Unhinge - Calia Read Page 0,19

are there?”

Dr. Calloway flips through them. The action’s all for show; I know she’s counted the photos beforehand. “Around twenty.”

“Can I take the ones from today?”

“Of course. They’re yours.”

I slip the photos into my pocket. I know that’s me in the picture, but it’s incredibly surreal to stare at a captured memory and not remember the moment. I stand up slowly, unsure of what to say or do. I think Evelyn picks up on my nervous energy. She looks up at me with those blue eyes, the expression on her face saying, “Well, did that help you at all?”

Like a coward, I look away.

“Are we going to go through all of those pictures?” I ask Dr. Calloway.

“If you want to we can. I think they are crucial to helping you remember things about your past.”

This leads me to think again about getting the hell out of this place. That’s the silver lining on all of this. I walk toward the door. My hand hovers over the handle and I glance at Dr. Calloway, hesitant about how to say my thoughts. “What happens if I remember something that isn’t good?”

“We’ll deal with that when we reach that point.” Dr. Calloway smiles. “Everything will be fine.”

I nod and say okay, but truthfully, I’m skeptical; there’s three years’ worth of memories mangled in a ball. And I have to untwist each and every one.

Alice is waiting outside the door. Without a word, I turn in the direction of the dayroom. She doesn’t ask how my day is going. How Evelyn is. Or how the session went. But I know she’ll never be that kind of nurse. Right now, I’m grateful for that. I have the opportunity to really think over each memory. Now that I have them back, I’m dumbfounded that I ever forgot them. And if I so easily lost good portions of my memories, what did I do with the bad ones?

I glance down at my hands. Now I remember all the times I used them to help people: holding the hands of scared patients, bandaging wounds….

How ironic that the roles have been reversed.

Entering the dayroom, I sit down at my regular table and instead of playing a game of cards or watching television like everyone else, I people watch.

I’ve never questioned why people came to Fairfax.

New names were put on the outside of doors daily. Faces came and went. Not once have I made an effort to get to know them. Yet right now it’s all I can think about. The girl rocking herself in the corner: Did she want to be here? Or the older woman—I think her name is Lottie—who’s been here much longer than me and sings “God Bless America” on a nonstop loop: What compelled her to make Fairfax her home?

The TV volume is low. Conversations between nurses and patients are barely heard. I’ve always thought that the hush over this room was just us patients collectively holding our breaths, waiting to see what would happen next, but every day I’m here, drug-free, I see the truth.

There’s no air here.

We breathe in madness.

We exhale insanity.

And the people around me? They seem okay with it. No one fights the nurses or tries to escape through the windows. No one seems to mind that our movements are circumscribed, monitored every second so we never fall out of line.

They sit and walk around like this is normal.

Not so long ago I was just like them.

I close my eyes and rub my temples. Just one single memory and I’m already shaken up. How will I be when I get the rest of my past back? I’m almost afraid to find out.

“You’re welcome by the way.”

I jerk back so abruptly I almost fall out of my chair. Reagan pulls out the chair across from me and sits down. Today she’s wearing black sweatpants but still has on a hospital gown. She crosses her arms. They look like two small sticks, barely supporting her. She looks so fragile. As if she could break in half at any moment.

“What are you talking about?” I ask.

Reagan rolls her eyes. “For yesterday. For being your shill. Decoy. Whatever you want to call it.”

“That was for me?”

“More or less.”

I narrow my eyes. The problem with Reagan is that she cloaks her words with layers of irony. I can never tell when she’s being serious. Her subversive personality constantly has everyone on edge, including me.

Abruptly, she leans forward and her chair legs hit the floor loudly. Her