This was written for a semester exam in a college English class. Admittedly unable to think up my own characters after midnight the day that this was due, I shamelessly stole a few characters from Labyrinth; namely, Sarah and her immediate family. I also used a lot of fantasy and sci-fi quotes (even a song lyric or two) to use up more space - er, make it more interesting I mean. ^_~; I hope you enjoy!
Retreat
Dear Mr. Williams,
I have spent the last week-and-a-half reviewing the doctors' notes on your daughter, Sarah Williams. I have interviewed each psychiatrist and counselor individually, and after much deliberation, I have come to the conclusion that your daughter would benefit the most from a prolonged stay in an institution of your choosing. I am available at any time of day or night for any questions or concerns that you may have. Please, do not delay in picking a place for your daughter to stay. Her life is in your hands.
Sincerely,
Dr. Martin Houser, Ph.D.
Sarah's hands went numb and the letter dropped to the floor. She couldn't believe it. After five years of fighting and shouting and visits with shrinks, her parents were going to lock her up in some hospital in the middle of nowhere. She probably wouldn't even be allowed to bring any personal possessions with her.
"What's it going to be - Happy Hills or Camp Deranged?" she asked herself aloud, then began to laugh hysterically. Her laughter quickly turned to tears, though, and Sarah blindly reached for a chair and collapsed on it. She laid her head on the kitchen table and covered it with her arms. Her chest contracted painfully with each sob and the brightly patterned blue tablecloth soon had a damp spot.
"Why?" she asked the empty kitchen. "Why is he doing this to me?"
The walls had no response for the teenager, though, save for the echo of her own broken voice.
"You'll like it here, Sarah. The staff is very friendly," Kevin Williams told his daughter. They were standing in the reception room of Serenity Suites, a white-walled, white-tiled, white-everything rest home for the mentally ill. "See that orderly over there? Don't you think he's - ah, hot? Isn't he hot?"
Sarah's green eyes remained glued on her black boots. She was mentally sitting in a field of green grass and flowers, the sun shining brightly down on her as she read a book and nibbled on a blade of grass.
"I'm Alice. Who are you?" she whispered. Kevin cleared his throat nervously and with a guiding arm, led her to the front desk. The nurse there, an elderly woman wearing glasses, with her hair up in a no-nonsense bun on the top of head, said in a patient, friendly voice,
"Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in the halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the shadows lie,
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the shadows lie."
Her father and the nurse were looking at her funny. Sarah shook her head, and the fog lifted just a little bit. "What did you say?" she asked timidly, licking her dry, cracked lips. Was it her imagination, or were the overhead lights flickering like crazy?
"You need to fill out these forms, and then we'll get you settled in. Tomorrow you'll see Doctor Wagner. He only comes here every other day and then only to -"
Once Sarah knew what the woman wanted from her, she tuned the nurse out. The brunette teenager quickly jotted down her name, age, sex, and signed and dated the forms saying that, yes, she had not been coerced into coming to this institution, and, no, she had no intention of leaving before the doctors thought she'd been properly rehabilitated to the outside world.
"The outside world? What about Xanth?" Sarah asked, her green eyes wide and frightened. "What about Xanth!" she screamed, her voice cracking.
The nurse collected the forms from Sarah and tucked them neatly into a folder on her nearly immaculate desk. "The Head Nurse, Joanna, will administer your medications to you. We don't tolerate patients not taking their pills - know that right away. Visiting hours are on weekends only, Mr. Williams, with a monthly Family Friday -"
Alice was chasing rabbits in one corner of Sarah's head. In another, a dragon was flying in the sky above a small village. There were mountains in the distance - snow-covered peaks of purest white - "Sarah. Sarah!" The nurse snapped her fingers in front of Sarah's face. The girl's eyes were glazed over, and she was whispering about the rules of casting a spell on Tuesdays. "Sarah, come with me. I'll show you to your room. Mr. Williams, I thank you for bringing her here. Have no worries now. She's in good hands with us. When we're done with her, she'll be a whole new person!" The nurse cheerfully ushered Sarah's father out the front doors, then returned to her newest patient's side, her white shoes squeaking cheerfully on the white tiles.
"Now, then, Sarah, why do we spend so much of the intervening time between life and death wearing wrist watches?" the nurse asked.
