Day One.

Blaine had been transferred to the John Ryder Institute; a mental health lockup on the other side of town. He remembered asking about it when he was young. He couldn't understand why the fence was so high or why the people looked so sickly. His father had told him that that was where they locked up the crazies.

He realized for the first time that he was crazy. Crazy. Pyscho. Cuckoo. Unhinged. Blaine was one of those people who was you would cross the street to avoid. The ones you laughed at in public and mocked with your friends. Society considered Blaine one step away from sticking his head into an oven.

After his desperate cry for help the day before, the doctor had jumped at Blaine, ready to wrestle the knife away. However, the teen had not the strength to put up a fight. He had simply dropped the knife beside him and let himself cry. The doctor looked at the boy curiously, made a few notes, and stepped out without another word.

The only pleasure that Blaine felt was from remembering the look his nhis fathers face when instead of discharge papers, he was passed transfer forms. Arthur fucking Anderson had thrown the papers back at the doctor and began shouting at the man. Somehow the doctor knew better and didn't tell Arthur fucking Anderson what Blaine had done. He simply said that Blaine needed more evaluation and treatment. He had given Blaine a referral for 90 days in a mental institution..

The lockup was a padded room with nothing in it. If Blaine wanted to go to the bathroom, he had to press a call button to be escorted. After his hospital suicide attempt, he had to spend three days in isolation and pass an evaluation to be moved to a regular room.

Blaine welcomed the silence. He could curl up in a ball and cry. He could lay spread eagle and think. He could talk to himself and not look crazy. He could kick and pound the walls in fury. Why wasn't be dead? Why did he have to live this way? Why would God give him this family of all families?

He hit the wall, every punch harder than the one before. At first it was directed towards his father. Why couldn't he accept his own son? Why did he think he was a disgrace? Why did he hit his kids? Why didn't he love his own family? Why did the lawyer even bother to have kids? How could he get away with this?

Then it turned to anger directed at himself. Why did Blaine have to be gay? Was it really something that he could change? Why didn't he try hard to appease his father? Could he have worked harder? Couldn't he have avoided his father's hits? Did he shame the Anderson name? Why did he let himself get this far? Why wasn't he strong enough?

Sweat poured from his forehead. He pushed his dark curls back and wiped his brow. How pathetic was it that he was punching a wall in a mental institution? Maybe he was crazy. Maybe he deserved to stay there.

Hours of sobbing later, Blaine finally reached the point where he had nothing left to give. Slowly he become empty. All of his fear and anger and disappointment had disappeared. It had turned to nothingness. He no longer felt anything.

Finally rational, Blaine took in his current state. He realised that he felt sticky. Not from the sweat from his panic, but from the clothes themselves The clothes he was given had left by a previous patient. A couple of plaid shirts and jeans. The shirts were frayed on the sleeves and the jeans were too short. Both articles had holes and stains. And they felt sticky. Like syrup. Blaine felt gross in the shirt, but kept it on, because he didn't have the energy to remove it. .

Of course his father couldn't be bothered to drop off clothes for his son to wear. That would require that a) he give a shit and b) that he be seen at the Ryder Institute. Blaine hoped that once he got of lockup, he could call his aunt and ask her to call his father. Maybe then Blaine would get some proper clothes.

With nothing but his clothes to worry about, Blaine stared blankly at the walls and sighed. There was no comfort to be found in this room. No cracks in the walls. No mistake in the paint. An even number Of ceiling tiles. The room was bare and perfect. It hid nothing.