I do not own the Labyrinth or its characters, all the crazy is me though.
We have the lovely nothingnothingtralala along for the beta ride again, she's a sucker for nonsensical aposthrophe punishment.
"An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind."
― Mahatma Gandhi
"Now, Ms Williams," he says, making her feel old. It's usually just Sarah – Ms Williams is her stepmother, after all, but he probably doesn't know that. "I've been sent as an independent psychiatrist to review your case. You have been in the Mella Lado institute for-" He pauses, reading from his papers.
She wants to snatch them from him. She is not allowed to have Paper With Words anymore; they give her 'strange ideas', apparently. Now her papers are always blank. They tell her there are pictures waiting for her inside of that paper; she is pressured to find them. They call it art therapy.
"It looks as though, despite an escalation of care, you have not made any improvement with treatment in the nine years you have been with the institute," he continues. "I only ask that you be as truthful with me as you can possibly manage."
Truth.
It is such a slippery thing. Once she knew the truth, then that truth changed and it isn't allowed any more. No matter how many times she tries to know the truth it always seems to be wrong. Ever since they brought her here no one tells her the truth. They all speak softly, never raising their voices, empty words. Sometimes the walls whisper to her, but that is a lie too, they tell her so. The walls are the only ones who do not tell her she is wrong or a liar, but that is her secret.
"I'll try my best," she says.
She always tries her best, but it never seems to impress anyone, and now they have sent a new white coat. She has a psychiatrist already, but it is a woman, and this is a man. A good looking man… probably… no basis for comparison, isn't that what he said? She can't compare other men to him, after all.
What about her, does she look good? She can't remember when she last brushed her hair; did they take her hairbrush away? Perhaps someone has brushed it for her recently? They do that sometimes. Sarah tries to run her fingers through the length of it to check, but quickly finds knots so raggedy they need cutting out. That would be a no on the brushing...
She looks closer now and sees that the white coat is wearing a wedding ring. Married... figures, all the good ones are.
"Is that something you're interested in, Ms Williams, marriage?"
So, clearly she has said that out loud. That has been happening a lot since they upgraded her psychologist to a psychiatrist; since the prescriptions started being filled. At first she flushed the little white tablets down the toilet, but now they follow her to the bathroom to check.
"I don't think I'm going to find a keeper in here," she drawls. "There's Tony who is locked up because he ate his dog, or Ralph who checked himself in and has a penchant for licking everything, and I do mean everything. That's not even mentioning the fact that I have nothing to offer the opposite sex. Certified crazy and I'm hardly worldly or educated. After all I've been locked up here for the latter half of my adolescent and now adult life, not much of a catch."
"Do you think it's due to sexual dormancy that you project these fantasies of unobtainable men?"
"What unobtainable men would those be?" she laughs, but she knows he's going to bring it up, they always do.
"This particular character you always seem to be chasing after, the Goblin King."
"Chasing?" she snorts. "If anything I'm hiding from him here. Besides, he practically proposed to me, I'd say that's pretty obtainable. I'm only in here because I said no." Of course, none of that is true, but even crazy people have their pride.
"Ms Williams… you are aware that this is a high level psychiatric institution?" he asks, frowning. Perhaps he thinks she has mistaken it for a day spa that has fallen on hard times. She stares at the check pattern on his shirt, and giggles.
"Yes, yes. I know that I've been committed against my will," she grins, even though it isn't funny, not even to her. "That doesn't make the rest of it a lie."
Delusional.
She can see him write it on the Paper With Words, the lucky Thing. If she was allowed to write words she would probably write something with fewer syllables, like spectacles. Perhaps she will tell the wall about that later.
This white coat is wearing spectacles; is that where the word came from? Sometimes her brain makes those leaps without her permission now. It is a great word though, spec-ta-cles; she tastes it in her mouth. Why do so many people insist on calling them glasses when spectacles is such a great word?
"Ms Williams, what just happened?"
Sarah looks up at the doctor in front of her, lost. "What?"
"I was asking you what you meant by 'the rest of it,' but you lost focus and became unresponsive. Can you tell me what happened just now?"
She licks her lips. "I was just thinking about your spectacles."
Delusional… she was thinking about that too, and the Paper With Words, and the wall. She doesn't tell him. They all say she is a liar, but silence isn't the same as a lie.
The doctor removes his spectacles, folds them and places them into his shirt pocket. Perhaps she isn't allowed to think about his spectacles. For some reason it only makes her want to think about them more.
"Stubborn, you've always been stubborn," she mutters to herself. Not her words, she's been told that countless times though, she remembers.
He gives her an odd look. "Do you understand why you are here?" he asks.
