When Truman had heard what I’d done, he’d rushed to the hospital; we’d made amends, cried, hugged, kissed. The foster family wouldn’t keep me after that incident, despite my going to a counselor, and no one else wanted me. So I went to a group home and almost had to transfer schools.
The lines on my arm had healed after some time, leaving behind pale white scars that could only be seen under certain lighting, but the gouges beneath my skin, the emotional effects, those would never really heal.
I’d just been trying to fill that emptiness then.
I hadn’t been trying to kill myself.
Afterwards, Truman had made me promise never to hurt myself again.
Here in this private patient room with sparse furnishings, my mind wanders back to that closet repeatedly, and each time I firmly tell myself that I wasn’t trying to end my own life. But the truth is, if my foster father had missed the blade later rather than sooner, I have no idea what would have happened. Would I have sliced the sharpness against my wrists, away from the palm and toward the crook of my elbow? Carving the correct way, the way to do the most damage, the way to bleed out faster… Would I have really done it?
Maybe.
Maybe is almost as terrible a word as sane. Why does it seem more and more innocent words are becoming sinister nowadays?
Yesterday, Vera promised that she’d be back this morning; that it would be her shift again. I’ve been looking forward to seeing her smile and hearing my new, yet somehow old, nickname of “Ocean Eyes” again. The minutes tick by slowly; like slugs across a Salvador Dali painting, they melt downwards instead of toward the horizon. So the waiting is interminable, endless, infuriating.
Vera does not come. I continue to wait for her, but at eight o’clock, when the sun has fully risen and is spying into my room from between the blades of the cream blinds that I have insisted stay closed, a new nurse comes in. Her name is Maureen and I immediately dislike her, even though her face is decorated in deep smile lines that illustrate an innate and frequently used kindness.
As she busies herself about my room, I see the new, fresh flowers sitting on the mobile dining table that is now pushed against a wall and not in use. They are tall and happy things, sunny and yellow, almost as luminous as the bright orb outside my window. And I find that I also hate them.
I hate the flowers and the nurse; I hate the way their presence forces the room to feel cheery. It disturbs the stillness in my head. I close my eyes, but only halfway, which allows me to ignore everything and fall back into the persistence of memories hidden in closets and razor-sharp blades.
I am not insane. I am sane. I am not insane. I am sane.
There is no bath here, just a large, tiled shower. If there was a tub, I would sink into it, push myself to the bottom, and see if the apparition of sea and the deep crimson, coral crown reappear. I want to know if I will be once again drawn to something in the oceanic distance.
The tip of a thermometer is pushing against my lips and I start. Apparently Nurse Maureen has been trying to get my attention. Vitals. I don’t bother to apologize for being lost in thought, but I open my mouth and let her depress the length of the medical tool against the bottom of my mouth. I lower my tongue against it firmly. It is too far inside my mouth and it juts against my frenulum, which makes my gag reflex flare. This woman is not Vera; she does not have the loving bedside manner. My dislike for this new nurse grows, like rampant weeds in a poorly-tended garden. Perhaps the smile lines are ghosts from long ago; perhaps this woman does not use her kindness now.
Nurse Maureen and I do not exchange any words while she draws my blood and repositions my bed. She works in silence and I have no desire to know her better.
Soon, her tasks are finished. And, to my surprise, I am alive. I am vital.
As she leaves, the nurse—I’ve decided to stop thinking her name, because I have no care to remember her once her shift is over and she has left me—speaks. Her tone is not unkind; it is neutral, and I get the impression that she does not like me any more than I like her. “The doctor just started his rounds. He’ll be in shortly.”
Maybe this nurse feels the way Truman’s mother feels—that I am a self-indulgent little girl, craving attention. I’d heard her say those very words to my… my fiancé outside this room, as if the thin curtain pulled closed could muffle her grating, nasal voice. Even whispering, I could hear her clearly.
“This is ridiculous, Truman. You’ve taken this affair with her too far. She’s a self-indulgent little girl. She just wants attention. Can’t you see that? How could you ask her to marry you? She’ll never be the type of wife you need. She’ll never be a good mother.”
“I don’t want children. I am marrying Lena, flaws and all. Live with it. I need her, Mother.” (Flaws and all. Because that’s what you say about your soulmate. I had wanted the conversation to end there, but it hadn’t.)
“Why, Truman? Why do you need her?”
(He doesn’t need me—that had been the obvious answer.)
“I have a plan, Mother. Just stop prying.”
“A plan? Stop being vague, Truman. It makes you sound like your father.”
“I’m nothing like him. Don’t ever say that. Don’t you ever say that.”
(But he did sound like his father last night.)
“Of course you aren’t actually like him. You haven’t lost everything and nearly put your wife and son in the poorhouse. Your father… I don’t even want to speak about him anymore.”
(The uncomfortable silence that followed Peggy’s words lingered for so long that I dozed off. When I’d awoken again, I’d heard Truman say something that made no sense to me.).
“…everything. It was a sure thing. The condo might have to go, the car, everything. So don’t you see? I need her.”
(He doesn’t need me. So… why does he need me?)
