Jamais Quitter [2]

A florescent light flickered a few times, grew dim, then started buzzing. The monotonous drone itched in Aline’s ears. It reminded her of the few times bugs had flown into her ears, surprising and frightening her.

Only a day had passed. She didn’t sleep last night. If they kept her another night, she probably wouldn’t sleep tonight either. The damn mosquito light would keep her awake.

Manfried had told her yesterday that they could only keep her for so many hours without her consent. Aline forgot how many hours that was, but she knew it went sometime into the next day. After that…She was her own problem again.

Aline lifted her arms up, put her elbows on her stomach, and held her wrists up so they were in front of her face. They were still wrapped around in gauze. With the same mentality as a child on Christmas morning, she wondered if she could unwrap herself yet. She could feel the cuts itching fiercely, more alive than she was. The cuts were trying to push her skin back together and seal the gap between life and death.

She thought about how her skin, without any command or force of her own will, healed itself. The body thrives on life; lives to live. It doesn’t need to be told what to do – it seals skin back up. Unless the cut’s too deep. Of course, the stitches made up for that now, didn’t they?

Her body wanted her to be alive. It was a parasite of her soul, using her to keep breathing, moving, growing, healing.

Aline turned her head away and dropped her arms. Her stomach churned and gnashed. She didn’t like the idea of being used so cruelly by her own body. How dare it heal without her consent.

There was a plate of food on a cart next to her. A nurse had brought it to her and told her to eat. It made Aline feel like a dog.

“Go on, eat your food, you disgusting wretch of a human being. We need to keep you alive so you can pay your bill.”

With the spoon she had been given (Manfried had advised the nurses not to give her sharper eating utensils, as if she wasn’t witty enough to do something horrible with a spoon) she had spread the mashed potatoes on top of the chicken, then stabbed the meat several times, though without piercing it as much as she had hoped. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to eat or wasn’t hungry, in fact she was starving. Aline simple liked the idea of the nurse coming back, seeing that Aline had only played with her food, and leaving with the idea that this poor child was dying and she could do nothing about it.

At least in that way Aline could cause the suffering of someone else. How dare that nurse come into her room expecting anything less than disappointment?

While Aline glared at her decimated plate of food, she heard someone walk into the room.

The steps were nearly silent, not at all like those of the nurses who seemed to desire nothing more than to make as much noise as possible when entering a patient’s room.

Manfried stood over Aline with a slight smile on his face. The smile looked crooked, pushed up on only one side.

“How are you feeling today, Ms. Gordon?”

Aline rolled her eyes from Manfried’s shoes up to his face. She hadn’t cared to stare this much at him yesterday.

“I am feeling quite fine, thank you.”

Manfried laughed a little and pulled the chair up to her bedside like he had done yesterday. “Your tone of voice seems to say otherwise.” He sat down and folded his hands in his lap.

Since neither had said anything for what seemed like hours, Aline decided to speak.

“You aren’t wearing a wedding ring,” she said, lazily pointing to Manfried’s hand.

He nodded and held out his hand as if to confirm her statement. “People who aren’t married don’t wear wedding rings.”

Aline would have smiled but she didn’t want to make the effort.

“Are you married?” he asked.

“Now that would really make me want to kill myself,” Aline replied.

Manfried laughed, as if he knew she wouldn’t. “You seem to take what you’ve done so lightly. As a psychologist, I have to wonder if you really cared whether you died or not.”

Point goes to the Kraut. Aline knew that was the exact extent of her apathy. It honestly hadn’t mattered what happened after she cut her wrists and lied in the tub, so long as it was something new.

“Do you plan to try it again?” he asked, after getting no response from the previous statement.

Aline faked a yawn. “I can’t do many things twice. They become boring so fast.”

“So you really are just a very bored person then?”

Aline didn’t reply.

The light stopped buzzing for a minute then started again. Manfried looked up at it with feigned curiosity and said, “I’m sure that’s bothersome.”

“You wouldn’t believe,” Aline whispered.

Manfried smiled at her.

“You seem to be very funny for a person who considers life a bore.”

“You must be terribly mistaken. I am dry.”

Aline pulled her plate of mashed food closer to her bed, and showed it to him as if it were evidence for her case.

“Is it a work of art?”

“A product of boredom,” she replied.

He smiled again; it was that sick, crooked smile. Perhaps he couldn’t smile naturally; a birth defect.

“Perhaps if you weren’t in a hospital right now you’d be more entertained with life.”

“I don’t know what to say to that,” Aline admitted, pushing the food tray away.

Mannfried nodded a few times.

“Enough small talk, I suppose. Upon consulting with your other doctors, we’ve decided to release you tomorrow morning.” He looked completely uninterested in what he said, as if he would much rather be talking about how entertaining he thought Aline was.

“However, I do have one thing I would like to ask you before we send you back into the cruel world.”

While he was speaking Aline had pulled her wrists back to her face. She stared at them hard, as if they had eyes and it was a contest.

“Yes?” she whispered.

“I work as a therapist at your university every Thursday. I think it would be best if you started coming to weekly session, so we could talk about…”

“About my boredom?”

“About your depression.”

Aline slowly put her arms down and turned to look at him.

“Mr. Shaffer, I am not depressed.”

“Please, call me Manfried.”He cleared his throat, and continued, “If you do not have depression, why did you try to commit suicide?”

“I was bored,” Aline spat out. “I am not depressed; I am not happy. I just am. I thought it might be interesting to shake things up, but it didn’t work out. I’m perfectly fine continuing on like before.”

Manfried ignored her. “Aline, just come to the sessions for a few weeks. If you still think it is not helping your situation, then you can stop. I think it would be good for you.”

With her hand hidden from Manfried’s view, Aline dug her nails into her palm until she thought she was bleeding. When she finally opened her eyes and loosened her grip, nothing stained the perfectly white sheets. Nothing to be accused of, nothing to clean up…

Aline wanted to say something snarky but she felt it was better to be silent.

“Consider that I am caring for you. Your roommate, Savannah, she cares for you. We only want you to feel better.”

Aline wondered why it mattered to anyone what she felt. If she didn’t care about her life, why should anyone else? Christians were allowed to go off into the wilds of diseased Africa to convert small children, but she wasn’t allowed to be listless?

Manfried continued his pleas for a few minutes more. Aline feigned interest. Eventually she nodded her consent and turned away from him. Anything to get him to leave.

The wall which her bed was pushed against had ugly purple wallpaper with tiny flowers all over it. She hadn’t looked at it before, but now Aline realized she hated it more than the ceiling.

Aline felt something heavy fall on her arm and she flinched. It was Manfried’s hand. He rubbed the back of her elbow with his thumb for a quick second. A warm circle hovered there before he removed his hand.

“You need to feel better, Aline. No one should suffer like you are,” he whispered.

Aline counted three breaths before she heard his nearly silent footsteps move away from her and out the door.