Sarah blinked her eyes rapidly. In her head, the dragon flew to the mountains and disappeared in the distance. The elderly woman was leading her down a long white hallway. There were doors at regular intervals. They had locks on the outside.
"What did you just say?"
The nurse sighed. "I asked you, why did you bring so little with you? Some of our guests here bring their entire homes!" she said with a chuckle, patting Sarah's arm.
The lights were flickering again. Sarah's head began to ache. She glanced down at her body. Her legs, clad in blue denim, seemed to stretch for a mile before they finally ended and the floor began. Her upper torso was, by comparison, nonexistent. It was as if her black T-shirt was only an inch long. Sarah covered one eye with a hand. The hallway was spinning crazily. The nurse kept chattering on.
"This is where you'll stay. Someone will be by your room to make certain that you're awake by eight. Breakfast, and all other meals, are in the community dining room. If you're sick, ring the buzzer on the wall by your bed. There are three nurses on call at all times. The doors have locks, but don't worry, they aren't used unless absolutely necessary.
"This is not a prison, Sarah," the nurse intoned sharply, stopping beside a door. "You are free to wander the building as you please, except for the areas that are specifically marked as prohibited. You're not allowed outside, however, except during the afternoons, when everyone here goes outside, weather permitting, of course. There is a recreational room, an exercise room, a TV room, and a small library, in case you didn't bring anything to read with you. You are not here to be punished, young lady. You are here to heal." The woman smiled as if she had just imparted the meaning of life.
Her monologue over, the nurse turned and opened the door. The room was small. The walls, floor and ceiling were all the same insipid white as everything else. There was a small bed against one wall. Two empty shelves were on the opposite wall. On the one opposite the door was a sink and a mirror, with another little shelf obviously meant for personal items.
Sarah took two steps inside and set her single bag down on the floor. The nurse closed the door with an ominous thud behind her. There was no window in the room.
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And wither then? I cannot say.
The days melted together, and Sarah slowly got used to her cell, to the dizzy, white hallways, to the shrieks and cries in the night of the other patients. But she never got used to the emptiness she felt whenever she searched her room after sunset for some way to see the stars in the sky. She wrote in a journal she'd brought with her:
The days mean nothing. The nights mean nothing. My world has no clocks anymore. I can't believe my dad locked me up in here. I'm only seventeen. He ended my life before it had a chance to begin. All because I still see monsters under my bed and in my closet. Because I never stopped believing the fairy tales. Because I didn't live in the real world. It hurt me too much. He hurt me too much. I can't walk with broken legs, and I can't live with broken dreams. My spirit is crushed. Arthur, you were so right:
We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams.
Wandering by lonely sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World losers and world foresakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet, we are the movers and shakers
Of the world forever it seems.
Sarah took her pills, ate the food, played the games, and even painted the pictures of the baskets of fruit. Sarah, once known by her peers and her relatives for never being without a book, had brought none with her, and never once set foot in the library. Her green eyes, only months before a sparkling, bright, carefree green, were now a dull, colorless pale shadow of her former self. The mood-altering pills made her stable. She was so stable that she no longer quoted strange books or snippets of poetry in the middle of conversations. She was so stable that she no longer talked at all.
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
Let them a journey new begin,
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn towards the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
It was the last Friday of the month. One of the nurses, a fiery redhead named Kylie, came to Sarah's room after breakfast.
"Are you ready to meet your family, Sarah?" she asked, folding her hands across the front of her white uniform, her eyes shining behind her glasses.
Sarah glanced up from her journal. She stared at the nurse for a long moment, then turned back to moving her pencil across the pages.
"Sarah, your father and step-mother are waiting. They've even brought your baby brother. Don't you want to see your little brother Toby?" When the patient didn't move, Kylie moved briskly to her side. "Stop writing for a while and come - oh."
Sarah was laboring over a blank page. She had obviously erased what had been in her journal.
The nurse quickly got over her shock. Although she had seen Sarah's records, and knew that the girl had been a gifted student and an avid reader and writer, she dismissed the incident as 'nothing.'
"Come on, Sarah. We have to go now," Nurse Kylie said, gently pulling Sarah up and leading her out of the room.
I think what a joy it is to be alive,
and I wonder if I'll ever leap inward
to the root of this flesh and know
myself as one I was. The root is there.
Whether any act of mine can find it,
that remains tangled in the future.
