I pulled the long sleeved shirt over my arm. I was getting a ginger ale from the soda machine when Chelsea came into the room again.
“Dakota, you have another call,” she peered at me with an expression that made me wonder if she knew what I had been up to in the bathroom. “I think it’s your mother, she sounded almost hysterical.”
My stomach dropped. I really didn’t want to deal with my mother this morning, hysterical or no. My mother caused too much drama in my life and we only spoke maybe a few times a year. I had been an inconvenience for her. And a reminder of the pain and humiliation my father had put her through. Her very attitude reminded me constantly… I was unwanted.
“Dakota, thank God you’re alright,” she said briskly as I answered the phone. “Jeremy called me this morning and said you hadn’t come home last night. You had us thinking the worst.”
“I just did what I needed to keep myself safe.” I knew she’d figure that I stayed the night somewhere because I was too drunk to drive. I didn’t care. It was easier than the truth.
“Excuses,” everything she said was brisk. “You know I don’t approve of yours and Jeremy’s arrangement. But if that’s how you choose to live your life you need to treat him as respectfully as you would were he your husband. The poor boy was in a state. He thought that ethnic friend of yours had sold you into sexual slavery.”
I met that comment with stunned silence. Then before I could help it I burst into hysterical laughter. I was aware that everyone in the nurse’s station was looking at me. I could barely breathe and my eyes had filled up with tears. I didn’t care who saw or what they thought.
“Did he actually say that or was it a conclusion you jumped to?” Either was possible.
“We thought of it together, he and I,” she sniffed. “We talked for a good while. He told me that though he provides a good life for you, you aren’t treating him as well as you should. He’s a nice boy, I’m glad you found a nice boy.”
“Yah …” I trailed off.
“Leaving him like that to be with that miscreant. The priest told me how he found him doing naughty things to you in the rectory. He’s lucky I didn’t press charges.”
“You couldn’t have, Art’s only a few months older then me.” I wanted to die from the embarrassment of her even knowing about it. “I have to go back to work. I’ll call you tonight if you want me to.”
“Don’t worry about it, dear,” and she was gone without so much as a good bye.
I spun around in my chair in disgust. Like I was going to take relationship advice from a woman whose husband hadn’t touched her once in their twenty-one years of marriage, instead turning his eyes to her daughter long before she even hit puberty.
“Is everything OK?” I looked up, startled to see Chelsea still watching me. Her tone seemed genuinely concerned.
I rolled my eyes. “I’m glad they get along.”
“Who?” she cocked her head to the side. It made her look very childish.
“My mother and boyfriend. Pretty soon they’ll be having nightly discussions over coffee about how I need direction in my life and I never respect my betters.”
She looked bewildered.
“I didn’t go home last night.” I sighed. “The two of them decided to blame it on my friend Arturo.”
“Oh. Is that why you look completely worn out?” she asked with understanding.
“In part…”
The phone rang, relieving me of the obligation of answering any further. I gathered information from the caller on the other end as I watched her move off to her duties.
The patients kept busy with groups and lunch and cigarette breaks. The nurses and doctors kept busy with the patients. I focused all attention and energy on the phones.
Mindless call after mindless call I answered, checking codes and paging patients. The more automatic I became the less I felt. During the lull in the calls I would order files and complete paperwork.
I watched as they gathered for another “fresh air” break. I helped pass out cigarettes to expedite their departure. Chelsea and the male nurse, whose name I still couldn’t recall, huddled together, backs turned to the group as they played rock – paper – scissors to see who would go.
As I watched to see who won the phone rang again. I had to turn my attention away to address the man on the other line’s request.
“Kelly Pierce? Do you have an access code?” I scanned the corridor as he rattled it off for me, “Hold please, I’ll see if she’s available.”
Kelly was usually found in a chair by the station reading or curled hiding on the other side of her bed. Occasionally she could also be found perched in the wide windowsill watching the cars as they made their way on the road. Absently she would bang her wrist on the wood. I didn’t know much about her except that she wandered the halls at midnight and had come in quietly on a Monday afternoon. She had hollow eyes that seemed to take in everything and look through you all at once. She had the slow response of one who was heavily drugged long before her doctors concocted a cocktail of heavy uppers and downers for her.
In the ward there was a lot of bonding, with heightened emotions; people made fast friends and quick enemies. Kelly made neither. Though polite enough she treated the other patients as she would the TV in the common room, or her chair or bed, regarding them only as they were useful to her. It was as though behind her empty eyes she was sizing each situation. Behind the mask she was taking it all in, planning on how to make it hers. As though despite whatever madness she suffered she was in control. I liked her immediately.
