The next few days dragged their feet like Howie got out of bed. Howie acting dead and uninterested in me or anything made for a bleak existence, I had to admit. Of course, I would never tell him that; it would do nothing but harm.

He would answer if spoken to, but rarely did he speak first. The first 24 hours I couldn’t help but look at his bandaged forearms. I couldn’t believe I caused that. I had always been there for him on the worst of days, and I had to go and leave him. How selfish of me. Given, it had been a rough week-- a rough month-- a rough 3 months, honestly. Suddenly I was taken back to 3 months ago.

“Mom… mom, please!” I cried, “I won’t tell anyone! Don’t do it… please… I’m your son… you gave birth to me, you love me, I love you… what happened?”

My mother’s hands shook as she pointed a pistol at me. There were tears trickling down her face. She blinked hard.

“You don’t love me, I’m not an idiot. I know I’ve hurt you countless times. You can’t be trusted with my secret. No one can know the truth. It’s too late.”

My heart beat jack-hammered in my chest. I couldn’t believe this was happening. What could I do? All I could think was that I couldn’t die like this… I was going to die like this. I was going to die. Right now. The gun clicked. The anticipation was so thick that I couldn’t breathe. Should I run? Did I have a choice? Just standing here, I was going to die no matter what. Just run. Legs, move god dammit! I couldn’t move. I was too scared.

There was a knock on the door.

“Mac! Wanna go to that arcade we saw a few days ago?!” Howie called.

My mother glanced back at the door. We were standing in the living room, which was right next to the door.

“Don’t. Say. A word.” she hissed at me.

She waited. Howie knocked rang the doorbell several times. She waited for him to leave. Now was my chance. My phone dinged in the kitchen. I ran for the door screaming my head off.

“RUN!”

I heard a loud bang as I opened the door and another one rang in the air as I bolted. At first I didn’t feel it, but a searing pain leaked into my shoulder and spread. Can’t stop. I looked back. Howie was running too. So was my mother. She shot the rest of the magazine empty after I turned around, missing me with each bullet.

“HELP! SOMEONE CALL THE COPS!!” I shouted as I ran through my neighborhood, hoping someone would hear me and do it. I hadn’t grabbed my phone to do it myself. I ran to the nearest public place, a Publix on the corner of my street. I grabbed the first person I saw,

“Call 911, I’ve been shot, please,” I begged.

The look of horror in her eyes as she pulled out her phone had permanently ingrained itself in my brain. After that, an ambulance came and picked me up. They were all so dreadfully desensitized to something that had left me so distraught. They saw things like this every day. I remembered all of the whole experience. The worst part was that I hadn’t been hallucinating. I hadn’t been delusional, it was all real, Howie and others had assured me.

“Mac?” Dayo was looking at me, frowning, “What’s wrong?”

I realize I’m crying. Sobbing, actually. Gotta love PTSD flashbacks. “N-Nothing, I was just, just having a flashback, but it’s over now… I’m fine…”

She crouched down and wiped my tears,

“Why don’t you go get cleaned up? You can go and calm down in your room. Would you like some xanax?”

I shook my head, “I’m dopey enough, thank you though.” I took some deep breaths and got up with shaky legs. A bout of dizziness hit me which made it even harder to walk. I passed Howie, who was on his way back from the bathroom. The empty look on his face turned to concern.

“Mac? What happened?”

“F-Flashback… I’m okay…”

Howie swallowed, “O-Oh. Sorry I wasn’t here…”

“It’s okay, r-really dude… Don’t… beat yourself up…”

He looked down, “Right. See you soon, I’ll be waiting for you.”

I nodded. We had to stick together through this. We couldn’t let mental illness get in the way of our relationship. Our friendship would not be interrupted one more time.

Last time had had horrific repercussions.

After I calmed down and washed my face, I came back out and sat next to Howie.

“How you doing?” asked Howie.

“I’m better. You?”

“Same as always.”