And the conversation had finally ended and I knew that I had missed important bits… things that could alter everything in my head and life.
***
I am alone in the patient room again. There is no reason to abandon my thoughts for reality. Some of the images that pass through my brain-scape are nightmarish, but others are beautiful and ethereal. I can almost feel slick, mineral-laden water against my skin. The silky halo of my hair undulates behind me as I swim. And I never move my arms. They rest by my side and my legs kick in a fluid, ballerina-esque motion, propelling me toward…
“Afternoon, Ocean Eyes.”
The hope in my heart dries out, returning me to dry land.
But this time I do not mind waking, and I don’t hate the cheerful rays flooding into my hospital room. “Vera,” I breathe out, my voice raspy again. The film of salt water on my tongue has returned. It makes no sense… “You’re here.” It’s as much joy as I can imagine, still caught between my blissful illusion and wakefulness.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“You weren’t here, though—not this morning.” I realize instantly that I do sound like an indulgent child now. Maybe Truman’s mother is right about me.
“Well now, no, I wasn’t. My eldest grandson missed the bus and I had to drive him to school.”
I feel embarrassed. I’ve only just met Vera and I am acting as if I am the only thing in the world she should care about. I have forgotten that she has a life outside of this hospital. Swallowing, I force a weak smile. “Does he miss the bus often?” The question is so unimportant, and such a meager attempt to make up for my selfishness, that I almost laugh. I’m glad I don’t, though, because with my current mental state, a single laugh might morph into uncontrolled mania.
“More often than is convenient.” And now I do laugh with Vera. Her words and the expression on her face let me know that I am forgiven.
We talk for a while after Vera takes my vitals; the conversation is so pleasant and disarming. It has been a long time since someone has just sat down and talked with me without pressures or ulterior motives. Vera has laughed so many times. The sound is
beautiful, melodic and nearly effervescent—like soda bubbles rising to the top of a glass and popping merrily at the drink’s surface. It makes me think of someone else’s laugh. It is a sliver of a remembrance tucked in the back of my brain—where early childhood pictures and people reside. I’ve no idea who in my past has had such a laugh. Perhaps it is a figment of my imagination. Perhaps I am just wishing there was such a woman.
While we sit together, I realize that I love this woman, Vera. Which also makes me realize that I honestly, without a doubt, do not love Truman. This is healthy, what I am doing here with Vera—exchanging funny stories, favorite foods, bucket list desires.
All Truman and I exchange are responses for spoken and unspoken commands. That is not love, no matter how handsome and charming a man he is. Because handsome and charming do not outweigh kindness and companionship.
My oblivion.
Vera is calling my name. “Ocean Eyes? Ocean Eyes? Where have you drifted off to?”
I blink several times to clear the fog that has settled so thickly over me. It slowly retreats and I grimace. “Sorry, I sometimes do that. Zone out, I mean.”
“I prefer to call that sort of thing daydreaming.”
“Daydreaming.” The word is a low-pitched murmur from my mouth. That does sound infinitely more pleasant than “zoning out”. That’s what I am.
I am not sane after all.
A daydreamer. The worst kind of insanity.
Chapter 4
Release
They are releasing me today; the morning light is just greeting the songbirds outside my window. It has been a week since what Truman has been calling “the incident.”
I’ve had daily sessions with Dr. Lenderman. I am still sane in his eyes, but the secret I have recently discovered is locked inside my chest, put away so that no one can see—see that I am a daydreamer and actually insane. I have realized that it is not the worst kind of insanity, as I’d originally thought. It is the most wonderful sort of madness. I am round the bend. I am a girl in a fantasy world following a rabbit with a timepiece. Except I do not have legs and a cornflower blue dress.
I have a mermaid’s tail and a crown of coral.
Standing in the flowing wetness, I can almost feel my legs begin to fuse.
The hot water from the shower hits the subway-tiled floor and blossoms up in a mushroom cloud of steam. I love the hurt of it, scalding my shoulders and back, but it is not like the bath at home: I do not have the urge to lower myself and let the beating water envelop me until I can no longer breathe.
I feel slits at my neck opening and closing rhythmically. Gills. I have gills. But when I really focus on the sensation, the skin on my neck is smooth and human again.
Needing shampoo and conditioner, I open the small waterproof bag of fresh toiletries that Truman brought to me last night. There are travel-sized shampoos, soaps, face washes. I notice how careful he has been, which bothers me immensely. I am still not allowed a razor, so the sight of the light pink can of shaving cream nearly brings me to tears. It’s as if Truman is mocking me, pointing out my flaws in a passive aggressive way that no one else would see as cruel. Because, in reality it is a harmless, bubblegum pink can of beauty product.
It is innocuous.
Truman’s charm is wearing thinner and I can see him clearer and clearer. I do not believe he is trying in his way to protect me. Not anymore.
Pushing the feelings and thoughts down into my stomach, I turn off the water. As soon as I do, the last of the billowing fog rises to the ceiling and dissipates. When the last wet drops splash against the floor, dizziness unexpectedly grips me. My damp, slick body leans against the tiled wall and I slide downwards until my butt rests against the smooth surface, still so warm from the blistering water.
