SUSANA AND LISA

So, You Wanna Kiss Me, Huh?

SUSANA POV

Toby had visited me while I was in the hospital, the guy that I thought was going to get drafted; the only guy that was generally a nice person, and the only guy that I didn't mind having slept with.

When I first came into the place I would have to stay at for a year just because I downed a bottle of Vodka and some Asprin⸺yet they had thought I was trying to kill myself, which I wasn't, but that was hard for them to see through since I seemed to talk about death a lot⸺I detested it. Either way, I signed the consent form because I had to since I was over eighteen. And my therapist would've been disappointed in me, which wasn't something he usually was. Besides the impulsive acts my disorder caused of me. And that made my mother throw an absolute fit, even though I had thought it was just because I asked if it was inherited from a parent. And, evidently, she must've known I meant her. Especially with the fit she threw after that.

So, the first time I had entered the ward that I would stay in for the next year until they straightened me out and my brain⸺yet I wasn't sure if even the meds could do that (straighten my brain out, that was⸺I had wanted to leave the first day; I had wanted to leave the first day because I did not care about goals, the future, or getting better especially since I had masked my thoughts of wanting to die before I entered the ward through promiscuity and...well, and other things.

However, then I met Lisa. Now, Lisa wasn't someone who⸺when you looked at and were around her⸺you would want as a friend. First, she was diagnosed as a Sociopath. Officially by Melvin, the same guy⸺doctor, I should say⸺who diagnosed me with Shizophrenia. And, of course (having that disorder), I did not believe it.

Shizophrenic? What? Now, I was the kind of person⸺girl, I guess⸺who looked around and focused on everyone around her but myself, because I didn't want to focus on all the nasty stuff and thoughts in my head and all that crap I didn't want to listen to that was always running through my HEAD. Yeah. Lisa was one of the patients I met there who actually GOT the crap that was always running through my HEAD to stop running.

Now, she didn't exactly have that high of a soul like most people out of the ward did. She had low empathy, and was basically a 'lifer' (as she said) in there because she had nowhere to go and nowhere to be since nobody loved her. And I thought that was mostly why she had acted out all the time because she was trying to distract herself from all the shit that she had going on in her life⸺or all the shit she used to have that she never wanted to be reminded of again.

The first time I met Lisa, she guarded me in the room I was in with Georgina. Because her roomate had killed herself, and suspected I had something to do with it even though I was just new. When she found that out, she became calmer, and her emotions became less severe. Especially around me. Weirdly enough⸺and even sort of creepily, I was going to be honest⸺she started hanging around me a lot more as time passed by. I wasn't sure if it was because I was new, but since I wasn't new anymore, I thought that maybe she just liked me as a person. And I didn't even think I was a person, because I saw the life as dull and everything as dull and all the people besides when I would see things.

Lisa was not dull though. She made me want to start living again, and feel like I wanted to restart my life into some sort of direction since I had no plan before and purposefully had no plan before.

Anyway. Lisa made me want to start living again⸺almost at life, too, and not just by trying to get better in the ward⸺so I liked when she was always around me. I wasn't going to make her feel unlovable when she wasn't even doing anything wrong to me! Yeah, maybe she screamed and yelled at me the first day, but that part was over and she new me now. Well, she new me more than my parents knew me.

So, after a few weeks had past, and after Lisa and I had started to become...uh, friends? Well, time came and Toby was one of my visitors. I never had that many visitors since I had checked myself in. Or since my therapist had checked me in with my consent. Which I wasn't sure why, but that wasn't important anymore.

Anyway. He told me about how he was maybe going to be getting drafted, and yes, he was a nice guy, but I had friends in the ward that I had met from the weeks I was there. And I felt like I was in a group instead of a group who were just in it for the drugs or whatever kind of crap they were in it for. Sure, we were all there because we were fucking crazy, but it was better than being in it for other stuff.

And, so when Toby begged me to move to Canada with him⸺well, I was pretty sure that the correct term was runaway to Canada with him but it was the same difference⸺I was shocked. Because I hadn't seen him in weeks. Was he worried about me because I was in the ward? With those people? They weren't bad people, I wanted to tell him, yet he wouldn't agree with me on that if he met Lisa for the first time.

Yet, that was the difference. If he met her for the first time. When I met her for the first time, I didn't really want to be her friend, either. But now I had wanted to be, and I stopped writing crap about her in my journal, too. I didn't stop writing, though, because I was never going to stop writing. Besides, Lisa had a really strong personality. She was the one with the strong personality type, with high moods going up and down, yet they had been mostly up since we had started talking.

