The Wives(46)
“There’s no husband listed in your chart,” he says.
“Are you calling me a liar?”
Phil ignores me. “Why don’t we leave the checking in up to him? After all, you’re the one in the hospital.”
I glare at him as he leaves the room. I used to like guys like Phil—they were helpful in sticky patient situations, always willing to play bad cop when a nurse needed a break—but being on this side of a Phil is a terrible thing. I’ll wait for the next nurse and hope she’s more my type.
Dr. Steinbridge tells me that all is well in my head, nothing swollen or bruised.
“Looking good, looking good,” he says, tapping a bent finger against my chart. His knuckles are dusted with white hairs. “We’re transferring you to the psych ward, where you’ll have your evaluation and we’ll get your new medication sorted out.”
“Wait a minute,” I say. “I don’t need to go to the psych ward. I’m fine. I fell and hit my head.”
His lips fold in like he’s disappointed with me.
“You’re having extreme delusions, Thursday. Violent outbursts. Don’t worry,” he tries to reassure me. “We’ll work on getting you better. We all want the same thing.”
I doubt that. Seth wants me in here. I want to scream, swear at him...force him to see the truth, but I know that if I do I’ll only confirm what he’s thinking...what Seth’s telling him. I’m not crazy. You’re not, I tell myself. Even when you feel like you are, remember you’re not.
An hour later, a nurse pushes a wheelchair into the room and flips on the brakes.
“I’m here for your transfer,” she says.
“My husband...?” I hate the whine in my voice, hate that I have to ask where my husband is instead of knowing.
She shrugs. “I’m just here for your transfer. That’s all I know.”
I feel woozy as I walk over to the chair. The backs of my legs hit the soft leather and I sink down in relief. It’s not the head injury making me feel this way, it’s the drugs. I can barely think clearly. I don’t remember the wheelchair ride up to the eighth floor, or getting into the bed in the tiny room. I’m assigned a nurse, but I have no recollection of her coming in to see me. Nothing feels real. I question my existence, I question Hannah’s... Did I imagine everything, like they said? I want to talk to Seth, I want my head to clear, but they keep pouring pills down my throat.
I spend the next seven days in a sort of haze. Nothing feels real, the drugs making me feel detached from my body: a limp helium balloon bobbing about a room going nowhere. I go to group, eat my meals in the dining hall and see Dr. Steinbridge for sessions. I’ve lost so much weight that I don’t recognize myself when I look in the mirror. My jaw has definition and there are hollows above my collarbone, deep compressions that were once filled with fat. How can a week do this to a person? I wonder, but I’m not sure I care. Everything is muted, even my feelings about myself.
I stop asking about Seth after a few days; even the thought of him makes me feel desperate and crazy. The nurses look at me with pity in their eyes. I have the vague feeling that I don’t like it when they do that. They probably don’t think there is a Seth. And maybe there isn’t. Also, fuck him for putting me in this position where I am questioning myself.
On the ninth day, my mother comes to see me. Visiting hours are in the common area, where all of us crazies wait eagerly for our people to arrive. We sit on mustard-colored couches or at the gray tables on foldout chairs, our hair greasy and our faces pale and splotchy from too little or too much sleep. An attempt at normalizing the room is made with potted plants and framed artwork. I’ve studied each piece of art and the plaques next to them telling of the local artists who painted, or sketched, or photographed. Seattle likes to keep it local, homegrown artists to soothe the homegrown sick.
I find an unoccupied couch near the vending machines. They won’t allow us caffeine or too much sugar. The machines are stocked with vitamin water and bruised-looking apples. I sit with my hands in my lap, staring at the floor. When my mother walks in, she doesn’t recognize me at first. Her eyes move right over my face, then bounce back like they’re on a bungee cord.
I see her mouth my name before she clutches her purse tightly to her side and scurries over. I stand as she approaches. I’m not sure if she wants to hug me or if she’s too disappointed. The first time I landed myself in a psych ward, she refused to come, saying it was too painful to see me that way. Too painful for her. Now she lowers herself onto the sofa without taking her eyes from my face.
“Your father—” she starts.
“Yeah, I know, Mom. It’s fine.”
We look at each other like it’s the first time we’re truly seeing each other’s faces. My father would never come to a place like this. To see one of his daughters locked in a psych ward would mean that he had done something wrong as a parent, and my father likes to maintain the illusion of perfection. As for my mother, I am her crazy, unhinged offspring—she gave birth to me and has no idea of who I am or of the life I live. She doesn’t want to know. We’re both thinking the same thing. I pull my sweater down over my hands as I gaze at her Botoxed forehead. She doesn’t want to admit how old she is any more than she wants to admit that her daughter is a first-class fuckup.