After I Wake

first.

Now:

June 8th

I THINK I’ve been asleep. I’ve been doing that a lot lately. I’ve turned the craft of avoiding people into a fine art. Sleeping seems plausible right now because I’m tired and I really don’t want to move, because I’m in the postsleep phase where I’m only kind of awake. It would be incredibly easy to go back to sleep, but I could also get up, even though that would be both harder to do and incredibly annoying, because I’m still too entrenched in that sleepy state where I’d rather be because it’s like being a child again and the Earth isn’t real and nothing really matters because there is no logic in a dream and the only thing that is real is your freedom. That’s where I’d like to go, but something is dragging me out of all of that, and I do not like it, but there is more wakefulness to me than there was only moments ago, and so I must get up.

It’s really unfortunate when that happens.

I’m not in my bed. That’s the next thing I become aware of as my consciousness slips back and my world refocuses. The sheets are too scratchy, the blanket covering me is heavy and cumbersome, and the mattress smells of cleanliness as opposed to mine that smells like home, familiar and lived-in. I have no idea where I am. My eyes flicker open, and I am ambushed by painfully bright lights. I blink a couple of times, trying to adjust.

With the immediate challenges of first waking up and having no idea what the hell is going on out of the way, I try to figure out exactly where I am. But judging by the bed on which I’m sprawled and the air that is filled with dust motes glinting in the sun and the gentle beeping forcing its way into my attention, I’m in the hospital. Again. I groan loudly and close my eyes, pressing the lids together as hard as I can, rubbing my eyes hard enough to see stars floating, swirling gently about, behind my closed lids. My wrist twinges vaguely in pain, the skin not happy with being pulled. Something beeps, and I hear footsteps.

They’re watching me. I blink. I have no idea where that thought came from.

I wonder how I even got here. I never learned to drive, haven’t ridden my bike in years, and don’t cross the highway. Something has to have come up. There’s a logical solution, but I’m still a little trapped in the abyss of sleep, and I know I’m missing the final piece of the puzzle.

I think I can justifiably say that I am very confused.

It’s hard to move. I’m tired and stiff. I’ve probably been sleeping for a while. The bed is narrow, and I’m on my back, but I sleep on my side. There’s an IV protruding from my arm, and the beeping that shatters the peace stems from something that’s taking my pulse. It’s all dreadfully familiar and not an experience I wanted to repeat.

As remnants of memory slide back and click into place, I blink, doing my best to focus in my groggy state, watching experiences of the past months sharpen and contrast, and the bright emotions dominate the murky thoughts of my brain.

Then when I seize the moment that brought me here, what I did and why I am in the hospital, after the initial flurry of memories has passed, my arms tingle in a sudden realization, and I glance toward my wrists and an all-too-familiar chill finds its way into the pit of my stomach before coursing throughout the rest of my body. I groan again but this time in utter frustration when I realize again I’m a failure.

The pristine gauze has slipped free from my wrists, exposing the hideous black stitches that grin at me as they hold my veins together, proudly keeping me alive.

Flashback:

February 22nd

IM COLD and its cold

and im really fucking cold and i want to sleep

and its numb and its cold and ohmygod am i breathing what’s that smell oh it’s vomit oh it’s mine

and dear lord its so cold and goddammit and where am i—oh the snow is so pretty

i think ill sleep now. yes i will sleep in my winter palace

up up im going up why are they taking me thats my river

im weightless and flying and—is that how i look

oh im free and im bouncing—bouncing and rolling

down down i go—their noises hurt my ears

and slamming and strapped in oh lights are flashing are those sirens and whats that darkness

im just going to sleep again. whats in my arm whats on my face

She’s not breathing.

She’s flatlining.

…cardiac arrest.

Standby.

Clear. Lightning flashes

Ow it hurtsithurtsithurtsithurts make it stop. makeitstop.

We can get her back.

She’s too young, goddamn it.

Stay with me, Carter!

Standby.

Clear.

more more more lightning flashes and it hurts and where am i

is that me like that

and why wont they let me go back to sleep

and leave me alone it hurts.

pleaseplease leave me alone

my hand my hand my hand where has it gotten to

everythinghurtsandwhywon’ttheyletmesleep

oh, never mind.

good night

I’M DRAINED,

Utterly drained

It’s too hard to think,

My head is so full of cotton

As I swim on the brink of consciousness

I cannot move—

My bones are made of ice

and my limbs are weighted with lead

I am left to struggle against unseen

Bonds which I know nothing of

And I want this, this

Agony—

To end

So I let it

Finding an escape

In sleep—

Withdrawing

Seeking a place

Where nobody can find me

And no one will see me

That’s how it is

In sleep.