I nodded. “Something will work eventually. You’ll feel better soon.”

Howie looks away,

“Maybe, but it’s not worth the wait.”

“Howie, look at me.”

My eyes met his dissimilar ones.

“It’s worth the wait. It’s just that you can’t see that right now.”

Howie looked down, and yawned.

“Besides, you have no choice.” I yawned too.

“I know.”

We were both functioning on minimal sleep every day. After that conversation, we just sat next to each other watching tv or listening to others’ conversations about the uno game or reading donated books until it was time for group.

Every day was basically the same; there was a clock on the wall in the common room which the whole day ran on.

We woke up at 6 and get dressed. Each person only had two outfits. We brushed our teeth with finger swabs that came in a small packet, and deodorant was basically wet wipes.

Breakfast by 7, when everyone took their meds. I took an immune booster vitamin and an antacid and zyprexa (my antipsychotic) and lamotrigine (a mood stabilizer) and zoloft (an antidepressant). I usually gave my food away because that shit did not settle well, and the antiacid didn’t kick in until around lunch.

We sat around until 10, when everyone had a check up with Rafael. He called us in alphabetical order by last name and evaluated our mental state, our physical condition, checked us for self harm, etcetera. Every day, I confirmed my side effects were still the same, and that I wasn’t having an episode. He did a more thorough internal check up for me to make sure I hadn’t gotten sick. Howie got his bandages changed at that point.

At noon we ate lunch, at 2 we had an hour of outside time. The area we had outside was surrounded by tall, thick brick walls topped with spikes. Half was concrete and half was grass. There was a ball and a speaker that the doctors allowed us to request songs for. Two patients in particular, Sam and Ali, were big fans of outside time. They chose most of the songs played. Sam picked dubstep songs and remixes, and Ali picked songs by artists like Mac Miller and Clairo. Every once in a while, I requested Howie’s favorite artist, Tyler the Creator, since he didn’t feel up to doing it himself. I never requested my favorite songs because they didn’t seem appropriate to play in a group of mentally ill people. It was amazing how hyper some of them were. Sam especially. He was like a little kid.

At 4 we had group therapy, where all 11 of us sat in the tv area and learned about self care, talked about our feelings, and mediated any conflicts. Most of us took it seriously-- all but Yosef. Yosef was a character. He was an artist like me, but while I did mostly abstract art, Yosef drew monsters. They were all fictional, of course.

All monsters were fictional.

At group all he did was make a lot of offensive remarks and be sarcastic. He had a curly brown mass atop his head, and a high pitched cackle for a laugh.

At 5 we had dinner, where this group of guys; Tyler, Sam, and Vincent; tried to coax food from the other patients.

Tyler I had befriended. He was 18 and bipolar. I hadn’t seen him manic yet, so he was always quite depressed, but he still smiled and laughed even though it wasn’t genuine. He’d moved all the way from Brooklyn and arrived in Florida a week before he was admitted. He’d only been to his new high school for two days. He wouldn’t talk about what happened to get him here, and I respected that, but I sure was curious.

At 8 we had a snack and some people got more meds (including me), and at 9 we took showers. The showers were always cold and the supervisors passed out ketchup packets of soap. There was never enough to go around, so the last people in line could only run themselves under cold water to clean their bodies.

After 10, no talking or leaving our rooms. At night, two men and a woman guarded the hallway. According to Tyler, Rafael guarded the common room. I wasn’t entirely sure that was true. If that was accurate, Rafael would never have a chance to sleep. Well, perhaps he slept after check ups.

We all settled into a circle of bean bags for group and a man named Quincy set up a folding chair he brought in with him.

“Hello everyone, are we ready to begin?”

“Yes,” I agree along with a few others.

“Nope,” says Yosef.

Everyone pretends to not have heard him.

“Alright, everyone knows the drill. Who wants to start?” asks Quincy.

No one offered to, so after a few moments, I nudged Howie. He sighed.

