Note: Y'know, I love older music as much as I love newer music – I love a lot of music. It shouldn't be that hard to include lyrics from a song that came out in my set timeline, should it? (This time featured lyrics – the italic sections in this segment – are from He Is We's "A Mess It Grows".)

What Babe?

Eleven: Stasis

She used to be so good at pretending. She still is.

You're love-drunk, you're blinded.

It's in her blood, you know. She has a famous mother, an actress, and despite what they say sometimes talent – or at least a penchant – can be inherited. She used to spend hours in the park, playing out the stories her parents would read her. When her parents divorced, and especially after her father remarried, that park practically became her home. She lived in two worlds most times, the real and the make-believe. She was a child of imagination who toed the line until it blurred.

Maybe that's what led her here, in the end. If you ask her stepmother (because you can never reach her mother these days – the famous actress is too shamed by her schizophrenic daughter, I suppose), Irene will say it was the death of her brother. It took the lean towards fantasy that had always been there and pushed it over the edge. If you ask her father, Robert says it was a good year before the boy's death. She had started slipping well before, when she would prance around their backyard singing songs of goblins and their terrible king.

She doesn't sing anymore. She doesn't even talk, except on those rare occasions when someone can pull her out of her mind. It's been weeks, though. She hasn't spoken since just after her eighteenth birthday.

You've lost the ones who love you most.

That was the last time Robert and Irene came to see her, too. Word has it they're moving South, back to North Carolina where Irene's family is. Robert probably wanted to take her with him, but after her last outburst Irene most likely refused. It's better for her, anyway, staying established. It's still a shame. Most people fare better when they have someone to connect to.

There was even that boy, Jay. Her cousin, according to the family, but the way he acted around her was unusual for cousins. Her stepmother just said they had been close – practically inseparable. But the last time, the only time, he came to visit, she…didn't take it well. Accused him of being the Goblin King of her delusions. Accused him of stealing her brother. Accused him of…

He hasn't been around lately, either.

Actually, she hasn't had a visitor for quite some time. Since…goodness, it's been months. Not since her birthday. Maybe that's why she just sits there most days, staring out that window.

This liar's on fire…

Charlie still tries to connect with her. He talks to her when he gives her her medicine, when he sees her in that chair, when someone's brought her into the garden. Every time he sees her, he has a kind word to say.

She never returns it, though. Her doctor's starting to worry. Most patients reach a stasis or improve. Few deteriorate as quickly as she is.

Melted like wax, a mess it grows.

She's getting worse. When she first came here, everyone thought she'd be one that would be out quickly. Maybe a few weeks – a month, tops – and she would be back home, maybe not well-adjusted but on her way to healing. The longer she stayed, the more that hope was lost.

Few believe she'll ever leave now. Not with the way she just sits there and stares. Not with the way she doesn't respond. Her doctor rarely sees her anymore, but what's the point? She won't answer her, even if she does. Most of her doctor's visits are spent in five-minute intervals by that chair, asking questions that don't receive answers. Making comments that don't stir a reaction.

And you're the one that chose…

But she's doing it to herself, so no one really sympathizes anymore. She's the one who won't face reality. At least with the crazier ones there's a legitimate mental disorder. She just doesn't want to accept what happens, and they call in her schizophrenia what they call stubbornness in you.

Too long playing make-believe, perhaps. When you toe the line between reality so fluidly, perhaps this is all that you can expect. All you end up deserving.

(And do you believe that in the end, really? Or does the alternative just make you too sad and uncomfortable to admit?)

…and that's just how karma goes.