Nobody can hear me scream.

Now:

June 8th

I’M IN the intensive care unit. I’ve been unconscious for two days, and they didn’t know if I was going to wake up. I don’t know anyone here, except for my mom, who visited while I was unconscious, but I haven’t seen her yet since I opened my eyes before. God, she’s probably a mess right now. I guess I didn’t think about her when I did it. I’m only thinking about myself. I want to be free. But my mom could be okay. She’s always been so supportive of my choices. Now there are twenty-eight stitches in my arms.

The doctors are overly suspicious, which makes sense considering I’m still on suicide watch. If I so much as cough, everyone looks at me with a sharp, owl-like twist of the neck, and I become the star of a one-woman show. I can’t even try anything, there’s nothing here that could take me away.

I want darkness. I want to rest and never to wake again. I want to be alone, and more than that I want to be free and anywhere but here. Obviously. I don’t want this, the constant surveillance.

I am boxed in by blasé walls and the stuffy environment. On my left, there is a machine beeping out my pulse, fluttering around every time I think about it and drawing in more tired, wrinkled faces with their hair pulled out of their eyes so they can see me. I can feel all of their eyes watching me, boring uncomfortable holes in my personal bubble. I hate the staring eyes.

Also on my left, there is an IV. I suppose that nearly bleeding out must dehydrate you, or something, and I find that I am suddenly picturing myself as somewhat deflated. So the contents of the IV drain into me, slowly inflating me like the shriveled balloon of a person that I am. A sticker on it states that the bag is for Carter Alice Rogers, and I watch gravity slowly pull away the sticker with my name on it from the bag. The only thought that I can muster is what an annoyance gravity can be, always dragging everything down.

I ponder my general lucidity, and I doubt I’m quite all there as the phrase goes, but the question remains: whether or not I’m that special title of all there on purpose, or if I’m hiding in myself, hiding from who I am and what I’ve done, not letting the bastards in scrubs see me as I live and breathe.

On my right there is only a large window that shows off a dirty gray rooftop strewn with dead leaves. It is depressing and dull, and it reflects my mood perfectly.

There comes a second when the boring eyes are turned, and my personal bubble feels untouched again, so I ferociously pick at the stitches on my left arm, trying to gnaw them free. They are like saplings, growing roots and making a home on my arms. They are hideous, they are black worms consuming my skin, and I don’t want them fixing the beautiful red droplets that are starting to leak free and bead on my arm. They almost seem like bubbles, growing larger as they fill with the disgusting hospital air, and I can imagine them popping in the bitch nurse’s face when she comes back in.

Instead, I am caught and restrained. They watch me much more closely, and I fall asleep under their oppressive gazes that shatter any remnants of privacy I was under the illusion I had. But I was disillusioned from the start. I know how little privacy I have, absolute zero. Those ten seconds were an absolute blessing.

When I wake up, the arm with the stitches that I tried to remove with my teeth is covered with new and equally pristine bandages as the old ones. I can only vaguely wonder where the old bandages could have gotten to since they aren’t in possession of legs, because then a man walks in, back rigid, dressed in slacks—he’s someone who knows how to communicate with a child.

Because that’s who I am to them. A child. One who couldn’t handle the pressure of growing up. More like a girl who couldn’t stand losing her hand, then her livelihood, then her will to live. He asks me if I regret my actions, so I think about it and tell him that if I regret anything, it’s the fact that I tried to slit my wrists in such a spur-of-the-moment manner. There could have been a much better time to make sure it worked, but I panicked and wanted out right then. I regret that there were so many times I could have done it better—done it right—and if I had been patient I would have gotten a much better chance.

Slowly giving up is much easier when you’re quiet about it.

The man introduces himself as Jordan, my therapist, politely apologizing about not introducing himself before.

I guess I was pretty anxious to discuss your case, he says, and he sits and takes notes while I stare out the window and refuse to answer. I think awhile on his name. Jordan, my therapist. That’s quite an interesting name to possess, to have one’s title in one’s name like that. I’ll have to use his full name every time I see him, I think. It’s only right. Then he asks about my hand, or lack thereof.

This? I sneer, holding up my left wrist tattooed with the stitches that remain hidden under that stupid pristine bandaging, one that ends abruptly where a hand should start and there are older scars instead, scars that have faded, as inconspicuous as they will get.

