by Ned Vizzini
“Huh, eat your salt.”
“What, tough guy? How about I knock your head off, how would you like that—”
“Boys.” Noelle stands up and pulls her hair away from her cheeks, which are red in addition to being cut up. Everybody shuts up.
“So now,” I continue, “instead of a quarter-life crisis they’ve got a fifth-life crisis—that’s when you’re eighteen—and a sixth-life crisis—that’s when you’re fourteen. I think that’s what a lot of people have.”
“What you have.”
“Not just me. It’s the . . . um . . . should I keep going?”
“Yes,” Noelle says.
“Well, there are lot of people who make a lot of money off the fifth- and sixth-life crises. All of a sudden they have a ton of consumers scared out of their minds and willing to buy facial cream, designer jeans, SAT test prep courses, condoms, cars, scooters, self-help books, watches, wallets, stocks, whatever … all the crap that the twenty-somethings used to buy, they now have the ten-somethings buying. They doubled their market!”
Bobby has pulled up a chair next to me. “This kid is a freakin’lunatic,” he says.
“I hope they keep him in here,” says Humble.
“So pretty soon.” I keep thinking. “There’ll be seventh- and eighth-life crises. Then eventually a baby will be born and the doctors will look at it and wonder right away if it’s unequipped to deal with the world; if they decide it doesn’t look happy, they’ll put it on antidepressants, get it started on that particular consumer track.”
“Hmmmmmmmmmmmm,” Humble says. I think he’s going to follow it up with something, but instead he says: “Hmmmmmmmmmmmm.”
Then:
“Your problem is you have a worldview totally in formed by depression.” He leans in. “What about rage?”
“I was never big on rage.”
“Why?”
“It’s so much more angry in my head than it could ever be outside.”
“Extra cookies!”
It’s one of the nurses. We all get in line; it’s oat meal and peanut butter. As I shuffle forward, Noelle nudges me from behind; when I turn to her, she turns her face away as if I were trying to kiss her but she wouldn’t let me.
“You’re trouble,” I say.
“You’re silly,” she answers.
I did it. I talked and she liked me; she thought I was smart. I start to develop a plan. Once I get my cookies, I go to the phone to call Dad, who’s already bringing Blade II tomorrow night. I want him to bring something else too.
forty-three
This is your last full day at the hospital, is what I think when I get up—no one’s taking my blood today (it’s only happened once since Sunday) so I don’t get up super-early, but I’m still the first one in the halls. I take my shower and think about how much life would suck if hot water didn’t come out of the show-erhead when you wanted. I’ve tried to take cold showers and they’re wonderful when they’re over, but during the process they feel like some form of animal torture. But then again, that’s the point—when you take a cold shower you’re supposed to get in and out as fast as possible; that’s why they do it in the army.
That’s right! Want to take a shot, soldier?
I don’t think so. Sir.
C’mon, what’s the matter with you? You got a lot going for you; you don’t want to keep it going?
I need a cold shower to keep things going?
That’s right. Less time in the shower, more in the battlefield.
Fine.
I can do this. I reach out and twist the temperature knob slowly to the left, then decide that I’m never going to get it done gradually so I’ll have to do it like a Band-Aid—I jerk it over. The water goes from toasty warm to frigid so quickly that it feels like it burns me. I bend my groin out of its path but I know that’s cheating, so I stick it back in as I furiously lather myself. Leg: up! Down! Other leg: up! Down! Crotch: uh, scrub scrub scrub. Chest: wipe. Arm: down! Back! Other arm: down! Back! Neck, face, turn around, wash your butt, and I’m out! Straight to the towel. I wrap it around myself and shiver.
I’m so desperate to put my clothes on that my socks stick to my wet feet. I go out to talk with Smitty.
“You okay?”
“First cold shower.”
“Of the day?”
“Of my life.”
“Yeah, that’ll knock ya.”
“What’s the news?”
