For those who need a name, there's a gift basket of medical terms. All I know is that cutting made me feel safe. It was proof. Thoughts and words, captured where I could see them and track them. The truth, stinging, on my skin, in a freakish shorthand. Tell me you're going to the doctor, and I'll want to cut worrisome on my arm. Say you've fallen in love and I buzz the outlines of tragic over my breast. I hadn't necessarily wanted to be cured. But I was out of places to write, slicing myself between my toes— bad, cry — like a junkie looking for one last vein. Vanish did it for me. I'd saved the neck, such a nice prime spot, for one final good cutting. Then I turned myself in. I stayed at the hospital twelve weeks. It's a special place for people who cut, almost all of them women, most under twenty-five. I went when I was thirty. Just six months out. Delicate times.
Curry came to visit once, brought yellow roses. They chiseled off all the thorns before he was allowed into the reception room, deposited the shards in plastic containers—Curry said they looked like prescription bottles—which they locked way until the trash pickup came. We sat in the dayroom, all rounded edges and plush couches, and as we talked about the paper and his wife and the latest news in Chicago, I scanned his body for anything sharp. A belt buckle, a safety pin, a watch fob.
"I'm so sorry, my girl," he said at the end of his visit, and I could tell he meant it because his voice sounded wet.
When he left I was so sick I vomited in the bathroom, and as I was vomiting, I noticed the rubber-covered screws at the back of the toilet. I pried the cap off one and sanded the palm of my hand—I—until orderlies hauled me out, blood spurting from the wound like stigmata.
My roommate killed herself later that week. Not by cutting, which was, of course, the irony. She swallowed a bottle of Windex a janitor left out. She was sixteen, a former cheerleader who cut herself above the thigh so no one would notice. Her parents glared at me when they came to pick up her things.
They always call depression the blues, but I would have been happy to waken to a periwinkle outlook. Depression to me is urine yellow. Washed out, exhausted miles of weak piss.
The nurses gave us meds to alleviate our tingling skins. And more meds to soothe our burning brains. We were body searched twice weekly for any sharp objects, and sat in groups together purging ourselves, theoretically, of anger and self-hatred. We learned not to turn on ourselves. We learned to blame. After a month of good behaviour, we earned silky baths and massages. We were taught the goodness of touch.
My only other visitor was my mother, who I hadn't seen in half a decade. She smelled of purple flowers and wore a jangling charm bracelet I coveted as a child. When we were alone, she talked about the foliage and some new town rule that required Christmas lights to be taken down by January 15. When my doctors joined us, she cried and petted and fretted at me. She stroked my hair and wondered why I had done this to myself.
Then, inevitably, came the stories of Marian. She'd already lost one child, you see. It had nearly killed her. Why would the older (though necessarily less beloved) deliberately harm herself? I was so different from her lost girl, who—think of it—would be almost thirty had she lived. Marian embraced life, what she had been spared. Lord, she had soaked up the world—remember, Camille, how she laughed even in the hospital?
I hated to point out to my mother that such was the nature of a bewildered, expiring ten-year-old. Why bother? It's impossible to compete with the dead. I wished I could stop trying.
there's nothing to say to a reveal like that, cloud thinks, especially against camille's wishes (thanks shadows!!), and that's part of why he doesn't say anything after. it's also part of why he's looking away. ]
... When d'you get out? [ of the facility, if she even had. maybe even that is too much to ask. something about being locked away in a place with doctors makes him uncomfortable, though these were trying to help. probably. ]
Camille is left to stew in the residue of her own filth. He's kind enough to not make moon eyes at her. She hates the idea of being pitied. Hates being seen even more still.
She inhales thickly through her nose, eyes trained on the hem she's been picking out at her sleeve. Her scars scream to her from beneath. Vanish. Vanish. Vanish.]
Not long after. [She clears her throat and swings her hair over her shoulder. Meeting his eyes head on.] I checked out after three months. Moved on up and out.
It helped some. Some people more than others. The break did help curb the urge for a while.
[She quiets. Mouth quirking.]
I'm a year out from my last slip, now. Living with good people. Ditched some other bad habits, dropped some ties. It's better. Much better, these days.
[She looks to him, head cocked. Then smiles. It's small, weary, but true. Camille puts her hand on his shoulder and rubs. A remnant from their touchy feely week before, maybe.]
Maybe they'll make some later. Or maybe you'll all figure out something better.
