The taxi ride was long and silent. I leaned my head wearily against the window, watching the trees streak past in a blur of brown and green. No other cars were traveling this road, but why would they? No one else had any reason to travel to the same destination as I on this crisp spring morning.
One suitcase sat in the seat beside me. All of my worldly possessions still allowed to me were contained in that one suitcase. My life as I had known it all summed up in one brown, medium sized rectangle.
I wanted very badly to stop the driver and tell him to turn around and take me home. I wanted to race back through the forest-lined back roads back to the city, back to my house, back to my mother. But I could not do that.
This was, after all, my decision. It had been my decision to drag a razor across my pale flesh on an almost nightly basis. It had been my decision to ingest an entire bottle of aspirin and chase it with a bottle of vodka. And now it was my decision to seek help. Mother insisted that I did not need to go this far, that some counseling at home would be enough. She might have been right, but I needed more than just counseling. I needed to get away. Away from her new husband who thought I was too feminine and now a freak as well, who offered me no warmth and no love; away from the school that worshiped and adored me, smothering me in their constant attention; and, yes, I even needed to get away from her, my own mother. I needed a new environment altogether, and one where I would get the help I sorely needed.
Even my mother's comfort could not make the voice in my head stop. She could not banish this other presence in my mind, or stop Hatanaka's disapproval of her non compos mentis son. The voice had been quite today, for which I was thankful. It…he…claimed to be a demon, a thief that had taken refuge in my body to save his life. He was Youko Kurama, the greatest thief in all Makai, the demon world that is. I still remember the doctor's carefully masked face when I revealed all of this, how my mother burst into tears and how Hatanaka glared at me as though I had suddenly sprouted two heads. I had worried Youko would supply some of his witty interjections as I bid my tearful mother farewell this morning, but he had remained silent.
"There it is," the driver commented almost cheerfully, breaking me from my thoughts, "The Ichigaki Mental Health Institution."
I gazed up at the cold, soulless building as we entered the gates. The white paint was chipping off the walls and the few trees and bushes there were around the place looked sickly and stunted. I looked up at the windows and for a second saw a small, pale face with dark raven hair swept up like a black flame peering back at me. I blinked and it was gone.
The brakes gave a brief whine as the car came to a stop. Taking a deep breath I grabbed my suitcase and calmly stepped out of the car. A young doctor came out of the front door and waved as he descended the steps to meet me. He looked hardly out of medical school and not that much older than myself.
"Minamino Shuichi, I presume," he offered me his hand. I nodded and shook it, his kindly brown eyes at once putting me at ease.
"My name is Dr. Koenma," he introduced himself, "and welcome to Ichigaki."
"Um…thank you," I replied, a bit caught off guard at being welcomed so warmly to an insane asylum.
"Please, come in and let me show you around," he said. I managed a weak smile and paused only long enough to pay the taxi driver before letting the doctor lead me inside. As we climbed the steps I heard the rumble of the taxi starting once more followed by the creak and dull clank of metal on metal as the gates closed behind it. I did not turn to see it go. There was no turning back now.
"This," Dr. Koenma said as he held the door opened for me, "is the men's ward. There is a women's ward as well in a separate building a little ways beyond this one. However, this building is the only one that contains solitary confinement chambers and so any patients, of both genders, in need of solitude are brought here." Again I marveled at how cheerfully all of this information was relayed to me. We walked down a short hallway that ended in a gate, not unlike those used in prisons, and a check-in station.
"You'll need to sign these," Dr. Koenma said as he handed me a clipboard, "and I'm afraid we'll have to check that," he added, nodding at my suitcase. I traded the suitcase for the clipboard and calmly signed my name here and initialed there as the doctor searched my underwear for hidden scalpels and smuggled dope. After confiscating my nail clippers he was satisfied and returned my suitcase. I in turn gave him the signed forms, which he handed over to the nurse behind the desk. She smiled at me and then pressed a button on the corner of her desk. A beep echoed above us and the door clicked open.
"Allow me show you to your room," Dr. Koenma offered. I nodded and followed him in, hearing the loud click of the door shutting and locking behind us. We entered a large commons area with couches, chairs, tables, and a television mounted on one wall. There were nine or ten people milling about but I ignored them and kept my gaze fixed straight ahead, or at least that is what I tried to do.