"Sarah!" Kevin exclaimed. "It's so good to see you again! How are you? Are you taking your medications? Are you going to therapy sessions with the doctor? Are you participating in the group activities? Have you finally grown up?"
His barrage of questions finally wound down, and Sarah looked up at her father, her giver of life, and her destroyer of dreams. 'Have you finally grown up?'
Sarah's step-mother, Karen, took a step forward, leading Sarah's three-year-old brother, Toby, by the hand. He was chewing on a piece of red licorice, and drool ran down the front of his blue outfit.
"Sarah," she said timidly, absently smoothing Toby's hair. "Are you alright?"
"Of course she's all right, Karen!" Kevin exploded. Several people around them in the recreational room glanced over, then away. Many of the other patients had families visiting. Some had parents, some had children, some had other relatives. Those with no visitors were likely holed up in their rooms, wallowing in lonesome misery, if they were even aware of what was going on around them anymore. "We're paying good money to keep her here, so of course she's fine. She's great! Look at her! She's wearing normal clothes! No more of those frilly antique dresses or other weird things."
"You didn't let her bring any of her costumes with her, remember?" Karen snapped testily, grabbing Toby's hand as he tried to slip off to explore the toys in one corner of the room. "No books, no makeup, nothing but a few changes of clothes and her toothbrush! She doesn't have a choice of how she looks anymore!"
"Karen," Kevin replied, "She's my daughter, not yours. I know what's best for her." Karen pursed her lips, but didn't say anything.
"Now, then, Sarah, you are taking all of your medications, aren't you? Like a good girl? If you take them, you can be a normal teen again. Don't you want to be normal? Don't you want to fit in, be one of the crowd? Maybe then you'll finally get a boyfriend, like all the other girls your age," her father rattled on, but she wasn't paying attention. A glimmer of a thought had wormed its way into her head and it wouldn't leave.
'I give you the desert chameleon, whose ability to blend itself into the background tells you all you need to know about the roots of ecology and the foundations of a personal identity,' Sarah thought over and over.
"Sarah!" Kevin called loudly, snapping his fingers in front of her eyes. She blinked a few times, then met his gaze with her own glazed-over one. "Are you paying attention to me? Do the drugs they give you make you sleepy? Do you need to go lie down? We can always come back next month. I know that there are visiting hours on weekends, too, but we like to go out on weekends with our friends. We need to stay in touch with them. You'll find out what that's like when you're older and you finally make some friends."
...And these children that you spit on
as they try to change their worlds
are immune to your consultations.
They're quite aware
of what they're going through...
Sarah opened her mouth. Maybe it was being a room full of nervous people; those who visited patients in a mental home always acted like deer in an open meadow when they came. Maybe it was seeing Toby squirm in his mother's grasp, trying to break free and being unable to pry the hands of the adults in his life off of him. Whatever it was, Sarah's mind cleared, and for the first time since she'd arrived at Serenity Suites, she spoke.
"All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by frost."
Her father was looking at her with a mixture of anger and bewilderment on his face at the raspy words his daughter had just whispered. He opened and closed his mouth several times, then finally grabbed his second wife's hand and marched out of the room.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken:
The crownless again shall be king.
Back in her room, her blank journal now a mirror of her soul, Sarah sat on the floor beside her bed and leaned her back against it. She slowly pulled off her black boots, not bothering to untie the laces. The air hit her sock-clad feet and she wiggled her toes, just to watch them wave at the wall. One of the nurses opened the door to check on her at noon, but Sarah didn't look up to see which one it was. Her stomach complained that it needed food, but she ignored it.
After nightfall, a nurse came in with her pills and a paper cup of water. Once she'd been handed her medications, Sarah sat there for a moment, just looking at them where they sat in her palm. One blue and white gel capsule, one small, black pill, and one white, powdery one that tasted the worst of all of them. She finally swallowed them, and the nurse checked her mouth to make sure, then left the room.
True, I talk of dreams;
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy;
Which is as thin of substance as the air,
And more inconstant than the wind.
Time passed, but Sarah knew not how much. The lights above her head flickered as they had on the day she'd arrived at Serenity Suites. Her mind retraced her childhood spent reading fantasy and writing poetry. Her pre-teen years flashed through her brain, in the form of mute pictures and flashes of faded memories. Her innocent inner child, dormant for nearly the last month, slowly uncurled herself from the corner of Sarah's mind and stood up. She stretched her arms above her head and arched her back. She looked around and began to take a step forward.
