| Book One -S- |
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Santa Ana Part One What is that smell? Eyes squint open. Is anyone watching me? Empty pale green room, cold surrounding electric light. It's disinfectant . . . I'm not at home . . . I'm . . . The memories come reluctantly back, playing like a scratchy documentary from her nightmares . . . the nightmares of last night . . . she begins to understand they were real . . . the last two days happened somewhere, and now she was here in this fucking cold green room. Took mom's xanax . . . how many . . . don't know don't remember . . . took them at school . . . came home what happened? A letter? No letter? The razor blade . . . the end of patience . . . the trapped feeling that seemed so distant, but not any less urgent. There had been one way out but she was here . . . this was not that way . . . sitting in the doctor's office late after dark after hours. . . alone again while the adults conferred about what was to be done with her when she was alone . . . playing with the wooden trains for what seemed like days . . . then a long drive and a lot of sobbing . . . she had begged, though she didn't have a clue what was going on . . . In the summer of 1982, the Olympics hit the greater Los Angeles area with a vengeance. California didn't have State Mental Institutions, as such, which had given birth to a plethora of private hospitals that charged out the nose to keep your ornery kids doped up for a few months. The tourists visiting Southern California for the Olympics had no idea about these kids. Those who visited Disneyland that summer had no idea that the nighttime fireworks they took for granted were the only grasp on reality some of these kids had every evening around nine . . . while they munched their graham crackers and sipped their juice from safety containers and watched those fireworks from the courtyard within the high stucco walls. They were largely unnoticed that summer, that is why they were there, so that those in charge would not have to pay so much attention. Even those who were really in need of help never actually got it . . . the hospital was filled with this weeks pop diagnosis . . . and this was the summer of bi-polar disorder. . . this was the summer of lithium. These were plush places with stucco-walled courtyards, real sand pit volleyball courts, and cafeterias designed to look like cafes, stereo systems and cable TV for the incarcerated. It was like urban summer camp for those who, by the age of 15, had nothing left to lose. They even had schools so the wayward youth didn't have to suffer the needless embarrassment of falling behind while on their sabbatical of mental health. There were brothers and sisters in there, daughters of record company execs, pageant participants, the offspring of the rich and bored. And they were all under 18. Most had very active drug habits and all had incredibly active sex lives, for being under 24-hour watch. Many had spent their youth in juvenile halls and were able to hone their darkest skills in the relaxed atmosphere that comes with heavy medication and electroshock. There were others who had never been told what to do in their lives and spent the bulk of their time in 5-point restraints in the greenroom . . . where the girl had just found herself, tired, sore and strapped at five points of her body to a wooden bed. This is not happening, why can't I move my body or my arms or my legs what the hell is going on I can't scream my throat is on fire and god what happened to my head it's gotta be split open what is going on here somebody please come help me don't fucking leave me here!!! You can't just fucking drop me here and tie me up and expect me to be happy about it . . . fuck no, kill me or something you sick fucks! You don't understand, I live somewhere else I don't belong here I have a home I'm not crazy you have to let me go please come and let me up I have to pee I really have to go please come and let me up and let me out of here where is my mom she will get me out it was that man who took me here it is all his fault my mom will clear this up I am sure of it just come and talk to me and we can work this all out . . . She strains her body as hard as she can against the restraints and ignores the burning in her throat to let out a scream. This is the last that her body can take and she feels the blissful release of her bladder minutes before she feels the heat between her legs . . . and her then body goes limp with the realization that it cannot get any worse. And the thought that maybe lying here, being left wet, but in peace for the rest of her life wouldn't be such a bad thing, she starts to wonder how crazy she really is. What is this place and why hasn't anyone come in? Am I to be like this forever? What the fuck did I do, will someone just fucking tell me what I did? I only hurt myself isn’t that my right so why am I here how can they do this to me what right do they have to tell me it will help? How does a person ever leave one of these places? I have to get up and call someone there has to be someone who can come get me out of here I can't stay here, I ran away before I can do it for good I don't care what I have to do but I am not staying here. . . The bruising panic starts to awaken and her body begins to tremble and then shake against the thick brown leather restraints, which open up the scabs she created only a few hours before in a more ‘sedated’ state - they had all been amazed she could do so much damage to herself that tranqued up. She had read a lot of books and knew with this morning's sketchy lucidity that the more fucked you are in the head, the more meds it takes to keep you under control and she did not want to be under their control she just wanted everyone to stop hassling her. She would be just fine if everyone left her alone. They all said that they couldn't, that she would have to deal with people all her life and she had to get used to it . . . they wanted her to fear being alone, to need the company and approval of others, they wanted her to be like them . . . there were times when she hoped