"Because he had power over them," she mumbles.
"I'm sorry?" the white coat asks. He isn't, but they never are.
"He had no power over me, but he had power over them, and it seems that they had power over me in the end, go figure." She giggles. "What's the point in him having no power over me when he still has power over everyone else?"
"Ms Williams, do you understand what schizophrenia is?"
"Do you understand what the Rosenhan experiment is?" she shoots back. For a moment the fog clears, almost, but that never lasts.
It is hard to pay attention to this white coat. He will not look at her; they all like to avoid eye contact in here. How can one have a productive conversation when you cannot check to see if they are being manipulated by him? Besides, she is much more interested in taking her new word back to the wall in her room.
"Are we almost done here? My friends are due to visit soon."
He gives her another pitying look. "Ms Williams, according to my records you haven't had any visitors since you came into the care of the institute."
She grins. "That's right… none that you know about. Insanity doesn't deter true friends, however; they come to see me nearly every day."
He sighs, an unhappy sigh. She has not pleased him. No matter, they rarely seem pleased with her; it only mattered to her when she first arrived here. Now she knows that she is mad; she takes the tablets, she talks to the wall, she displeases them. It is her routine. One needs a routine.
He nods, using more of his Paper With Words. One must not covet, she tells herself, but it is hard not to sometimes, there's so little else to do in here.
"One last thing, Ms Williams," he says. His eyes slide off her like butter off a hot plate. Her hair must look really terrible… pity they are not allowed mirrors since The Incident.
"Can you tell me why you have harmed yourself?" He indicates the slashes and scabs on the back of her left hand.
So he does want to talk about The Incident then, does he? He can't see the pattern forming in these aesthetically displeasing cuts – none of them can.
"Revenge," she smiles sweetly, "for my revenge." Seven years' bad luck is a small price to pay for that.
He shakes his head and folds the paper with words neatly, placing it back into his folder.
"Thank you, Ms Williams, Bernie will take you back to your room now," he sighs.
Today was easy.
This new white coat only talked about him, not the 'monsters'. The hairy one, the short one, the fox; usually they like to bring those three up if they can. Everyone has a different idea of what they represent: family trauma, childhood abuse, emotional distress. They tell her the Labyrinth is her mind, twisted and maze-like. If they only knew… it will be true soon enough.
Bernie arrives. She likes him; he is big and slow like the furry friend. He does not try to touch her inappropriately; he lets her use the bathroom alone. He lets her be a human, and due to this she feels he is one also. Some of them are not.
They go back to her room but Bernie does not lock the door today. She does not always like it open; Ralph might come and lick her things. Not that there is anything left now: she looks and sees that there is no hair brush after all. There is nothing. All that she has is the bed and the mirror.
It is not a real mirror anymore; though she still needed the pieces of the old one, they took them away when she started the cutting. This one she drew on the wall, and that is why the wall whispers now. If she still had the crayon she would draw herself in the mirror. She would draw her hair neat and tidy and a tree and maybe the sun. This mirror works just fine without those though.
"Hoggle, I need you," she whispers, watching the unlocked door with trepidation. It is harder now than when the mirror was real, now she cannot see when he is looking back at her. "Hogg-"
"I'm here, Sarah," is the reply. It comes from either her friend or the wall, or both. It's possible it's no more than a voice in her head, but if that's true then she is already lost and there's no need to agonise over ignoring it.
"Is all prepared?"
She hears him hesitate. "I'm still not sure about this, Sarah."
"Winner, winner, chicken dinner," she blurts, knowing it has some relation to what she wants to say, but is not quite right.
"I don't think it's a good idea to get Toby involved."
"Have you thought of a better alternative then?" She frowns; she knows he hasn't. "Or shall I just wait until my mind is pudding?"
"He is only a boy, Sarah," he chides, "and we're not exactly sure what this will do."
"I was only a girl once too." She stops. Suddenly she is torn by his words and knows the feeling is guilt. She has not been a girl for some time now; she did not get much time to be one. The Goblin King saw to that. "He has said he can do this… he knows the words, they will keep him safe."
"Like they kept you safe?"
Sarah bites her lip until it bleeds. There is no other alternative now. So much planning, so many years of research. With her one long fingernail she scratches at the thin lines on the back of her hand, rocking back and forth on the floor.
"If something should happen will you keep him safe for me?" she asks.
"I could not keep you safe," he laments.
With her hand she smears the blood from her lip across her cheek.
"Different, different, we couldn't see the evil owl coming then, but this time you will know. If I cannot clip his wings then you should run and hide."
She hears the wall sigh. "Are you suggesting that we leave you behind?"
