On the sallow, white-washed wall nails, dark and consumed by fear have left behind the vivid scratch marks of your pain. I wonder what happened to you that made you so desperate to escape. As the dark oscillates between the nothingness of sleep and the terrors of wakefulness, I see you begging for help. Pleading like a child. But your eyes are old – dull and broken by tragedy and loss. Your skin shattered like the barren earth of Hiroshima-devastated by the whims of men and their need for power.
I learn later, much later when I finally remember that I can speak, that you succeeded in your wish, you hanged yourself from the bathroom ceiling. The clothes of the outside world tethered together in a rope as strong as your will. I wonder what memories they held and I think only, you are better for it. Holding a sweatshirt I consider the same. But they are more vigilant these days. Reprimands and investigations have an uncanny knack of making people care. Making them do their job.
The windows, dust filled and grey, protected by the heavy metal bars of oppression and despair, are ominous. They disconcert me. Reminding me of where I am. But not of who I am. For weeks, I am silent. What is there to say and to who? I stare at the bars, willing them to speak. The tree outside, it’s branches stripped and searched by the cold hands of winter, laughs at my ridiculousness. I must succumb it says, laughing
Laughing.
There is no other way.
I fight. Dragged through the nightly routine of unnamed pills handed over on a plate. I do not know what they are. I fear them. I fear sleep. Sometimes you watch. Checking for compliance but mostly you are too busy gossiping with the other nurses to notice the swell beneath my tongue. The plant in the cracked grey pot should have overdosed by now I think as I spit another concoction of drugs into its soil. Later, when no one is watching I will stir the earth to hide the evidence.
Madness and madness. Insanity. The screams of the broken ring in my ears. I do not belong here; the tears fall into the bowl they’ve rammed in front of me as I count the numbers in my head and shove the protein shake into the bra hanging from my skin. And I wonder momentarily if the straps would be strong enough to hold my weight. My thoughts are shattered.
The chair comes hurtling out of nowhere, landing by my side, clipping my shoulder as it crashes to the floor. You are manic and angry and I have angered you. Maybe it is my whiteness; my inability to communicate in your language. I do not know. Your eyes are filled with hatred as you lumber towards me. I do not move; I am not scared. More curious. Is this how I will end?
A flash of white and the nurses are on you – dragging you screaming.
Screaming.
Screaming. The hollow cry of a wounded deer. The cry of desecration that will live within me forever. They jab you hard with the needle. I vomit over the floor. The thick hot acid of guilt and shame.
One of you tries to console me but I can only watch dumbfounded as they drag your lifeless body to some other hell hole reserved for non-compliance. The guilt weighs like a gun. And your fury burns like a bullet to my head.
Later, I walk down the corridor, my IV rattling along the stark tiled floor, and there you are. Restrained and bound in the centre of the cell. Walls white and padded to protect who? You or them? I want to hold you. To say that I am sorry that I caused you such pain. That I am still causing it. I do not. I cannot. I know that I must not be here. For my sake and yours.
I resolve to do what is needed for freedom and wonder as I chew stoically on a mouthful of rice, the numbers clocking up – ticking, what that even means in this life.
- Dallee Generated
- This is my own work and has not been generated in whole or in part by AI
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