A smile seems out of place on Ruth’s blotchy red face, like it’s something she doesn’t do very often, like it’s something she’s practicing.
And I try to let her see, by not looking away, that I don’t mind if she practices on me.
Then she’s gone and I’m listening to her shoes squeak back to the ward.
You lean forward in your dead-cow chair; I pull back.
“I have a theory,” you say.
I decide then that I want to know exactly how many stripes there are on your wallpaper. Tan, white. Tan, white, tan, white.
“It’s just a hunch,” you say.
Tan. White. Tan. White.
“I don’t know why you’re not speaking to anyone…”
The stripes turn faint and it’s hard to see where the tan stops and the white starts.
“But I would guess that not talking takes an enormous effort.”
I picture myself running after school, something that takes a lot of effort, at least at first. After about the first mile, though, the white-out effect would kick in. I’d stop noticing the trees, or the road, or whether it was cold, or even where I was going. It was like someone came along with a giant bottle of white-out, erasing everything around me. Sometimes I’d even forget I was running and all of a sudden I’d see a building or a road I’d never seen before and I’d realize I’d gone too far. The white-out effect had stopped. I’d turn around and run home then, wondering if I’d have the energy to make it.
“It must take a lot of energy,” you say.
I blink.
“Not talking. It must be very tiring.”
I watch granules of dust slowly drift through a shaft of afternoon sun, and all at once I am tired. Something inside me sags, like a seam giving way. But my brain fights back.
My mom’s the one who gets tired. My mom and Sam. My mom gets tired washing everything with antibacterial spray and making special food for Sam and scrubbing the lint out of all the filters and air-vent covers to keep Sam from having an asthma attack, so tired that sometimes she has to rest all day. And Sam sometimes gets so tired just getting ready for school that he has to go straight back to bed.
Which means staying absolutely quiet when I get home from school so they can rest. Which could be for ten minutes or ten hours. Which means it’s up to me to do the spraying and cleaning. Which still doesn’t stop Sam from having an attack. Which means he could be in the hospital for a couple of hours or a couple of days. Which means my mom will stay there around the clock, until she gets so tired she has to come home and rest. Which means it’s up to me to do more spraying and cleaning. Which means I just don’t get tired.
“…you’re in a situation here where a lot of things are beyond your control.”
I look up and it occurs to me that you’ve been talking all along.
“Just about everything you do here is determined by forces outside your control—what time you get up, how often you go to Group, how often you come to see me. Am I right?”
I understand now that you’re talking about Sick Minds; I go back to counting the stripes on the wallpaper.
“Sometimes when we’re in situations where we feel we’re not in control, we do things, especially things that take a lot of energy, as a way of making ourselves feel we have some power.”
The tan and white stripes melt together.
“But Callie.” Your voice is so quiet, I have to stop counting a minute to hear it. “You’d have so much more power… if you would speak.”
Usually I try to be the last one to use the bathroom in the morning. That way, I don’t have to see the other girls looking all soft and sad the way people do after they’ve been dreaming. This morning, though, when I walk past Rochelle, the bathroom attendant, I see Tara standing at a sink in her nightgown and baseball cap, putting on makeup. I pick the sink farthest away and make a big deal out of putting toothpaste on my brush.
After a while I stand back at just the right angle so I can see, down the row of mirrors, a dozen reflections of Tara. Tara taking off her baseball cap. Tara touching a comb gingerly to her head. Tara arranging thin, colorless strands of hair around a bald spot. Something about that bare patch of scalp makes me feel so bad I have to turn away.
“Think we’ll make it in time for breakfast?”
I study the column of water streaming out of the faucet. From the corner of my eye, I see that Tara has put her baseball cap back on; she’s talking to me.
“We better hurry,” she says. “Debbie says we’re having pancakes.” Tara’s voice is surprisingly deep and womanly, considering she weighs only 92 pounds. Last week in Group she announced that this was a new high for her. A couple of people clapped. She cried.
I turn up the water full blast and stare at it like something about it is very, very important. I can’t see Tara, but I can feel her standing a few sinks away watching me and suddenly I feel bad giving the silent treatment to someone who weighs only 92 pounds and has to wear a baseball cap to cover up a bald spot.
The rushing water gets louder, then softer, then louder Tara moves toward the door where Rochelle is sitting on the orange plastic chair, reading People magazine.
“Do you really want us to ignore you?” There’s nothing mean about the way Tara says this; there’s nothing in her voice except curiosity
I waste as much time as I can brushing my teeth. Eventually, she’s gone.
Today is linen-exchange day. All of us guests have to line up in the laundry room and hand in our old sheets and towels and get new ones. Everyone displays Appropriate Behavior during linen exchange, probably because Doreen, the custodial worker in charge, takes it very seriously Each week she hangs hand-lettered signs all over the laundry room, signs with lots of capital letters and exclamation points. “Line forms to the right of the Attendant!” says one. “Please have your linens ready for Presentation to the Attendant!” says another.
I’m standing in line—to the right of the Attendant, with my linens ready for Presentation—when Sydney and Tara come up behind me. I can tell from the cigarette smell that they’ve just come in from the smoking porch, where everyone else hangs out between sessions.
“Hi, S.T.”
Heat creeps up my cheeks. I feel bad not talking to Sydney, since she always says hello to me like I’m a normal person. I hold myself rigid and wait.
“These signs crack me up,” Sydney says after a while. I relax a little, once I figure out she’s talking to Tara “This one’s my favorite.”
I can’t help but listen in.
“‘Guests are kindly requested to refrain from removing their mattress pads at the end of their stay.’” Sydney reads Doreen’s sign in a deep, official-sounding voice. “Like someone’s going to say, ‘Hmmm. What souvenir can I bring home from my stay at Sick Minds? Oh, I know! A mattress pad!’”
I picture Doreen, suddenly, in a tug-of-war with someone over a mattress pad. I can see Doreen pulling the emergency alarm, then rolling around on the floor trying to wrestle one of her beloved mattress pads away from a guest. A giggle creeps up my throat. I swallow. A fullfledged brawl is raging in my mind’s eye, with guests and attendants slugging it out over mattress pads. I bite the insides of my cheeks. I dig my nails into my palms. It’s no good. I bolt out of line and run for the steps.
“Where are you going?” Doreen yells. “That’s a violation, you hear?”
The door swings shut behind me and I’m in the cool, muffled world of the hallway. I take the steps two at time, stomping so hard that the echo drowns out the strange, stifled sound of me trying not to laugh.