Chapter 30 Xiaoyu, Interrupted
Xiaoyu
“Yeah, and that’s the story of how I got institutionalized.”
The doctor’s brown eyes judge me critically.“So you do admit you were an accomplice to the murder of Captain Jacobsen.”
“Captain Moriarty? I don’t know this Jacobsen dude.”
“He was the main ship’s captain. The one who unfortunately passed away by—” the doctor looks down at her notes, then clears her throat. “—asphyxiation by foreign objects. Flowers were put inside his mouth.”
“It grew inside his belly and choked him, doctor. Just fucking say it out loud.”
She breathes deeply and scratches her neck. For some stupid reason, I’m fixated on why she keeps wearing turtlenecks. The tip of the pen moves it enough that I see ink peeking out.
I’m grinning from ear to ear now. “Are you part of the Void’s cult, too?”
“Pardon?”
“Don’t act so innocent, they’re making me think I’m crazy. Gaslighting me. It’s not working.”
“How long have you thought people were gaslighting you, Xiaoyu?”
I groan and lean away. This line of questioning again. My leg shakes impatiently. The second Alani docked the ship months ago, I’ve been surrounded by these people. I know they aren’t Moriarty. They look more like government employees than anything else.
Doctor Beth, the government psychiatrist, has been trying to make me think I’m fucking crazy. I see it in her exaggerated sympathy, the fake understanding. Everytime she says she feels what I feel, I want to gag.
No, she does not know what it’s like to be manipulated into thinking they are delusional.
“It’s just interesting to me how you keep mentioning people—mainly your mother—are making you think this way. Yet, you do not do anything to make them think otherwise.”
Because the truth is bat-shit crazy. She continues, “You also said your significant other—”
“His name is Datu.”
“Yes, him…is a plant man? But also a god? And then you tell me that he isn’t a god anymore, but just a monster?”
What’s the point in talking to this doctor when she’s just going to psychoanalyze what I tell her. Well, she is a psychiatrist. One who is part of the Void’s cult, though. They will do everything in their power to make me think I’m mentally unstable.
“You also said Moriarty is taking troubled women to this place and…feeding them to the people?”
“Esoterra. They gather information, okay! Almost all these women have had tough lives and answered a stupid “are you human” verification test. When there’s no privacy, people’s personal information is a billion-dollar trade. I see women who need help, they see profit.”
“That sounds horrible, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, because y’all are just letting machines replace the real people here. Don't you ever think that's you aiding the end of humanity?”
She releases a long-suffering sigh, shutting her notes closed. “Xiaoyu,” Leaning in, she levels me. “We’ve been going through the same thing for months now. And, every time, your story changes, everything gets increasingly more fantastical. Do you see where I’m at right now?”
“I understand, doctor.” No, I don’t.
“Good, if that’s the case, you would not be opposed to listening to a recording, right?”
Something heavy drops to my stomach. “What recording?”
“Why don’t you listen first then I’ll explain.” She takes out a small rectangular thing, touching play.
“Don’t look at me like that.” It’s my voice followed by scratching silence. “Like you’re in love with me.”
My eyes water, remembering this exact moment. It’s that time when his eyes turned pink when he looked at me. The same time Datu might have fallen for me.
“A safe place where it’s all mine, no one can pry it away from my dead hands.” Something twists inside me as I listen more. “Yes. With plants, preferrably. Somewhere I can nurture life in. Somewhere to belong in.”
The doctor hits stop, continuing, “So you do see how wanting things like this can manifest in your mind, right?”
Closing my eyes, I shake my head. “I wasn’t hallucinating.”
“You weren’t. This was you sleep-talking, Xiaoyu.”
Something breaks inside me. “What?”
“You have never gone on a trip with Moriarty Organics. You’ve been dosed with some chemicals that made you comatose for over two years.
Your friend, Crystal, said you went with a strange man offering you a job.
You called your mother saying something highly uncharacteristic.
The same day, she found your body on the floor of your home. You wouldn’t wake up.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“We’ve been looking after you. When you started talking, we recorded it. Full-on one-sided, incoherent conversations. But this one stands out because it makes sense.”
I hug my knees on the chair, terrified of my mind. No. Everything that happened had been real. I know it, I see it inside my skin. See him inside my skin.
“It makes sense you would create a world you would want the most while you were unconscious.”
“I know the difference between right and wrong, real and fantasy. This was real.” But my mind is desperately trying to hold on for dear life. I can’t imagine how life would be if what I went through had all been a dream.
Mother visits me everyday in the facility.
Ever since the incident, she claims she has become a changed person.
She doesn’t apologize for anything, just sweeps things under the rug.
Pretend like nothing had happened. Pretend like we are not in the middle of a psychiatric facility cafeteria having lunch.
At the way she picks at my food, no. She is still the same. She can’t come to terms that she hasn’t. She can’t.
With her chopsticks, she sets aside the prawns from my plate. “Not too much now. You know what happens when you eat too much.”
My eyes find the fish sauce she has brought.
It’s one of my favorites. Before everything went to hell, it had been my dad’s sauce of choice.
He used to put it on everything. The taste reminds me of a time when Mother had been happy.
When my siblings were still little and innocent and had not cut ties with Mother.
“That’s just one prawn.”
“One can become two, two can become five. Control yourself, Xiaoyu.”
She slaps my hand with a stick. It doesn’t hurt, but it is all that I need for me to break. She always makes me feel like a disobedient dog. With unreasonable force, I stab the prawn with a stick and I swallow it whole.
“I’ll eat whatever the hell I want. In fact, I’m going to get more food.”
She watches me, horrified, as I basically inhale everything in the canteen. My hands squeeze, break the food before I stuff them into my mouth. It goes down easier that way.
“My god, have some decency!” She pulls at me, but I shove her away. I hate the feel of her touch.
“What decency do you mean?!” I know I’m yelling, but this has been almost thirty years worth of bottled-up emotions.
“You didn’t even have the decency to comfort your daughter—” I’m pointing, tapping my chest madly.
“—your flesh and blood told you she was afraid. That your husband, my stepfather, had been coming into her room at night when she was a child.”
Her eyes had started tearing up, but she swallows, tilting her chin like what I said did not matter. Like I did not matter at all.
“Is this the reason why you had him killed, Xiaoyu? Who did you tell?”
This is breaking me all over again. And, maybe, it’s for the best. “Ma, I was eight years old.”
Her movements become jerky, and I know this is her coping, too. Trying to sweep it off like it’s nothing. But I see through her. It’s getting to her, and she’s at that point where she needs to choose.
Herself, or me?
“Obviously, you are still sick. I will pay for your treatment for a month. Other than that, I’m cutting you off.”
“Thank fucking god.” I snarl, food flying out of my mouth. “I’m going to prove you so wrong that I’m not crazy. Once I’m out, you will never see me again.”
That is the last time I see Mother before I force down the medication they give me. It is hell, but I’ve been through worse. I know I’m strong, I just have to prove it to myself—not to anyone else.
But for now, this is my rock bottom.