[Her hand stills, expression fond. People here were infinitely more gracious than she was used to. Maybe her world was simply too complacent to think twice about it. Any sign of otherness was too big a shock to bear.]
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(2/2) ((SPOILERS, CW: self harm, suicide, dead children, rehab, mental health, gore))
Curry came to visit once, brought yellow roses. They chiseled off all the thorns before he was allowed into the reception room, deposited the shards in plastic containers—Curry said they looked like prescription bottles—which they locked way until the trash pickup came. We sat in the dayroom, all rounded edges and plush couches, and as we talked about the paper and his wife and the latest news in Chicago, I scanned his body for anything sharp. A belt buckle, a safety pin, a watch fob.
"I'm so sorry, my girl," he said at the end of his visit, and I could tell he meant it because his voice sounded wet.
When he left I was so sick I vomited in the bathroom, and as I was vomiting, I noticed the rubber-covered screws at the back of the toilet. I pried the cap off one and sanded the palm of my hand—I—until orderlies hauled me out, blood spurting from the wound like stigmata.
My roommate killed herself later that week. Not by cutting, which was, of course, the irony. She swallowed a bottle of Windex a janitor left out. She was sixteen, a former cheerleader who cut herself above the thigh so no one would notice. Her parents glared at me when they came to pick up her things.
They always call depression the blues, but I would have been happy to waken to a periwinkle outlook. Depression to me is urine yellow. Washed out, exhausted miles of weak piss.
The nurses gave us meds to alleviate our tingling skins. And more meds to soothe our burning brains. We were body searched twice weekly for any sharp objects, and sat in groups together purging ourselves, theoretically, of anger and self-hatred. We learned not to turn on ourselves. We learned to blame. After a month of good behaviour, we earned silky baths and massages. We were taught the goodness of touch.
My only other visitor was my mother, who I hadn't seen in half a decade. She smelled of purple flowers and wore a jangling charm bracelet I coveted as a child. When we were alone, she talked about the foliage and some new town rule that required Christmas lights to be taken down by January 15. When my doctors joined us, she cried and petted and fretted at me. She stroked my hair and wondered why I had done this to myself.
Then, inevitably, came the stories of Marian. She'd already lost one child, you see. It had nearly killed her. Why would the older (though necessarily less beloved) deliberately harm herself? I was so different from her lost girl, who—think of it—would be almost thirty had she lived. Marian embraced life, what she had been spared. Lord, she had soaked up the world—remember, Camille, how she laughed even in the hospital?
I hated to point out to my mother that such was the nature of a bewildered, expiring ten-year-old. Why bother? It's impossible to compete with the dead. I wished I could stop trying.
no subject
there's nothing to say to a reveal like that, cloud thinks, especially against camille's wishes (thanks shadows!!), and that's part of why he doesn't say anything after. it's also part of why he's looking away. ]
... When d'you get out? [ of the facility, if she even had. maybe even that is too much to ask. something about being locked away in a place with doctors makes him uncomfortable, though these were trying to help. probably. ]
no subject
Camille is left to stew in the residue of her own filth. He's kind enough to not make moon eyes at her. She hates the idea of being pitied. Hates being seen even more still.
She inhales thickly through her nose, eyes trained on the hem she's been picking out at her sleeve. Her scars scream to her from beneath. Vanish. Vanish. Vanish.]
Not long after. [She clears her throat and swings her hair over her shoulder. Meeting his eyes head on.] I checked out after three months. Moved on up and out.
no subject
[ okay, he has probably ruined any good will by asking that, but. y'know. you know ]
no subject
No jk she actually laughs a little.]
It helped some. Some people more than others. The break did help curb the urge for a while.
[She quiets. Mouth quirking.]
I'm a year out from my last slip, now. Living with good people. Ditched some other bad habits, dropped some ties. It's better. Much better, these days.
no subject
[ he sounds sincere, too, not like it's a platitude ]
There's not a lot of facilities like that that'd ... help, back home. But maybe that's just my bias.
no subject
Maybe they'll make some later. Or maybe you'll all figure out something better.
[Her hand stills, expression fond. People here were infinitely more gracious than she was used to. Maybe her world was simply too complacent to think twice about it. Any sign of otherness was too big a shock to bear.]
Thank you, Cloud. I'm glad too.
no subject
Yeah, maybe.
[ he sounds dubious though.
bloops this here ]