I didn’t have to check her usual haunts; she was standing with the crowd chatting amicably with the stick girl. I was bewildered by her sudden friendliness.
“Kelly, you have a phone call.” I expected her to leave without a word to take the call.
“Would you be a dear”—her eyes darted to my name badge—“Dakota, and take a message? I’m going out for some fresh air.”
“Uh, sure thing.” her manner of response threw me. She was fidgeting with a cigarette in her hand. “I didn’t know you smoked.”
“I thought I’d start,” her voice was a bit too perky. “Life affirming and all that shit, you know.”
“Ok,” I was still hesitant, “so … I’ll tell him you’ll call back.”
She smiled graciously. “Thank you, dear.”
I watched her for a moment longer. She joined an animated conversation. She seemed as much a part of the group as not. She picked at a loose thread on her shirt and turned to give me a knowing look, all without the others even noticing that her attentions had shifted. Shrugging off a nagging feeling I picked up the phone.
“Sir, Kelly asked that I take a message and she’ll call you back after her fresh air break.”
“Oh.” Hurt and confusion were evident in his voice. “We always talk at this time…”
“They will be back in soon, she’ll call you then.”
Chelsea, it seemed, had won the game of rock – paper – scissors. Her own pack of smokes in hand and patients in tow she signaled me to track their leaving as she opened the door. Purposefully they trudged through the adjoining ward to an enclosed area out back.
“I was wondering,” the man on the line started cautiously, “could you tell me how she’s doing?”
“I couldn’t sir, I’m not at liberty to say, and I’m just a receptionist.”
“I just can’t forget what she did to herself. I had this hunting knife, you see. I came home and she was naked.”
“You shouldn’t be discussing this with me,” I tried to cut him off but he talked through me.
“She was hacking at her legs and groin, smearing blood on her chest and face. There was so much of it, it was like a horror movie.”
“I could transfer you to a doctor to discuss it.”
He still went on as if I had said nothing. “She didn’t even see me there, when I touched her she started screaming. It was an inhuman sound. She didn’t stop until after the doc had sewn her up.” His voice shuttered and broke.
“She has a good staff to help her get better, and it sounds like she has a good support system waiting for her to get out. Already she’s better off than others we see here.”
He seemed somewhat reassured by that, though I was only able to get off the phone with him by hanging up on him while he was thanking me profusely for the support we gave her.
I tried to picture Kelly doing something like that, but the girl I imagined her to be wouldn’t let me. The air of control was deceptive and it fulfilled its purpose. I just couldn’t imagine that anybody could do such a thing to herself when she obviously had somebody who cared a great deal about her to take care of her. If I could come home from work knowing Jeremy loved me and supported me, it would be different. I know it would. It’d have to be.
I felt a twinge of jealousy that she could call for help the way she did. That she could lose all control and still claim it as her own. That she could let go of the pretence. I didn’t know if she had a job she’d have to worry about still having when she got out or if there were family and friends who would want some kind of explanation. All I knew was she had this man who obviously loved her and was hurting because she was. She seemed better off than me and yet was able to holler her pain out. Let everybody know she needed help. Was that her strength or weakness?
I suddenly felt terribly lonely. I couldn’t face what seemed to be an insurmountable pile of paperwork at that moment. My body was so weary I didn’t think I could face anything. Would I be struggling to conquer my self-destructive nature the rest of my life if I didn’t call out for help like she did? Would people like me look down on me if I did? She wasn’t less of a person because she needed support for her pain.
It seemed odd I could watch a parade of new people coming in, staying three days to over a week, wanting to help them, to ease their pain. But I couldn’t let myself end up here because it would mean I was a failure. I didn’t see any of the patients as failures, why is that how I’d view myself?
I spun around to face my computer and typed idly on the keyboard watching the desktop register nothing. I wanted to be that way. I wanted to have the input given to me, but not have to process it. I typed, “I hate me” over and over, my fingers picking up speed as I became familiar with the pattern. I hate me I hate me I hate me.
Did the hospital monitor keystrokes?
Danie Radtke Keller is a 28 year old para-educator working for the San Mateo Office of Education. When she isn't working or going to school for a degree in special education she enjoys writing, making jewelry, and starting--but not finishing--DIY projects. She also likes participating in NaNoWriMo, hot chocolate, pina coladas and getting caught in the rain. Danie lives in California with her husband, two cats, and five chinchillas. You can view a small amount of her jewelry work at www.damikdesigns.etsy.com, or cyberstalk her here. Click here to read Part One of this excerpt and here to read Part Three.
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