she lived long enough to prove them wrong . . .this was not one of those times. She didn't want to answer the thousands of questions they would present her with, after the fed and cleaned her. But first the obligatory scolding about the evils of doing harm to oneself, though she just could not get beyond the idea that it was her body and she was not at any time putting her life at risk, and was, in fact, quite fastidious about sanitation and avoiding infection. But the big cross nurse will hear none of it. Fuck you twice you fat whore, I screamed for help and no one ever fucking came and I peed myself and I have no clothes and you fucking suck you cow I can't believe you're fucking paid to do this . . . paid to fucking humiliate people you ball of festering puss . . . get the fuck off me you have no right to touch me fuck you don’t touch me . . . i don’t like to be touched, get it, get off me! Fuck you! You can’t touch me let go you have no right stop it! "But we do have clothes for you, your parents brought them, they are in your room, after you eat, you can go through your things." The nurse explains through the girl’s outbursts as she tries to clean her wrists. Then the nurse explains that yes, the girl will eat . . . every activity has a point value assigned to it. You can't get out until you advance through several stages based on your point accumulation and public twice-weekly reviews by your peers and the staff of your attitude and progress. So if you don't eat, you don't get out. Bullshit . . . I am not fucking eating . . . leave me alone, I don't care what your job is get the fuck away from me . . . fine, strap me back up, I'll shit and piss myself as I starve to death, I want out of here now you bitch and you are fucking no one to stop me, unless you are all into beating up children . . . right, that is called restraint . . . fuck you, tie me up sick bitch or let me out of here but stop fucking talking to me because you are a lying fat whore with no self esteem and I doubt very much you have anything useful to teach me . . . The girl begins to scream, a scream of dis-embowelment, the scream does not relent, the air she inhales goes through her dry raw throat so that it continues the sound of the scream, if not the volume. Five large people in white rush past the crowd of patients that have gathered at the door, and rush to the rescue of the nurse, who is standing nowhere near the motionless, though loud girl, hands on her hips, planning to outwait the energy of the angry stubborn child. She knows more about the tortured teen's last two weeks than the girl herself does. . . she has not eaten any food, while slowly ingesting enough tranquilizers to keep her high for at least another week or so, and is on the brink of malnutrition from running herself at such a high speed of hate and anger, and has already had one complete nervous collapse . . . she should run out of steam soon . . . but still the girl screams and screams. The five orderlies are on the waif in a flash, the nurse shuts the door to halt the gaze of the other inmates . . . she knows that the force being used is extreme, the girl is completely motionless, but for the heaving of her overworked chest as she refuels and releases the shrieks, which are losing volume now, but not vehemence. But she does not fight at all against her captors. When the deed is done and the girl is re-strapped to the table at the waist, arms, and feet, still she shrieks, though has still not tried to fight the physical events around her. It is at this point that the girl experiences the most helpless feeling she will ever feel in her life . . . the safety gag is placed securely over her mouth, and though this is the one thing she tries to fight with the little movement now afforded to her it dies no good, she is now completely helpless and without hope. When the gag is secure, she is finally silent . . . her spirit is broken . . . inside she is dead. How is this possible? I am not a criminal, I am scared and hurting and I need help and they have tied me up and still no one has told me any more than I am in a fucking prison and my parents have washed their hands of me. I am afraid and I ache and I am alone and strapped to a bed in a room in a place I couldn't get home from even if I had a fucking home to go to. So this is what happens when you try to make people listen . . . fuck it. Three hours in real time. That is all it took to kill her. It was three hospitalizations later before she actually got down to what was making her sick. This was just the beginning. Years later, as she re-reads the report from the tests performed endlessly by the group of eminent doctors, it amazes her how blind they all were to the obvious signs of deceit, psychosis, separation from self, and traumatic abuse, and what a waste of a person it all was. Fifteen years later she cannot go into a store by herself . . . she cannot speak up when she has been wronged and is faced with the offender . . . it is because she knows that at any minute they are going to grab her again and take her to a place of lies where her real fears will be played on and fake ones 'cured'. She has no friends because she is afraid of what will happen when they know. It’s hard to trust a crazy person, she knows. But she keeps trying to find people who do understand, who don't take the easy route of applying a label as soon as she gets 'out of line'. This is what keeps her alive, the hope that these people exist. She knows that she has something to say, but one has to know where she is before you can decipher what she does and once you know, you won't want to believe her anymore. Her quiet peaceful dreams in her adult life are of the quiet green room and the dopey apathy that undermines responsibility . . . she longs for the days when she had nothing left to lose . . . second try selfish i don't want to hear
about how i am cold and unaffectionate another gesture from
me that was not enough. Sell This Out Share She Smushy Mushy and
Warm Somebody Else’s
Hat Spare Change i crave the different change for all my men! leaves change twice
a year
Summer Dream |