And why had I called her friendship creepy? I wasn't even calling it creepy at first. And, the way I was using it, by the way...well, I wasn't necessarily saying creepy was a bad word. Because I had said that I had generally liked being her friend after actually getting to know her. Even if she was fucking crazy, but so was I. Maybe. Was I crazy? Because I was in the ward with them? Why, because I drank a bottle of Vodka and Asprin? I was only doing damage to myself, while Lisa did damage towards other people. Maybe she did it to herself, too, but I didn't think so. She didn't seem like a cutter. And she definitely didn't starve herself, even if she was extremely skinny.

When I was outside talking to Toby and telling him that I needed to stay, though, he didn't like that; he didn't like that because it meant I couldn't be with him, but he wasn't the guy who I was interested in when I slept with him just a few months ago as well. His personality...he was nice, yeah, but Lisa just made me happy instead of self-medicating. Even though I still had to take my meds, but everyone did. Lisa didn't make everyone happy, though. Some people just dealt with her. Mostly the nurses. Valerie, for example, was one of those people.

While I was outside telling Toby to leave and that, no, I didn't want to go to Canada with him, he got pissed off and left. What I wasn't aware of since, well, I wasn't inside the ward at the time I was talking, was that seeing Toby have to be told to walk away brought a smile to Lisa's face as she was watching me through the window from above. I wasn't sure if I should've been creeped out by that, but apparently, the other patients⸺friends⸺were all there, too. And they were liking that I was finally getting better and wasn't going to be a lifer. However, I thought I would miss Lisa when I was eventually going to leave.

No. I knew I was going to miss her. She was the only person who was starting to make me think life was going to be bearable. At first I had thought that it was Toby, yet he didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with me. Neither did I at first. I guess that was because I was the only one who could look into my head, and sometimes I just looked at the TV instead because I never wanted to dig deep for the answers on how to become a better person. I thought I was an okay person at first. Until everything turned to shit. But it wasn't anymore.

Lisa, however, had fixed the lightbulb in my head. I never thought I could've turned it on again without the use of something, or the help of something. I guess that was Lisa, but she wasn't hurting me, and I wasn't hurting her.

And most of that was because of Lisa, yeah, but at least I planned to do something now with my life.

Then, when it was quiet I said to her, "You do know you're one of the only people in my life that make life bearable for me?" And when that came out, she could tell by my eyes that I really, really meant the damn words. "At first...at first I thought that was Toby, but he just says the same crap that everyone else says."

"What? That you're a dyke?" She replied jokingly.

Uh-huh. Okay. I was a dyke because I didn't want to runaway to Canada with Toby. The thing was, though, was that I actually wasn't being sarcastic for once. Yeah. I know. It scared me shitless. Except, I wasn't sure if she knew there was more to it.

Or maybe she did. After all, she was a sociopath. And sociopaths were smart.

Well...most of them anyway. Like I was...or like I was supposed to be.

"Shut uuup," I said with a smirking smile and then threw a pillow playfully at her while we were both sitting on the couch.

I didn't know why everyone hated the living room. Apparently Lisa didn't now since she liked sitting next to me. And I liked sitting next to her. Which I supposed, yeah, would make me a dyke. Yet so was she. And neither of us cared.

"Lisa?"

"Yup." She answered.

"Why do you like me?"

"Because I'm fucking crazy," she said, "and because your brain is fucking crazy. I've got both. But eh. I'd rather go for a brain than a complete idiot anyway. Heh, right? And sociopaths have really, really high IQS. Which is why I escaped so many times and why Valeria had so many hard times trying to find me. So yeah. Answer for ya?"

"I...I guess?" I said, just rolling with her answer that she had given me.

"Hey." She said next. "So what would happen if I kissed you?"

"W⸺what do you mean?" I was shaken by that and she could tell. Fuck.

"Wow. And I thought you had a high IQ, Susana. Guess you're just Susana now, huh?"

Confused but alert, I asked, "Wait. You wanna kiss me?"

And why was I so taken off? God, I sounded like an idiot. I had just talked about how much I fucking liked Susana, and now I was sounding like an idiot in front of her after one ask. I wasn't sure if she was fucking with me at first when it came out of her mouth, though, but apparently that wasn't what it seemed like. She was not fucking with me. After all, she knew she shouldn't fuck with me because I wasn't one to be fucked with. Yikes. A little more anger than I intended, but that was where love got you. So I calmed down since I seemed like an idiot. And I never wanted to be seen that way, even though I probably was all the time like when I fell asleep during graduation even though I had the highest IQ than anybody in our grade. And I wasn't kidding.

"Uh, yeah. Why'd ya think I made all those dyke jokes, Susana? I'm a fucking dyke. Get over it. Let's makeout."

"Okay. Yeah. Let's do it, you fucking sociopath." She said teasingly.