nervous, constantly looking at Reagan as if she’s a wild animal about to attack.
Reagan pouts. “I’m tired of all these rules.”
“Bring it up with your doctor,” Alice shoots back.
“You always say that.” Gone is the snark and dark smirk. Now she’s angry. This girl can turn on a dime. “The doctors do nothing!”
“You can always leave.”
“I can’t leave because, to quote my doctor, I’m ‘a danger to myself and everyone else.’ ” Reagan looks directly at me, a malicious smile on her face. “Hey, you have some experience with that, don’t you?”
I take a step back and then another. I need to get away from this girl. Reagan steps forward, her hands outstretched. “Let me hold the baby, Mommy Dearest.”
I back away. She steps forward.
“Come on,” she says, continuing her taunting. “Don’t you trust me? I’m a good babysitter. I promise.”
She looks me straight in the eye and then sighs. “Oh forget it. You’re no fun.”
Slowly, she backs away. It seems like she’s done creating a scene. But then she snatches the cigarettes from Alice and skips down the hallway. Her laughter trails behind her. “Come catch me, you old bat!” she shouts.
Alice looks like she’s going to kill her. She grabs the walkie-talkie hooked on her pocket and calls for assistance.
“Stay right there,” she tells me and then she’s chasing after Reagan.
I watch as she disappears around the corner.
When I glance around the hallway, I see that hardly anyone is giving the scene any attention. One lady peeks her head out of her room, looks around before she slams her door shut. This is the norm.
If Alice expects me to stay here and wait, she’s delusional. Her telling me to stay put makes me want to defy her even more.
With Evelyn cradled in my arms, I hurry down the hall.
A social worker passes by. She’s talking to one of the youngest patients in the women’s ward. The girl can’t be more than eighteen. She has a fight-or-flight expression.
She’s way too young to be here. There’s a part of me that wants to grab her by the shoulders and tell her to get out now. While she still has the chance.
I quicken my steps and look over my shoulder to make sure I’m in the clear. Still no Alice. Ahead of me, the doors to the women’s ward are shut, as always. You need a passcode to get through them. Momentarily, I panic, but through the glass I see a nurse punching in the code. I slow down and glance out the windows to my right, pretending to be fascinated with the outdoors. She walks by me and I grab the door right before it’s about to shut.
I walk confidently into my ward as though it’s perfectly normal to be without a nurse. The nurse behind the front desk doesn’t blink an eye and the one sitting to my left has her nose buried in a bodice-ripper romance. This place could catch on fire and she wouldn’t notice.
The dayroom is the largest room in Fairfax, with tables scattered throughout, always full of patients. Because of that, you’d think they’d spruce this place up more but the walls are painted a dull white. There’s a single painting of mountaintops during a sunset on the opposite side of the wall that looks like it’s been here since the day this place opened its doors. Windows line the left wall. The blinds are open, letting bright light in, so it’s not completely depressing in here.
Besides the dining hall, this is the only area that men and women share. We’re constantly kept busy here with sessions, therapy, activities, and meals. The activities are all laid out in front of us and we’re expected to reach out and take them. If you choose to go to your room for privacy, you can kiss the dream of leaving this place goodbye. Nurses will knock on your door every five minutes, to “check in on you.”
The table that I normally sit at is unoccupied and I hurry toward it.
The television is on, but the volume is so low that captions scroll at the bottom of the screen. Most of us waste away watching talk shows where women sit around a table and “discuss” topics, but it’s just a lot of yelling to me. We watch game shows. We watch soap operas. We watch the news. We watch anything and everything to avoid focusing on the problems haunting us.
Not so long ago, this used to be my favorite spot