I sit, naked as a fresh-born baby, save for the starfish around my neck. My eyes are closed tightly and my hands grip my legs loosely, which are pulled toward my chest protectively. Prickly hairs on my calves bring the absence of a razor back to the forefront of my mind.
The dizziness does not want to leave me; instead it is kudzu, growing every minute that I remain motionless. Soon I will be a derelict building concealed by a parasite that grows a foot per day.
A singular droplet of water hits my calf. It surprises me, since I thought all of the water had been spent, that the showerhead above me was dry. I had been wrong; there was just one more teardrop to empty the pipes. And that is all it takes. That singular tear. And I am there again, away from this world and into that other one that was once so wonderful and welcoming.
The deep, red seaweed is a damp curtain against my back. I love the feel of it, silky as I run my fingers through the strands, and they stain my hands so that they look sunburned. The weight of the coral crown atop my head is a comfort.
This time I am not swimming. Instead I bob up and down, the ocean a tranquil sheet of glass around me. It is night and the stars are diamonds in the sky; my eyes are set upon them, superglued to the beauty of their twinkling. The sight captivates me for a long time, until something brushes against my legs below and my gaze is drawn downward.
A fish, golden and green, brushes against something silver and glinting beneath the water. Curious, I disturb the ocean’s peace and lower myself until only the top of my head is exposed to the moon rays and starshine.
I am the silver.
In place of my legs is a mermaid’s tail… or what I imagine a mermaid’s tail to look like—so similar to the children’s illustrations and animated movies of my youth. It is an expanse of tiny fingernail-sized scales set one upon the other like silver shaker shingles on a beach house. And silver is a misnomer; they are not just silver, they are iridescent. They are mother-of-pearl, changing hue according to the light filtering through the undersea vibrations. It is beautiful. I am beautiful.
Beautiful. Strong. My own controller.
The fish is yards away from me now, watching me with interest.
A fish is watching me with interest.
I laugh, expecting the action to only bring life to gurgles and bubbles beneath the water’s surface. Instead, my ears hear a sound much like a chorus of glass bells ringing in unison, creating a dainty, happy tinkling that increases in intensity and fills the space around me. I startle in surprise, my hand clamping down against my mouth, but then I laugh again, because the sound is the most wonderful thing I have ever heard.
It is the sound of my own happiness, an elation defined by me and only me.
My curious fish nudges me now. It seems he is also drawn to my laughter.
“Can I call you Flounder?” My words form; I hear them clearly. It is so strange, to be able to talk to myself underwater. Each time I speak, I feel an odd sensation on either side of my neck. My fingers find their way to the source of oddness and I feel rigid lines opening and closing. My gills. I’d subconsciously known that they were there before—when I’d let myself die in the bathtub—and I’d consciously known they were there in the shower, but now I am feeling them with fingertips that seem to shed a shimmering dander as they move through the water. Feeling them is different from knowing.
Smiling, my eyes find the fish again. He is darting about in front of me, trying to attract my attention. “So, Flounder it is. Shall we find a sunken ship? I need a new dinglehopper.” I go to laugh, excited to hear the sound one more time, but the fish is rising and falling in front of me in a whole body nod. It is too much for me—that my new friend can understand my words. In that flash, the flash of my brain being overwhelmed by the fantasy, I am pulled away.
The salt water vanishes.
I am just sitting on the damp floor of a shower, and now the tiles are cold against my nakedness and I shiver violently. I shake partly from the coolness, partly from the loss of so much wonderment.
I thank God that it is Vera that finds me there without a stitch of clothes on, physically quivering and mentally catatonic. I’ve been there for a while, it seems. My hair is dry, maroon frizz; I can feel t
he fuzz of it against my shoulders and back. It grates me like sandpaper, rubs against my psyche painfully. Vera is soothing, murmuring to me that everything is okay, asking me to stand and move with her. But my body does not want to change positions; it seems that I have left all of my courage and self-awareness back in my pretend world of mermaid tails and curious fish.
Flounder stole my courage when he nibbled at my scales beneath the waves.
Laughter rips through the air; it is manic and loud. Vera startles.
In an instant I realize that it is my laugh, and quickly my lips clamp together firmly, arresting the sound and leaving the space around me in a state of silent confusion. Vera is looking at me. She is looking at me like I am crazy. Just like everyone else looks at me. Having her stare at me so is a terrible thing. I want her to continue to care for me with those kind hands and judgment-free eyes.
“I’m so sorry.” It’s a whisper that sounds so strange after the cackle.
Vera’s face goes slack, as if she has just realized the expression on her face and how it shames me. “Don’t apologize,” she says firmly, her mouth a hard line. “You surprised me is all.” Her hands are buttresses, clasping my upper arms and helping me to right myself. In a matter of seconds, she has wrapped a too-small towel around my body. It barely covers me from chest to groin. We walk together out of the bathroom and the hospital room air feels too dry.
I am facing Vera now; she still helps support me. And I need the support, because my legs are shaking like leaves in a stiff breeze. I hate how much trouble I am causing for Vera, for Truman, for Truman’s family… for myself.
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