This is no hand. There is no hand. It’s a blunt object. A stump. A symbol for stupidity and an eternal mark that screams ‘score one for peer pressure.’ It is by no means a hand. There is no fucking hand. I rush through the first few thoughts in my mind, but by the end of my speech I am so enraged that I say the words slowly, savoring their bitter inflection in my mouth. I lower the thing that is supposedly an arm back into my lap and pointedly ignore it. I am suddenly exhausted by my miniature tirade, and I flop backward, just now realizing I had been leaning forward in bed as I spoke.

He asks more questions, some of which I answer in short, clipped sentences; the others I pretend I don’t hear. When he asks me why, I look him in the eyes and say, Take a guess, twitching my arm vaguely, to which he slowly nods and stands up, his back cracking as he stretches.

As he walks out, he turns and says, We won’t let that happen. We’re trying to help you, Carter, I promise. I know you don’t believe that now, but it is my hope that you will thank me for this someday. We’re going to get your antidepressants sorted out and we hope those will help you feel better. Now, I want you to think hard about something good, and I’ll be back tomorrow to talk some more.

Now:

June 9th

THE NEXT day they take me out of the ICU, and I go into the psych ward. I’m dulled. Zombiefied. I am not clear minded. My mind is muddy. No, muddled. I am a shuffling, sniffling beast with a clouded mind. It’s almost worse than depression, but I’m not able to push away the antidepressant-laden fog that is all encompassing. It feels like I’ve been lobotomized. I think. I’m not actually sure. I haven’t been lobotomized, and I don’t know anyone who has been lobotomized, but I’m fairly certain this is how it is.

They tell me that I need to comply with the rules, so I do, I guess. I go to the group therapy. I talk a little but not much. Talking doesn’t seem worth much anymore. There’s nothing to say.

At night I lie in bed and stare out a different window across the leaf-strewn rooftops and try to find my old window, but I am unsuccessful. I feel like a monster, locked away from civilization because I’m too broken, a jagged piece of glass nobody can be near for safety’s sake. I am a gross, pathetic, sluggish thing.

They lessen my dosage a bit and emotions begin coming back, and they start to feel less foreign. I can’t pinpoint what, but something feels easier. They also tell me the medicine wouldn’t have such a zombie effect on me, so I conclude that I was overreacting.

One day, I participate in therapy. I talk about writing poetry. Someone else laughs, and I laugh. It’s terrifying at first, and my throat is sore for a few minutes afterward from actually talking. I look forward to therapy the next day. I look forward to it every day.

An abundance of time passes, and I stay put. I follow rules and listen to the staff and talk to Jordan, my therapist, and quite frankly, I become absolutely sick of the hospital. It’s been so long. I’ve grown accustomed once again to the whole breathing and eating and functioning like a human being thing. I’m feeling better, I’m feeling real, and that’s enough for me. I want to go home, even though I have a strong feeling there will be locks on some drawers and the contents of others will be missing. I could do without the daily temperature and blood pressure checks, and I would love some privacy, mostly so I can shave my legs without being watched by a nurse.

I doubt my own mother even trusts me, not now. I wouldn’t. She’s going to watch me like a hawk when I get home. It doesn’t matter that I’m seventeen, practically an adult. I did a childish thing and will now be treated as such. But it would mean going home. It would mean waking up when I want to, and I could eat my mother’s food and go on the Internet.

But when Jordan, my therapist, comes back again for my next visit, reinforcing our new everyday meeting habit, he asks me how I’m feeling, and I tell him I want to go home. He taps his pencil to his lips, then tells me all about how it wouldn’t be beneficial to my rehabilitation and that he thinks it best that I just stay here a little while longer. Not too much longer, just for a few more days. I’m making incredible progress, he tells me, trying to reassure the crushed flurries of hope at the bottom of my ribcage.

It’s strange really, how foreign a smile can feel when it no longer reaches your eyes.

I continue to do what is asked of me; I go to group therapy, I talk, I eat, I take the antidepressants my doctor prescribed, and honestly, the smile already feels different. That moment when the smile felt fake was just that—a moment. It sounds cliché, but to know that my smile is reaching my eyes again is reassuring. The smile is nice. It’s the beginning of a new grin. A better one than my old smile. A battle-hardened, well-earned one. It’s a smile that I can wear with pride, not one that makes me feel nauseated every time I look in a mirror. It is, I feel, a smile that shows I have conquered more than a few demons. Or something huge and mighty in that nature.

I even manage to create a solitary rhyme, despite my unwavering beliefs about them (they suck. I hate rhymes. I am a published poet and rhymes are gross), a promise of a new poem. I forget moments later and panic, my heart racing, and I forget how to breathe before remembering