge. Honestly, though, to me it's just another bill for my parents to pay. In that room, I know there’s more than drawings watching me. I know I’m being watched all the time, even in the lounge. But I want to prove to everybody that I’m heading back to normalcy by doing what they tell me to. I feel like if I kiss their asses, maybe they’ll let me go home. Maybe it won’t take my parents too much convincing to get me out of here when they finally get around to pulling me out of this program. It's bound to happen anyway, right? I wonder if they’d fight for me, even. If the hospital said I wasn't ready to leave, would my parents let them keep me until they said I could leave? Or would they argue with the doctors and therapists, telling them that I’d be fine and they wanted their kid back?

Do they want me back?

I feel like an anxious kid at the bus stop, waiting to be picked up. But the bus has broken down, and it’s snowing. It’s very cold.

I don’t know if Josh has talked to my parents yet, or maybe he chickened out, figuring that they’d come and get me soon anyway. At least, that’s what I figured a week ago, too, but trust hasn’t gotten us far, has it? Maybe Josh forgot. He’s probably studying for midterms or taking them right now. I don’t even know when they are this year. I’ll probably miss them…what if I have to repeat the ninth grade?

He probably lied to you, Logic says in the back of my mind. I don’t know when I started personifying my conscience, but it always feels more like a cynical conversation than a feeling of paranoia or skepticism.

He’s just telling you what you want to hear, it continues harshly. He’s just too nice to let you down easy. You glom onto him like some lost puppy, holding his hand and agreeing with everything he says. I bet he’s just stringing you along because he feels bad that you’re so pathetic. He knows you’re going to die just like you and I do, and he’s convinced that if he’s nice enough to you before you rot in here, he won’t hurt your feelings too badly. Once you die, he can carry on without having to deal with you.

My stomach turns and it feels like my heart is covered in splinters. Logic has never been mean like this, it was only ever doubtful of my sanity. But what if it’s true? Josh is too nice of a guy to just ignore me or flat out say that he hates me. Who even likes a girl who’s insane anyway? He already has to take care of his sister, why would he want to deal with me in addition to Lissi and Natalie?

All you do is cause problems for him. You got him kicked out of his house, you got possessed and spit in his face,- I spit in his face?- along with punching him a couple of times, screaming at him for trying to help you, and embarrassed him by making him talk about his sister when he clearly didn’t want to.

I don’t remember doing half those things! I screamed at him? Punched him? A cold wave of guilt washes over me. He left out a lot of the story when he told me what happened during the séance. I want to call and apologize, but I feel like it’ll just make the hole I’ve dug for myself deeper. I didn't think that he was uncomfortable with talking about Lissi and Natalie to me...I mean, after a while he didn't mind, right? Or was he covering it up? My head is spinning.

I can’t take the negative thoughts anymore and stand up abruptly, feeling as if I’m going to explode. I walk out of the room, trying to look calm and to not attract attention to myself, even though I want to run down the halls screaming. What I’m feeling is like claustrophobia and cabin fever, like I’m trapped inside this hospital with no one legit to talk to besides my own conscience.

I spend the rest of the night walking every single hall of the first floor before heading back to my room. I go to sleep, feeling robotic because I can’t show any emotion without getting locked up. If I throw the tantrum that’s eating away at my insides, every sign of progress I’ve made will go down the tubes. In the morning, I go to my daily group self-harm meeting, listen to people’s problems, how they’re improving in some way, and proceed to lie about how I’m doing. When the meeting is done, I monotonously turn for the door while my mind is still racing.

Someone lays a hand on my shoulder, causing me to turn around. It’s our group leader, Cheryl.

“Yes, Cheryl?” I ask quietly, wanting desperately to be anywhere else but here. She’s smiling at me like I’m a small child with food all over my face.

“I have amazing news,” she says cheerfully, as always.

I just stare at her, expecting her to say something along the lines of “the dinner special tonight is lasagna!”, but she motions for me to sit at one of the chairs by the door. She sits down next to me and smiles again. I raise my eyebrows, waiting.

“Well, you know that you were originally signed up for the two-week program, then your parents added another two weeks so they could help your sister move into her new house, right?” she says excitedly.

I blink. “Um, no. I wansn’t informed,” I reply in a bitter tone. Of course they would help my sister instead of coming to get me. Because that makes a lot of sense…not.

“Oh! We just suggested to them that you stay a bit longer because you weren't showing much improvement at the time...” Cheryl’s cheeks turn pink, which is unflattering on her pale face. “Someone was supposed to tell you! Jeez, you probably thought your parents forgot about you, didn’t you?”

“I guess,” I say blankly, because it’s not like I still think that or anything. It’s totally common for your parents to put you on the back burner so they can make sure your sister, who actually has a decent place to live in the first place, is comfortable.

“Well,” Cheryl continues, looking as excited as ever, “you seem to be doing much betrer this past week, and we called them this morning to pick you up! Congratulations, you’ve graduated early!”

She gives me a hug, and I don’t even mind because I’m too busy trying to get my jaw off the floor. “I’ve…graduated?” I say in a shocked voice. This is a dream. It has to be.

“Yeah! We’ve seen so much improvement, Lydia. Your attitude this past week has been so much better. Even your individual therapist suggested that we let you go early. We think that seeing your friends and family will do you a lot of good.”

“Oh my god,” I breathe. “They’re coming to get me?”

"Yes," Cheryl says again and gives me another hug.

The air around me seems lighter, the walls less constricting. The negative thoughts that have been buzzing in my head are somehow quieter, almost silent, and I feel myself smiling for real, for the first time since Josh and Sam left. I'm finally going home.