Limbo

It seems so nice and quiet here. Everything in order. White walls. White sheets. White tile floors. White papery gowns that cling to white bodies like just another ghost. So much different from the life of chaos and color I came from.

But I won't think about that now. Sometimes, if I do, he comes back.

But that's the good thing about living here. There are nurses and needles and little white pills that make him go away again.

I suppose all of us came from some version of my life, something too bright and too wild for us to deal with. It's better to be wrapped up in the clean whiteness.

My window is small, the curtains drawn over it. I am glad. I don't want any of the outside world to penetrate my little fortress.

There is a digital clock in the corner that I glance at nervously every so often. It says 5:57.

That is why it makes me nervous. It tells me there are three free minutes left before he will return. That's when my defenses, so carefully built up by charts and kind mouths forming long words and shining needles and little orange bottles, wear away and leave my mind clear. I don't want clarity. This fuzzy haze is fine with me.

A soft unintelligible whisper echoes slowly, crawling across my skin with the inexorable slow pace of a tank. I curl up, folding the pillow around my head. I snatch one last glance at the clock before I pull the thin white sheets over my head. 5:58.

You are nothing nothing nothing...

That's not true!, I scream at him. They told me not to listen to you. Go away. I have white queens with long silver swords and they will chase you away.

I will never go away.

You will, you will! They will come and you will leave. You will...

I am always here. Just sometimes I am sleeping.

I hum loudly so I can't hear him. I try to do what the nurses tell me and hold on to reality, but it is fast slipping away like I'm trying to hold back a flowing river with one hand.

Help help help help...

I don't know if I'm screaming or whispering, or even if I'm making any sound at all. It doesn't seem to matter.

...your fault...

"NOT MY FAULT!" Now I know this is screamed, because the force which with the words tear from my mouth is enough to set my throat on fire. But it is good, the pain and the noise is good. I can feel the bedsheets around me now, they are not lost in my nightmare-world. I can see light filtering through them.

But it was... it was, and I am here because of it, and I will never leave you now. This is your punishment!

I scream again, but this time it is not enough. I can hear him laughing, can see flashes of something I never wanted to see again.

All your fault...

Now I am thrashing around on the bed, the sheets are tangled around me like strangling vines, but the nurses come in and I am safe...

They pull my arm free and I feel the sting that will send him away.

"Ha," I tell him. "You're leaving."

"That's right, sweetheart, it's leaving now."

"He," I try to say, but my tongue is thick and heavy. I am so tired now. But I am the only one in my head.

"It wasn't as bad this time," a nurse comments.

"No. I think she's really doing better."

But I don't care what they say, what's real or not, because I am drifting back into limbo, and it is good.