The child hit an invisible wall, and began to cry.
So old friends, now it's time to start growing up,
Taking charge, seeing things as they are.
Facing facts, not escaping them,
Still with dreams, just reshaping them.
Growing up.
Sarah saw her father, overbearing and dominant, ruling her life for the last decade. Her mother had left when she was six. A possible stage career was more important than a supportive husband and a doting daughter. The physical resemblance between Sarah and her mother was amazing; both had long dark brown hair, piercing green eyes, a narrow nose, and high, wide cheekbones. But whereas as Linda Williams was a fearless, headstrong woman, her daughter had been reduced to a timid, unquestioning mute, sitting on the floor of a mental hospital, contemplating the best way to commit suicide with the limited resources available.
Dear Mr. Williams,
I am very sorry to inform you of the untimely death of your daughter, Sarah Williams, by her own hand, during her stay at our facility, Serenity Suites. You should be aware that this is not a common occurrence, and measures are being taken to ensure that no such incident happens again. Once again, I am very sorry for your loss, and offer my deepest condolences.
Sincerely,
Dr. Philip Wagner, Ph.D.
Kevin Williams was sitting at his kitchen table, reading the letter from the doctor. His eyes went over the words again and again. The paper floated to the floor from his lifeless hands, and he placed them palm-down on the blue tablecloth to steady himself. The words of Jackson Browne on the CD player behind him floated to his ears.
Keep a fire for the human race.
Let your prayers go drifting into space.
You never know what will be coming down.
Perhaps a better world is drawing near.
Just as easily it could all disappear,
Along with whatever meaning you might have found.
Don't let the uncertainty turn you around.
(The world keeps turning around and around.)
Go on and make a joyful sound.
Into a dancer you have grown,
From a seed somebody else has thrown.
Go ahead and throw some seeds of your own.
At somewhere between the time you arrive and the time you go,
May lie a reason you were alive that you'll never know.
Retreat
Dear Mr. Williams,
I have spent the last week-and-a-half reviewing the doctors' notes on your daughter, Sarah Williams. I have interviewed each psychiatrist and counselor individually, and after much deliberation, I have come to the conclusion that your daughter would benefit the most from a prolonged stay in an institution of your choosing. I am available at any time of day or night for any questions or concerns that you may have. Please, do not delay in picking a place for your daughter to stay. Her life is in your hands.
Sincerely,
Dr. Martin Houser, Ph.D.
Sarah's hands went numb and the letter dropped to the floor. She couldn't believe it. After five years of fighting and shouting and visits with shrinks, her parents were going to lock her up in some hospital in the middle of nowhere. She probably wouldn't even be allowed to bring any personal possessions with her.
"What's it going to be - Happy Hills or Camp Deranged?" she asked herself aloud, then began to laugh hysterically. Her laughter quickly turned to tears, though, and Sarah blindly reached for a chair and collapsed on it. She laid her head on the kitchen table and covered it with her arms. Her chest contracted painfully with each sob and the brightly patterned blue tablecloth soon had a damp spot.
"Why?" she asked the empty kitchen. "Why is he doing this to me?"
The walls had no response for the teenager, though, save for the echo of her own broken voice.
"You'll like it here, Sarah. The staff is very friendly," Kevin Williams told his daughter. They were standing in the reception room of Serenity Suites, a white-walled, white-tiled, white-everything rest home for the mentally ill. "See that orderly over there? Don't you think he's - ah, hot? Isn't he hot?"
Sarah's green eyes remained glued on her black boots. She was mentally sitting in a field of green grass and flowers, the sun shining brightly down on her as she read a book and nibbled on a blade of grass.
"I'm Alice. Who are you?" she whispered. Kevin cleared his throat nervously and with a guiding arm, led her to the front desk. The nurse there, an elderly woman wearing glasses, with her hair up in a no-nonsense bun on the top of head, said in a patient, friendly voice,
"Three Rings for the Elven-kings under the sky,
Seven for the Dwarf-lords in the halls of stone,
Nine for Mortal Men doomed to die,
One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne
In the Land of Mordor where the shadows lie,
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them
In the Land of Mordor where the shadows lie."