She smiles, raising her bloody hand in a salute to the ceiling. "I'm saying I don't even know if you haven't already. I'm more than a little bit mad, you know."
"We won't abandon you, Sarah."
"If we can't pull this off there will be nothing left to abandon, just a cracked husk full of jelly," she snorts.
There is a long silence. "Fine," he agrees. "To be honest I doubt I could stop what has been set in motion anymore even if I wanted to. Your brother is as stubborn as you are."
She grins, scratching at her hand. "The babe with the power."
She can tell when he eventually leaves the fake mirror; some subtle ambient sound is no longer present in the room. Now she must wait.
She follows the routine.
It consists of boredom, mostly. Hours spent alone in her room with only the poor companionship of her own mental faculties… or lack thereof. Lunch, grey goop on plastic plates with plastic spoons; these are collected and checked after the meal. Daily tablets – there is no avoiding this slow poison anymore; her intake is monitored. The orderly gets handsy, checking under her tongue and handling her a little more than is necessary. She's bit them for less in the past, but she does not like going to the dark room.
Group therapy, bonding with people who are even more mentally ill than you are: perhaps this is to promote competition amongst patients? Exercise time, art therapy and musical healing.
Time always passes slowly here, but today it is a battle.
Finally it is time for dinner. She sits next to Tony; he usually smells bad, but so does she, probably. It is even greyer goop this time on her plate. She pushes it off and onto the table. She draws an owl on the table for Tony; he likes owls. She does not; but hopefully this is the last day here so she can afford to be generous.
I have been generous. She shudders.
When she goes to leave, the touchy feely orderly finds her.
"Where's your spoon?"
She shakes her head; she has left it on the table with the owl.
"Are you hiding it?" he growls.
She points at the table. "I used it to make an owl."
"You're a liar, Williams girl; you've got it on you, don't you?" He starts to frisk her.
She doesn't like it.
Her arm travels the arc towards his face without her permission. She bruises her knuckles in the backward slap, and her long fingernail snaps. She is sad; she has been growing that fingernail in secret for some time now, what a waste to break it today when it was almost free.
He punches her square in the jaw. She can see from the look of shock on his face that he has surprised even himself in this. She almost feels a little bit sorry for him. The madness here spreads and lowers inhibitions. That's why they're all afraid to make eye contact, they know it's catching.
She giggles through the bubble of blood on her reopened lip wound.
Bernie comes then, but he takes her down the path that she does not like. Long shadows, bars and silence: the dark room.
It is the proverbial oubliette of the institute.
Now she feels some panic. Not because it is dark and scary, which it is. Nor because she truly thinks she will be forgotten, but because she has not finished the one thing she still needs to do.
With her fingers she traces the scabbed lines on the back of her hand. They are not yet complete, and now she must make them from memory because she has no light to work from.
She twists the jagged, broken end of her freshly damaged nail into the soft flesh. She cuts the pattern from memory. She has looked at it thousands of times, and it is burned so deep into her mind that even the madness cannot touch it.
She only knows it has worked for sure after many long, dark hours draw out, and he finally comes.
It is like an explosion when he does. She hears him thrown across the room violently; he crashes into the wall with a sickening thump. Even if she cannot see it, she knows it must hurt.
There is something to be seen, though, as if his skin has some faint luminescent glow. The blob that is him gropes through the dark, nursing his injuries. Soon his keen senses take over and he crawls awkwardly towards her. With a malicious growl he grabs her by the shoulders and shakes her in the darkness.
"Do you know what you've just done? Do you have any idea what it is you've just done?" he shouts. His anger is so visceral it takes her breath away, but only for a moment.
She smiles. "Hello, Goblin King."
A/N: And so beginneth a new story.
I thought I'd be sad to be back at the starting line again, but since I like writing Sarah and Jareth hating on each other in the early chapters I find I'm quite looking forward to it.
This story will be quite different to the last and might take some time to adjust to, we'll get some Jareth POV next chapter and I'll continue to switch between the two throughout.
Onward!
Chapter title credit to Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.
The Rosenhan Experiment: For those of you who do not know what Sarah is referencing here, was a study of healthy individuals who sought admission to psychiatric health institutes under the pretence of being mentally ill to test psychiatric diagnosis. After admission they all behaved normally and claimed to be mentally healthy, seeking release from the clinics. They were denied their freedom until they admitted to psychiatric disorders and agreed to take antipsychotics as a condition of their release (which they disposed of). All but one were diagnosed as schizophrenics. Any actions they took while in the insititute, which might otherwise be considered normal behaviour (e.g. writing), was considered as pathological. All reported a feeling of dehumanisation whilst in the care of these institutes.