Smitty holds up his paper. It seems that a new candidate is running for Mayor of New York promising to give everyone who votes for him a lap dance. He’s a multibillionaire, and at $100 per lap dance, he thinks he can lock up the vote. A lot of women are supporting him.
“That’s crazy.” I shiver. “It’s like . . . Who’s out there and who’s in here, you know?”
“Absolutely. Better music in here, though.” Smitty turns up the radio.
“By the way, that’s a question I have—can I play some music on the hall tonight? At the other end?”
“What kind?”
“There’s no words, don’t worry, nothing offensive. It’s something one of the people on the hall will like. Like a gift.”
“I’ll have to see it first.”
“Okay. And you know I’m bringing that Blade ? movie tonight to watch with the group.”
“You think about that a minute. You’re bringing a vampire movie onto a floor full of psych patients.”
“They can handle it.”
“I’m not gonna get any nightmares?”
“Promise.”
“Nightmares are a big problem in my job, Craig.”
“Understood.”
Smitty sighs, puts his paper down, and gets up. “You want me to do your vitals?”
He straps me in on the chair, pumps me up, and puts his soft fingertips on my wrist. Today I’m 120/70. First day I haven’t been perfect.
forty-four
“How’re you doing?” Dr. Minerva is like.
It’s 11 A.M. I sigh. After vitals was breakfast, where the guy who was afraid of gravity and Rolling Pin Robert were gone—Humble told me and Noelle that they got discharged. Toward the end of the meal, Noelle touched her leg against mine for as long as it took me to drink the first sip of my after-breakfast Swee-Touch-Nee tea, which was a big sip. Then Monica announced that we’d be screening Blade II tonight opposite the smoking lounge and everybody got excited, especially Johnny: “Huh, that movie is cool; a lotta vampires die.” No announcements about my music, but then again it hadn’t arrived yet.
I took my Zoloft in my little plastic cup and drew some brain maps by the window in the corner of the hall next to Jimmy. I handled my phone messages, started thinking seriously about what I’d do the moment I got out—would I buy a cup of coffee? Walk to the park? Go home and start in on the e-mail?—and that got me started thinking about e-mail, and all of a sudden I was really glad to have Dr. Minerva to go to.
“I’m doing okay, I think.”
She looks at me calm and steady. Maybe she’s my Anchor.
“What’s got you in doubt, Craig?”
“Excuse me?”
“You said you were okay ‘you think.’Why do you just think it?”
“That’s an expression,” I say.
“This isn’t the place to be leaving if you’re not feeling better, Craig.”
“Right, well, I’ve been thinking about my e-mail.”
“Yes?”
“I’m really worried about getting out there and having to check it. The phones I’m caught up with, but the e-mail might be pretty deadly.”
“Deadly . . . How can e-mail be deadly, Craig?”
“Well.” I lean back, take a deep breath. Then I remember something. “You know how I had a lot of problems with starting and stopping my sentences before?”
“Yes.”
“Not lately.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, it’s like the opposite, like words can just pour out of me, the way they used t
o, when I used to get in trouble in class.”
“Which was…” She focuses on her pad to write this down.
“A year ago . . . Before I went to Executive Pre-Professional.”
“Right—now tell me about the e-mail.”
“The e-mail.” I put my hands on the table. “I hate it. Like, right now, I haven’t been checking it for five days, okay?”
“Since Saturday.” She nods.
“That’s right. Now, what are people thinking while they’re trying to reach me? These are people who probably already have some idea where I am because Nia told Aaron the number and he figured it out.”
“Right: a big source of shame for you.”
“Yes. But even if someone has no idea where I am, what are they thinking? Five days. They’re like: He’s crazy. He must have OD’ed or something. Everyone is expecting me to answer them instantly and I’m not able to.”
“Who e-mails you, Craig?”
“People who want homework assignments, teachers, school clubs, announcements about charities I should volunteer in, invitations to Executive Pre-Professional football, basketball, squash games …”
“So they’re mostly school-related.”