Her father and the nurse were looking at her funny. Sarah shook her head, and the fog lifted just a little bit. "What did you say?" she asked timidly, licking her dry, cracked lips. Was it her imagination, or were the overhead lights flickering like crazy?
"You need to fill out these forms, and then we'll get you settled in. Tomorrow you'll see Doctor Wagner. He only comes here every other day and then only to -"
Once Sarah knew what the woman wanted from her, she tuned the nurse out. The brunette teenager quickly jotted down her name, age, sex, and signed and dated the forms saying that, yes, she had not been coerced into coming to this institution, and, no, she had no intention of leaving before the doctors thought she'd been properly rehabilitated to the outside world.
"The outside world? What about Xanth?" Sarah asked, her green eyes wide and frightened. "What about Xanth!" she screamed, her voice cracking.
The nurse collected the forms from Sarah and tucked them neatly into a folder on her nearly immaculate desk. "The Head Nurse, Joanna, will administer your medications to you. We don't tolerate patients not taking their pills - know that right away. Visiting hours are on weekends only, Mr. Williams, with a monthly Family Friday -"
Alice was chasing rabbits in one corner of Sarah's head. In another, a dragon was flying in the sky above a small village. There were mountains in the distance - snow-covered peaks of purest white - "Sarah. Sarah!" The nurse snapped her fingers in front of Sarah's face. The girl's eyes were glazed over, and she was whispering about the rules of casting a spell on Tuesdays. "Sarah, come with me. I'll show you to your room. Mr. Williams, I thank you for bringing her here. Have no worries now. She's in good hands with us. When we're done with her, she'll be a whole new person!" The nurse cheerfully ushered Sarah's father out the front doors, then returned to her newest patient's side, her white shoes squeaking cheerfully on the white tiles.
"Now, then, Sarah, why do we spend so much of the intervening time between life and death wearing wrist watches?" the nurse asked.
Sarah blinked her eyes rapidly. In her head, the dragon flew to the mountains and disappeared in the distance. The elderly woman was leading her down a long white hallway. There were doors at regular intervals. They had locks on the outside.
"What did you just say?"
The nurse sighed. "I asked you, why did you bring so little with you? Some of our guests here bring their entire homes!" she said with a chuckle, patting Sarah's arm.
The lights were flickering again. Sarah's head began to ache. She glanced down at her body. Her legs, clad in blue denim, seemed to stretch for a mile before they finally ended and the floor began. Her upper torso was, by comparison, nonexistent. It was as if her black T-shirt was only an inch long. Sarah covered one eye with a hand. The hallway was spinning crazily. The nurse kept chattering on.
"This is where you'll stay. Someone will be by your room to make certain that you're awake by eight. Breakfast, and all other meals, are in the community dining room. If you're sick, ring the buzzer on the wall by your bed. There are three nurses on call at all times. The doors have locks, but don't worry, they aren't used unless absolutely necessary.
"This is not a prison, Sarah," the nurse intoned sharply, stopping beside a door. "You are free to wander the building as you please, except for the areas that are specifically marked as prohibited. You're not allowed outside, however, except during the afternoons, when everyone here goes outside, weather permitting, of course. There is a recreational room, an exercise room, a TV room, and a small library, in case you didn't bring anything to read with you. You are not here to be punished, young lady. You are here to heal." The woman smiled as if she had just imparted the meaning of life.
Her monologue over, the nurse turned and opened the door. The room was small. The walls, floor and ceiling were all the same insipid white as everything else. There was a small bed against one wall. Two empty shelves were on the opposite wall. On the one opposite the door was a sink and a mirror, with another little shelf obviously meant for personal items.
Sarah took two steps inside and set her single bag down on the floor. The nurse closed the door with an ominous thud behind her. There was no window in the room.
The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And wither then? I cannot say.
The days melted together, and Sarah slowly got used to her cell, to the dizzy, white hallways, to the shrieks and cries in the night of the other patients. But she never got used to the emptiness she felt whenever she searched her room after sunset for some way to see the stars in the sky. She wrote in a journal she'd brought with her:
The days mean nothing. The nights mean nothing. My world has no clocks anymore. I can't believe my dad locked me up in here. I'm only seventeen. He ended my life before it had a chance to begin. All because I still see monsters under my bed and in my closet. Because I never stopped believing the fairy tales. Because I didn't live in the real world. It hurt me too much. He hurt me too much. I can't walk with broken legs, and I can't live with broken dreams. My spirit is crushed. Arthur, you were so right:
We are the music-makers,
And we are the dreamers of dreams.