I nearly jumped as an arm draped itself around my shoulders. I turned to see a teenage boy about my age grinning at me. His black hair gleamed with gel that smelled of peppermint and insecticide. Bright chocolate eyes shone at me.
"Hey new guy," he greeted. "Are you the Demon's new roommate?" I blinked. The Demon? He continued before I could answer. "The name's Urameshi Yusuke, the toughest guy at Ichigaki."
"The hell you are!" was the cry from across the room. A copper haired teen was suddenly on my other side, his hair also slick with gel and his onyx eyes burning. "I'm Kuwabara Kazuma, the real toughest guy at Ichigaki!"
"Yeah, and that's why you carry a stuffed cat around with you all the time," Urameshi replied. I had to fight hard not to laugh when I noticed what the teen was talking about. Sure enough Kuwabara was holding a stuffed tabby cat in one arm.
"Shut up about Eikichi!" Kuwabara yelled and I had to duck as he swung at Urameshi with his free arm. I managed to get out from between them just in time before an all out brawl broke out. Behind me I heard Dr. Koenma sigh.
"Both of you nitwits stop it!" I turned to see an old woman in nurse's uniform stomping towards the fighting teens. What she lacked in height she more than made up for in strength and temper. She grabbed both boys by their collars and yanked them apart. "I can't turn my back for a second and not turn around to find you two fighting again!" she practically screamed. "Now I want both of you to go to separate sides of this room and stay there!" Kuwabara nodded and offered a weak "yes, ma'am" before stalking to a corner, petting his stuffed cat. Urameshi on the other hand straightened his shirt and huffed, "Whatever, Grandma," as he went to join a card game.
"Shuichi," Dr. Koenma stepped forward to address me, "this is our head nurse, Genkai."
"It is a pleasure to meet you," I said with a bow. I felt it was best to get on her good side immediately and stay there. She looked me up and down and then smiled.
"Well," she said, extending her hand, "I think you might turn out to be the best behaved young man we've seen here in a while." I shook the offered hand and would have asked who 'the Demon' was, but another nurse with blue hair came hurrying up and whispered something in the old woman's ear, after which Genkai bade me a hasty goodbye and hurried away.
Feeling slightly lightheaded and overwhelmed, I again followed Dr. Koenma as he led me out of the commons, past the nurse's station, and down a long hallway. He opened a door on the right about halfway down and beckoned me inside.
"This will be your room," he announced. It was small and white, like everything else here. There were two small, white beds with a lamp resting one a nightstand between them. There was a window above the nightstand, far too small for a person to fit through, of course, but a window nonetheless. A white chest of drawers stood against one wall and a desk, the only thing in the room not white, against another. There was a small closet on the last wall.
I remembered Urameshi's words and yet for a moment wondered if I really had a roommate. There were no personal effects in the room, nothing to suggest that anyone used it. The two beds were identical with no apparent difference between which one was taken and which was open. However, Dr. Koenma quickly dispelled my doubts.
"You're roommate's name is Hiei," he said.
"Why did Urameshi call him 'the Demon'?" I inquired. The doctor looked at me for a long moment, as though debating whether or not to tell me the truth, and then sighed. "Hiei's condition is not so much unlike your own. He believes he is a demon and possesses, well, powers. It's actually not such an uncommon delusion to have, as I think you will discover in your stay here. Anyway, Dr. Yomi will be overseeing your treatment. You will meet with him on Thursday afternoons. Breakfast is at seven, lunch at eleven, and dinner at five. Lights out at ten. I'll leave you to get unpacked now."
He closed the door behind him and I stood alone and uncertain, staring helplessly at the white, sterile room. Hoping I would not upset my roommate by accidentally taking his bed, I eventually chose the right one and sat down heavily upon it. Propping my suitcase against the nightstand I stretched out on the bed. I frowned at the view of the white ceiling that greeted me and covered my face with my hands.
'Welcome to the Funny Farm, Shuichi.' I jumped at the voice and looked around. I was still alone. I groaned.
"You are the reason why I am here, Youko,"I said aloud, closing my eyes once more.