“They’re all school-related. My friends don’t e-mail me. They call.”
“So why don’t you just ignore the e-mails?”
“I can’t!”
“Why not?”
“Because then people will be offended!”
“And what happens then?”
“Well, I won’t get to join clubs, get credits, participate in stuff, get extra-credit. . . I’ll fail.”
“At school.”
“Right.” I pause. No, it’s not exactly school. It’s what comes after school. “At life.”
“Ah.” She pauses. “Life.”
“Right.”
“Failing at school is failing at life.”
“Well… I’m in school! That’s the one thing I’m supposed to do. I know a lot of famous people didn’t do well at school, like James Brown; he dropped out in fifth grade to be an entertainer, I respect that… but that’s not going to be me. I’m not going to be able to do anything but work as hard as possible all the time and compete with everyone I know all the time to make it. And right now school’s the one thing I need to do. And I’m away from the e-mail and I can’t do it.”
“But your definition of school isn’t really one thing, it’s many different things, Craig: extracurricular activities plus sports plus volunteering. That’s not to mention homework.”
“Right.”
“How anxious would you say you are about all of this, Craig?”
I think back to what Bobby said, about anxiety being a medical thing. The e-mail has been in the back of my mind since I got here, the nagging knowledge that when I get out I’ll have to sit on the computer for five or six hours going through everything I’ve missed, answering it in reverse order because that’s the way it comes in and therefore taking the longest time to respond to the people who e-mailed me in the most distant past. And then as I’m answering them more will come in, and they’ll sit on top of my stack and mock me, dare me to answer them before digging down, telling me that I need them, as opposed to the one or two e-mails that are actually about something I care about. Those will get saved to the end, and by the time I have the time to deal with them, they’ll be so out of date that I’ll just have to apologize: Sorry, man. I haven’t been able to answer my e-mail. No, I’m not important, just incapable.
“Craig?”
“Very anxious,” I answer.
“The e-mail anxiety, and the failure talk . . . These are subjects you’ve brought up before. They’re very distressing to you.”
“I know. I’m sweating.”
“You are?”
“Yeah. And I haven’t been sweating for a while.”
“You’ve been away from your Tentacles.”
“Right. Not anymore. Now I get to go back and they’re all right there for me.”
“Do you remember what I asked you last time, about whether or not you’d found any Anchors in here?”
“Yes.”
She pauses. In order to ask a question, it is often possible for Dr. Minerva only to intimate that she might ask a question.
“I think I’ve found one,” I sigh.
“What’s that?”
“Can I get up and get it?”
“Absolutely.”
I leave the office and walk down the hall, where Bobby is leading a new recruit on his welcoming tour—a black guy with wild teeth and a stained blue sweatsuit.
“This is Craig,” Bobby says. “He’s real young, but he’s on the level. He does drawings.”
I shake the man’s hand. That’s right. I do drawings.
“Human Being,” the man says.
“That’s his name,” Bobby explains, rolling his eyes.
“Your name isn’t Craig; it’s Human Being too,” the man says.
I nod, break the handshake, and keep walking to my room. It’s literally like breaking away from a monster—the further I get from thinking about e-mail and Dr. Minerva and the fact that I’m going to have to leave here and go back to Executive Pre-Professional, the calmer I get. And the closer I get to the brain maps, to this little stupid thing I can do, the calmer I get.
I walk past Muqtada—he’s staring and trying to sleep—and take my art off the radiator cover. I cradle it in a stack past Bobby and Human Being— who’s now explaining how his real last name is Green and that’s what he needs, some green—back into the office.
“I kinda like it in here,” I say to Dr. Minerva.
“This room?”
“No, the hospital.”
“When you’re finished, you can volunteer.”
“I talked to the guitar guy Neil about that. I think I’ll try. I can get school credit!”
