Reality.

“Reality is merely an illusion, although a very persistent one." --Albert Einstein

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Question after question was answered, his polite demeanor in place. All the while though, his mind wandered to other things.

He noticed the pink and white and yellow and purple swirls of sunshine (sunshine that had been taken to a nauseating degree, he thought to himself) that looked more like pastel popsicle puke instead of walls. The place tried much too hard to mimic life and it failed miserably, he decided. Besides, if life had a smell, he doubted that it would choose to smell like antiseptics.

"Yes, I would love to become a personal mentor to one of your patients," he assured the nurse behind the desk while his mind flitted away to his SAT booklet sitting at home. If one of the words in an answer choice is logically wrong, then you can eliminate the entire choice from consideration.

He found himself uttering phrases like "No, time is not a problem," and "Any age would be fine ma'am." Eliminate the entire choice, he reminded himself. The entire choice.

This was all part of the ticket to his life. To the great future life of Tailor Banks, his mind whispered in his ear as he was handed forms to fill out. His ticket into college, then med. school, and eventually, eventually, into life itself. The whispers titillated his senses and set him into a frenzy, filling out date of birth and gender and ethnicity and whatnot.

This was all part of his ticket.

As he handed in the forms, confident smile in place, and was told to come back to St. Medley's Institution (with all its glorious mimicry) on Monday morning, he was sure that he couldn't find a life more fulfilling than his.

Monday morning, however, he would begin to see something more brilliant than his Ivy League colleges and definitely, more brilliant than St. Medley's. Clinically, she was insane, but the truth of the matter was that she outshined the sunshine paint on the walls and the carefully constructed reality that he had set up for himself.

Tailor Banks just didn't know it yet.