"Who are you talking to?" a deep voice asked. I jumped again and looked to find the door open. A short boy was standing there staring at me. He might have been my age but then he might have been older, it was hard to tell. He looked familiar and it took me a minute to recognize him as the face I had seen in the window when I arrived. Now that I could see him more clearly I saw that a white starburst adorned his hair and noted with some curiosity that his unnatural style bore no evidence of gel. 'Must use hairspray,' I thought. His eyes are what really drew my attention though. I had never seen eyes like that before. They were deep crimson and glinting with malice, unsettling and threatening. Truly these were the eyes of a lunatic.
"Who are you talking to?" he repeated a bit more forcefully, obviously annoyed at my refusal to answer. Quickly I shook my head.
"No one," I answered.
"No one," he repeated, stepping fully into the room and closing the door behind him. "You were talking to no one." It was a statement, not a question. I nodded hesitantly, beginning to feel nervous. "That's not possible," he said simply. I opened my mouth to protest but he hurried on. "If you were talking to yourself then it is yourself you were talking to. You are not 'no one' and so you could not have been talking to 'no one'."
I blinked uncertainly. I had never heard such strange logic and yet in an odd way it made sense. He was still a staring at me and suddenly I realized he was waiting for me to respond. But how was I supposed to respond to that?
"I was not talking to myself," I answered truthfully. He stared at me hard for a moment.
"But you were the only one here. Therefore…you were talking to someone else within you, but not you, correct?" I had to go over that sentence three times in my mind before I finally decided it was right and nodded.
"Who is he?" the boy asked.
"Who?"
"Youko."
I stared at him for a long moment wondering if I should tell him. I had no doubt he would believe me, after all he believed he himself was a demon, but I did not want anyone to believe me. The point of being here was to convince myself it was not true, was it not? Surely then it would only hurt me and him as well if we indulged in this fantasy tighter.
"He is not me." I finally answered.
"Who are you?" he replied.
"Minamino Shuichi," I answered. He suddenly shook his head violently.
"No, what is your name?" he asked. My brow furrowed in confusion. Hadn't I just told him my name?
"Minamino Shu—" In an instant he had crossed the room and was standing beside the bed, glaring at me.
"No!" he shouted again. "Not your human name!" The word human was uttered like something disgusting and foul. "Tell me your true name!"
"I don't—"
"Youko is a demon," he said suddenly, silencing me immediately. How did he know that? Had Dr. Koenma told him? "You are part human and part demon, both and neither. Now tell me your name!" I stared at him, feeling myself slowly edging away from him on the bed. He slammed his fist down on the nightstand, rattling the lamp. "TELL ME!"
"Hiei! What is going on in here?" I looked up to see that the blue haired nurse from before was standing in the doorway.
"Stay out of this, woman!" Hiei shouted back at her.
"Hiei, stop it! You're scaring him!" she cried, coming into the room and grabbing an arm. He went very still and the stillness after his sudden outburst unnerved me to no end.
"Let. Go. Of. Me," he growled. The girl hesitated but did not let go. She seemed used to his threats.
"Come on." She tried to pull him to the door but he refused to move. "Hiei," she finally said in a stern voice, "come with me right now or I am going to have to sedate you. The choice is yours." There was a long tense moment where nothing happened. The suspense in the air was suffocating. Slowly his feet began to move. His glare never left me as he slowly allowed himself to be pulled from the room.
I stared at the empty doorway, only now aware that my entire body was shaking. I had no idea what he was talking about. My true name? I wondered if I could request a new roommate. And yet, something dispelled that thought immediately. Some part of me that saw a connection to this obviously troubled young man. Whether it was through our shared delusion or something more I did not know. Though I did wonder how he knew about Youko.
'Because you're not crazy,' Youko's voice was like a cold bucket of water and at once I was over my shock.
"Shut up," I whispered as I retrieved my suitcase and began unpacking. "You have already gotten me into enough trouble today."
Well this is a story I've had for a while but never actually written out. It was inspired by the movie Girl, Interrupted and since I was watching it earlier today it finally spurred me to actually write this story out. I know you all are going to hate me for starting yet another new story when I have left you hanging for so long on my others (coughEyewashcough) but I really had to do this. Actually, you'd be surprised how little I really have to change the characters to make them all seem like homicidal sociopaths. It's kind of disturbing really. Oh, and the title is a Latin phrase that means "not of sound mind." So, I hope you enjoyed it and please leave a review.