“Is that the reason you should volunteer, Craig—”
“No, no …” I shake my head. “I’m just joking.”
“Ah.” Dr. Minerva cuts her face into a wide smile. “So what do we have here?”
I plop them down on the table. There are two dozen now. No kind of crazy breakthroughs, just variations on a theme: pigs with brain maps that resemble St. Louis, my couple for Noelle joined by the sweeping bridge, a family of metropolises.
“Your artwork,” she says.
She leafs through them, going “Oh, my” at the particularly good ones. I constructed this stack last night—not just for Dr. Minerva, for anybody. The brain maps have a certain order. Ever since I’ve been doing them, they’ve been making it clear that they should be stacked for presentation.
“Craig, these are wonderful.”
“Thanks.” I sit down. We were both standing. I didn’t even notice.
“You started these because you used to do them when you were four?”
“Right. Well. Something like them.”
“And how do they make you feel?”
I look at the pile. “Awesome.”
She leans in. “Why?”
I have to think about that one, and when Dr. Minerva makes me think, I don’t get embarrassed and try to skip it. I look to the left and stroke my chin.
“Because I do them,” I say. “I do them and they’re done. It’s almost like, you know, peeing?”
“Yes . . .” Dr. Minerva nods. “Something you enjoy.”
“Right. I do it; it’s successful; it feels good; and I know it’s good. When I finish one of these up I feel like I’ve actually done something and like the rest of my day can be spent doing whatever, stupid crap, e-mail, phone calls, all the rest of it.”
“Craig, have you ever considered the fact that you might be an artist?”
“I have other stuff too,” I keep going. What’d she say? “First of all I was thinking about this perpetual candle, like a candle on the ground with another candle hanging upside-down over it, and as the first candle melts the wax is kept molten by some kind of hot containment unit a
nd gets pumped up to the second candle and drips down like a stalactite-stalagmite thing, and then I was also thinking: what if you filled a shoe with whipped cream? Just a man’s shoe, filled with whipped cream? That’s pretty easy to do. And then you could keep going: a T-shirt filled with Jell-O, a hat full of applesauce . . . that’s art, right? That kind of stuff. What’d you say about artists?”
She chuckles. “You seem to enjoy what you’re doing here.”
“Yeah, well, duh, it’s not the most difficult thing in the world.”
“You’re not sweating now.”
“This is a good Anchor for me,” I say. I admit. I admit it. It’s a stupid thing to admit. It means that I’m not practical. But then again, I’m already in the loony bin; how practical am I going to get? I might have to give up on practical.
“That’s right, Craig. This can be your Anchor.” Dr. Minerva stares at me and doesn’t blink. I look at her face, the wall behind her, the door, the shades, the table, my hands on the table, the Brain Maps between us. I could do the one on the top a little better. I could try putting some wood grain in there with the streets. Knots of wood in people’s heads. That could work. “This can be my Anchor.” I nod. “But. ..”
“What, Craig?”
“What am I going to do about school? I can’t go to Executive Pre-Professional for art.”
“I’m going to throw a wild notion at you.” Dr. Minerva leans back, then forward. “Have you ever thought about going to a different school?”
I stare ahead.
I hadn’t. I honestly hadn’t.
Not once, not in my whole life, not since I started there. That’s my school. I worked harder to get in than I did for anything else, ever. I went there because, coming out of it, I’d be able to be President. Or a lawyer. Rich, that’s the point. Rich and successful.
And look where it got me. One stupid year—not even one, like three quarters of one—and here I am with not one, but two bracelets on my wrist, next to a shrink in a room adjacent to a hall where there’s a guy named Human Being walking around. If I keep doing this for three more years, where will I be? I’ll be a complete loser. And what if I keep on? What if I do okay, live with the depression, get into College, do College, go to Grad School, get the Job, get the Money, get Kids and a Wife and a Nice Car? What kind of crap will I be in then? I’ll be completely crazy.