“My day has been pretty much the same as all other days. I’m a little worried about mac since he had a panic attack last night, but otherwise im fine I guess. My arms look disgusting under these bandages.”

I kind of wished Howie hadn’t mentioned that, but it was too late now. Everyone glanced at me.

I face got hot and my tic fired up.

“Mac, is everything okay? What upset you? Was it something specific?”

I shrugged, “PTSD nightmare. I’ll be okay. Rafael is giving me anti-anxiety meds now, on top of everything else. I just hope it doesn’t give me more side effects to live with.”

A few people nodded.

“I hope not. You certainly have your fair share. Did you use the calming technique we talked about a few days back?” asked Quincy.

I nodded.

“Good, good. Did it help?”

I nodded again, “Yeah, for sure.”

“Excellent. Keith, how are you doing buddy? Has your anxiety calmed at all? I know coming here really affected you.”

Keith froze for a moment, gulped, and scribbled a response on his notepad with his skinny green marker, though you could tell his hand was shaking a little. The marker reminded me of him. Keith was very skinny and his glasses were dark green. He gave the notebook to Vince sitting next to him.

Keith was mute, and Vince had become his translator.

“Keith says he feels a little better, but he doesn’t want to answer any more questions.”

Quincy met Keith’s eyes, but Keith looked down.

“Fair enough. I must say your response was tremendously better than our first group. I’m proud of you, Keith. Vince, how about you?”

Vince shrugged,

“I’m sad. Yosef told me I’m stupid and I have no backbone after dinner yesterday.”

Quincy tilted his head up slightly at Yosef.

“First of all, I didn’t say it like that. Daren coaxed him into leaving the seat next to Keith so he could play cards, and Keith started to freak out, so I said, ‘if you were smart, you’d find yourself a backbone’. And second of all, are you going to tell me it’s not true?” Yosef countered with his arms crossed, trying to play it off like he didn’t want to eat his words. “He lets people do whatever they want to him and honestly, he’s not an information sponge.”

Vince bit his lip, looking quite distraught. I felt bad. It was easy to tell how insecure Vince was, and Yosef was a very mean to point out his flaws so bluntly.

Quincy looked Yosef in the eyes.

“Yosef. We’ve talked about this. Before you say something, ask yourself: is it kind? Is it helpful? Is it true?”

Yosef sighed, “I remember, believe me.”

“Then why did you say it?”

Yosef didn’t appear to have an answer he wanted to share, so he apologized,

“Look, I’m sorry Vince. My intent wasn’t to hurt your feelings, I was trying to give you some advice.”

Quincy let him off the hook.

“There you go. Is there anything you want to bring up?”

Yosef shrugged, “no.”

I didn’t think he would contribute.

“Who’s next?” Quincy asked, looking around.

“Ali, what’s up with you?”

She blew a strand of blue hair out of her face.

“I’m tired of all the bickering in this place.”

It was hard not to pay attention to her when she spoke. I swore I could taste the sound of her voice, and it tasted like something delicious. At first I thought it was because I was insane, but Howie said he noticed it too. Another strange occurrence of this hospital. I thought maybe I’d bring it up some time. Everyone already knew I was crazy so there was nothing to lose. I’d like to bring up something else strange this time though.

“I agree. Why are the bipolar patients and patients with eating disorders at each other’s throats constantly? I’ve never seen teams like this in a hospital before. Far be it from me--me, of all people-- to say it makes no sense.”

I blinked several times.

I could have sworn there was a nervous energy to the air. But I tried to ignore things like that, because they weren’t real.

“Interesting observation, Mac. Does anyone else have any ideas as to why these two groups have formed?”

Silence fell over the group like a blanket for several moments.

“Maybe because bipolar patients tend to be reckless while anorexic patients have a strong need for control?” Ali finally suggested.

Quincy obviously impressed, smiled at her.

“Well done, Ali.”

I supposed that was an explanation.