Wandering by lonely sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World losers and world foresakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet, we are the movers and shakers
Of the world forever it seems.
Sarah took her pills, ate the food, played the games, and even painted the pictures of the baskets of fruit. Sarah, once known by her peers and her relatives for never being without a book, had brought none with her, and never once set foot in the library. Her green eyes, only months before a sparkling, bright, carefree green, were now a dull, colorless pale shadow of her former self. The mood-altering pills made her stable. She was so stable that she no longer quoted strange books or snippets of poetry in the middle of conversations. She was so stable that she no longer talked at all.
The Road goes ever on and on
Out from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
Let others follow it who can!
Let them a journey new begin,
But I at last with weary feet
Will turn towards the lighted inn,
My evening-rest and sleep to meet.
It was the last Friday of the month. One of the nurses, a fiery redhead named Kylie, came to Sarah's room after breakfast.
"Are you ready to meet your family, Sarah?" she asked, folding her hands across the front of her white uniform, her eyes shining behind her glasses.
Sarah glanced up from her journal. She stared at the nurse for a long moment, then turned back to moving her pencil across the pages.
"Sarah, your father and step-mother are waiting. They've even brought your baby brother. Don't you want to see your little brother Toby?" When the patient didn't move, Kylie moved briskly to her side. "Stop writing for a while and come - oh."
Sarah was laboring over a blank page. She had obviously erased what had been in her journal.
The nurse quickly got over her shock. Although she had seen Sarah's records, and knew that the girl had been a gifted student and an avid reader and writer, she dismissed the incident as 'nothing.'
"Come on, Sarah. We have to go now," Nurse Kylie said, gently pulling Sarah up and leading her out of the room.
I think what a joy it is to be alive,
and I wonder if I'll ever leap inward
to the root of this flesh and know
myself as one I was. The root is there.
Whether any act of mine can find it,
that remains tangled in the future.
"Sarah!" Kevin exclaimed. "It's so good to see you again! How are you? Are you taking your medications? Are you going to therapy sessions with the doctor? Are you participating in the group activities? Have you finally grown up?"
His barrage of questions finally wound down, and Sarah looked up at her father, her giver of life, and her destroyer of dreams. 'Have you finally grown up?'
Sarah's step-mother, Karen, took a step forward, leading Sarah's three-year-old brother, Toby, by the hand. He was chewing on a piece of red licorice, and drool ran down the front of his blue outfit.
"Sarah," she said timidly, absently smoothing Toby's hair. "Are you alright?"
"Of course she's all right, Karen!" Kevin exploded. Several people around them in the recreational room glanced over, then away. Many of the other patients had families visiting. Some had parents, some had children, some had other relatives. Those with no visitors were likely holed up in their rooms, wallowing in lonesome misery, if they were even aware of what was going on around them anymore. "We're paying good money to keep her here, so of course she's fine. She's great! Look at her! She's wearing normal clothes! No more of those frilly antique dresses or other weird things."
"You didn't let her bring any of her costumes with her, remember?" Karen snapped testily, grabbing Toby's hand as he tried to slip off to explore the toys in one corner of the room. "No books, no makeup, nothing but a few changes of clothes and her toothbrush! She doesn't have a choice of how she looks anymore!"
"Karen," Kevin replied, "She's my daughter, not yours. I know what's best for her." Karen pursed her lips, but didn't say anything.
"Now, then, Sarah, you are taking all of your medications, aren't you? Like a good girl? If you take them, you can be a normal teen again. Don't you want to be normal? Don't you want to fit in, be one of the crowd? Maybe then you'll finally get a boyfriend, like all the other girls your age," her father rattled on, but she wasn't paying attention. A glimmer of a thought had wormed its way into her head and it wouldn't leave.
'I give you the desert chameleon, whose ability to blend itself into the background tells you all you need to know about the roots of ecology and the foundations of a personal identity,' Sarah thought over and over.
