Days spent on the Inside = 14
Days left to spend on the Inside = 28
Days since The Roof Incident = 17
I remember the day I lost my mind.
The sun was out, and the day was bright. It was fucking miserable.
Through the window of my apartment, I saw people jogging, cycling, laughing in Central Park. The birds were chirping and there wasn’t a single cloud in the sky.
Did I mention it was miserable?
Yeah, I remember everything about that day. Every single thing. But that’s not the worst part.
The worst part is that everyone else remembers it too. And the thing about everyone else remembering is that they don’t ever forget it. And they don’t let you forget it, either.
As if you need any more reminders.
As if you don’t relive those moments in very vivid and graphic detail. The day you crossed over to the other side.
The side where the crazies live.
I’ve always straddled that line and done a great job of staying on the sane side. Because unfortunately, everyone else in my family is sane and un-crazy. I’ve always wanted something in common with them. Other than my silver hair, that is.
I come from a family of silver-haired and green-eyed women. Also, tall.
Taylor women are tall and willowy and stunning and have been for generations. It’s our signature, actually. Not to mention fashionable and successful.
We own a boutique clothing store called Panache on Madison Avenue that caters to the old-money New Yorkers and Upper East Siders.
When I was born, my mom, my grandma, my aunt, my older cousin who was eight at the time, they all thought I’d be like them. In fact, they were so confident about my Taylor-ness that they’d already decided on a name suitable for a Taylor baby: Willow.
They shouldn’t have.
There’s nothing willowy about me. I’m not delicate or graceful or tall.
Except for the legendary silver hair, I don’t possess any of the Taylor qualities. My eyes are a startling shade of blue. I’m too short and my fashion sense is a pair of shorts, sneakers, and t-shirts with Harry Potter quotes.
But the thing that bothers me the most is that I was born with something more than blood in my veins. Something extra-terrestrial, alien, quite possibly blue-colored – hence the weird, un-Taylor color of my eyes. Something dark and shadowy, with long claw-like fingers. Something that has weighed me down all my life.
“Have you thought about it?”
“No,” I say.
“Have you thought about harming yourself in any way?”
“No.”
“Are you ready to talk about what happened that night?” she asks.
I look up from where I’m playing with my short nails. They don’t let us keep long, sharp ones on the Inside.
“What’s that?” I ask, like I haven’t heard her loud and clear.
“About your attempt.”
“It wasn’t an attempt.”
“So what do you think it was?”
“An accident,” I tell her. “It was an accident.”
Josie, my therapist, gives me the look.
That look.
The look where they think I’m crazy and I’m lying, and they pity me. They think that if they poke me too much, I might explode.
I don’t like that look.
It makes me want to explode. It makes me want to snap my teeth, grow my nails to the point where my hands look like talons. It makes me want to scratch and bite and scream.
But I won’t.
That’s not me. I don’t explode. I’m a peacekeeper. I’m sweet and quiet. I keep my head down and don’t make any ripples.
I am calm. I’m cool. I’m a cucumber.
Happy thoughts.
Thoughts about… my bunny slippers that I brought from home, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban that I’m reading for the thirty-sixth time, and the pigeons that I feed in the gardens when they let us outside.
Slowly, I deflate.
“Okay, then.” She nods. “It was an accident. Are you ready to talk about it?”
It being The Roof Incident.
People have been asking me this a whole lot ever since The Incident happened. My doctors back at the state hospital, my therapist, my mom. Everyone.
I’ve already told them, and they still sent me here.
On the Inside.
“If I talk about it, will you let me go? Will you recommend that I be released?” I ask.
“You know I can’t do that.”
I look at my bunny slippers. “Didn’t think so.”
“We still have a lot of ground to cover, Willow, and your contract says another four weeks. So I’m sorry.”
“Are you, really?”
“Yes, of course.”
I make a non-committal sound because I don’t believe her.
“Why? You don’t believe me?” she asks, reading me accurately.
“Not really, no.”
“Why not?”
“Because frankly… you’re not my friend. You don’t care.”
She doesn’t care that I’ve been stuck here for two weeks now and that my every move is monitored. She doesn’t care that they feed me pills twice a day and then, ask me to open my mouth and actually, show them that I’ve swallowed them.
What am I? An animal?