"Sarah!" Kevin called loudly, snapping his fingers in front of her eyes. She blinked a few times, then met his gaze with her own glazed-over one. "Are you paying attention to me? Do the drugs they give you make you sleepy? Do you need to go lie down? We can always come back next month. I know that there are visiting hours on weekends, too, but we like to go out on weekends with our friends. We need to stay in touch with them. You'll find out what that's like when you're older and you finally make some friends."
...And these children that you spit on
as they try to change their worlds
are immune to your consultations.
They're quite aware
of what they're going through...
Sarah opened her mouth. Maybe it was being a room full of nervous people; those who visited patients in a mental home always acted like deer in an open meadow when they came. Maybe it was seeing Toby squirm in his mother's grasp, trying to break free and being unable to pry the hands of the adults in his life off of him. Whatever it was, Sarah's mind cleared, and for the first time since she'd arrived at Serenity Suites, she spoke.
"All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by frost."
Her father was looking at her with a mixture of anger and bewilderment on his face at the raspy words his daughter had just whispered. He opened and closed his mouth several times, then finally grabbed his second wife's hand and marched out of the room.
From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring;
Renewed shall be blade that was broken:
The crownless again shall be king.
Back in her room, her blank journal now a mirror of her soul, Sarah sat on the floor beside her bed and leaned her back against it. She slowly pulled off her black boots, not bothering to untie the laces. The air hit her sock-clad feet and she wiggled her toes, just to watch them wave at the wall. One of the nurses opened the door to check on her at noon, but Sarah didn't look up to see which one it was. Her stomach complained that it needed food, but she ignored it.
After nightfall, a nurse came in with her pills and a paper cup of water. Once she'd been handed her medications, Sarah sat there for a moment, just looking at them where they sat in her palm. One blue and white gel capsule, one small, black pill, and one white, powdery one that tasted the worst of all of them. She finally swallowed them, and the nurse checked her mouth to make sure, then left the room.
True, I talk of dreams;
Which are the children of an idle brain,
Begot of nothing but vain fantasy;
Which is as thin of substance as the air,
And more inconstant than the wind.
Time passed, but Sarah knew not how much. The lights above her head flickered as they had on the day she'd arrived at Serenity Suites. Her mind retraced her childhood spent reading fantasy and writing poetry. Her pre-teen years flashed through her brain, in the form of mute pictures and flashes of faded memories. Her innocent inner child, dormant for nearly the last month, slowly uncurled herself from the corner of Sarah's mind and stood up. She stretched her arms above her head and arched her back. She looked around and began to take a step forward.
The child hit an invisible wall, and began to cry.
So old friends, now it's time to start growing up,
Taking charge, seeing things as they are.
Facing facts, not escaping them,
Still with dreams, just reshaping them.
Growing up.
Sarah saw her father, overbearing and dominant, ruling her life for the last decade. Her mother had left when she was six. A possible stage career was more important than a supportive husband and a doting daughter. The physical resemblance between Sarah and her mother was amazing; both had long dark brown hair, piercing green eyes, a narrow nose, and high, wide cheekbones. But whereas as Linda Williams was a fearless, headstrong woman, her daughter had been reduced to a timid, unquestioning mute, sitting on the floor of a mental hospital, contemplating the best way to commit suicide with the limited resources available.
Dear Mr. Williams,
I am very sorry to inform you of the untimely death of your daughter, Sarah Williams, by her own hand, during her stay at our facility, Serenity Suites. You should be aware that this is not a common occurrence, and measures are being taken to ensure that no such incident happens again. Once again, I am very sorry for your loss, and offer my deepest condolences.
Sincerely,
Dr. Philip Wagner, Ph.D.
Kevin Williams was sitting at his kitchen table, reading the letter from the doctor. His eyes went over the words again and again. The paper floated to the floor from his lifeless hands, and he placed them palm-down on the blue tablecloth to steady himself. The words of Jackson Browne on the CD player behind him floated to his ears.
Keep a fire for the human race.
Let your prayers go drifting into space.
You never know what will be coming down.
Perhaps a better world is drawing near.
Just as easily it could all disappear,
Along with whatever meaning you might have found.
Don't let the uncertainty turn you around.
(The world keeps turning around and around.)
Go on and make a joyful sound.
Into a dancer you have grown,
From a seed somebody else has thrown.
Go ahead and throw some seeds of your own.
At somewhere between the time you arrive and the time you go,
May lie a reason you were alive that you'll never know.