9. Little Ghost
NINE
LITTLE GHOST
MILA
Ifeel more rested than normal, waking just enough to mumble the bed check light away from my face. My eyelids force themselves open, and just for a second, I catch the new patient from earlier this evening in the corner of my room.
It’s too dark to see anything but the glow of his eyes and the mask covering his face. The rest of his body stays in the shadows. It’s fear that drapes over me, a dense blanket of snow that paralyzes every muscle in my body, practically wiring my jaw closed.
He doesn’t move.
My mind is playing tricks on me, the same way it does with Naya. There’s nothing I can trust in my world anymore, and the acknowledgement only leaves me more afraid.
“Go away,” I whisper. “Go away, go away, go away. I don’t want you here.” I pray to whatever might be listening, closing my eyes until the next bed check comes.
It’s my only comfort in this place.
Morning comes after another string of bed checks, my memory too hazy to remember what it is that kept me up and unable to rest. Still, the feeling stays in my body, determined to make itself familiar.
I’m pulled from group therapy again, Nurse Joy waiting at the entrance to the common room to split me from Helana and escort me the rest of the way to the doctor’s office.
“It’s good to see you so alert, Camila.” Dr. Valerian smiles, taking the achievement as his own, as if it’s all his doing.
He picks up his pen to write something in his notepad before reaching into his drawer and pulling out an orange prescription bottle.
I frown when he opens his palm, a single tablet in the middle held as an offering. He pushes his hand closer to me, but I don’t take it. “What is that?”
“We do this every morning, Camila. This is your mood stabilizer.” His tone is filled with exhaustion, his bedside manner only lasting so long with me.
“For what?”
He takes a deep breath, dropping the pill from his hand onto the table and pushing it toward me. Doctor Valerian stands and walks to the water dispenser in the corner of his office, filling a little paper cup with water before coming to my side of his desk.
“To help you,” he says, handing me the glass of water before going back to his chair.
“Doctor…” I fidget with my fingers, unsure how to ask the question eating away at me. “I am free to go at any time, right?”
“I don’t understand the question, Camila.” He smiles politely, blinking at a tempo that feels counted. “This is our one-on-one session. This is your time. If you don’t want to be here, you’re welcome to join the group session after you take your medicine.”
“No, that’s not what I mean.” I shake my head. “Am I cleared to leave the facility at my choosing?"
He sighs, a disapproving look to his expression.
“Camila, we’ve been through this. You’ve signed your care over to me.
You were voluntarily readmitted after your evaluation period ended, and in the time since, we’ve found you are not fit to return…
” he looks out his tiny window, waving his hand in the air a few times before continuing, “out there.”
I swallow, but it feels like rocks scraping down my airway. “What does that mean?”
Doctor Valerian’s lips flatten into a thin line. “It means unless you show signs of significant improvement, we will continue your treatment until further evaluation.”
I frown, confused, angry, and unsure how everything spiraled so out of my control so quickly. “And when will that be?”
“When I, and the rest of the staff, determine there have been changes.” He closes his little notebook once he sees I’m trying to look at what he’s writing.
“T-that doesn’t seem right. I’m fine. I’m confused from all the drugs and shit you’re doing to my head, but I’m fine!” I can’t help but get emotional, the tears streaming down my face before I can stop them.
I don’t acknowledge their existence in the hope he won’t use them against me.
The doctor clucks his tongue. “Your fiancé was right. You don’t want to get better.”
“You’ve talked to Demetri?” I stand up from the chair. “When? Why hasn’t he come to visit? Why hasn’t he talked to me himself?”
“Sit down, Camila. This is exactly why he’s stayed away. Demetri understands you are far too unstable to return to your everyday life. This separation is for the best. For both of you.” The doctor picks up his pencil again, but I push the whole pile off his table.
“Separation?” My heart hammers at the word, my blood pumping so hard, I can feel the vein in my forehead working overtime. “This is isn’t right! I haven’t agreed to any of this!”
His tone becomes harsh, his patience for me at absolute zero now. “Sit down!”
It’s alarming and unsettling, his anger forcing my butt to lower to the chair immediately. My lip quivers, fear and sadness entwining through the fibers of my DNA and turning me into someone I no longer recognize. “I’d like to go home now, Doctor.”
“Why? So you can kill Demetri too?” Naya’s voice comes out of his mouth.
I push the stupid nutrition shake from breakfast back down, but it fights hard to come back up.
“Everything alright?” the doctor asks, still writing something in his little journal.
Naya wraps her arms around the doctor’s shoulders, whispering something in his ear before staring straight through me with pale, hollow eyes.
There’s no color to her irises, a sheen of gray depicting she’s long gone, the blood on her face crusted and dried.
My late best friend stretches a bloody grin over her face, the red liquid dripping past her chin and falling over Doctor Valerian’s white coat.
He doesn’t wipe it off.
It drives me closer to madness with every drip until it’s the only sound in the room.
Naya cups her mouth over his ear to whisper again.
“Shut up!” I scream at them, too overwhelmed to decide which one I hate more at the moment. “Get out of my head!” I sob, dropping to the ground, hugging my knees into my chest.
The doctor’s shadow looms over me, but it’s Naya’s voice that comes out. “Aren’t you gonna tell him the truth? What’s the point of therapy if you won’t tell him how you killed your best friend?”
“Shut up! Shut up! Shut up, Naya!” I repeat until my head hurts.
“Who’s Naya?” Doctor Valerian crouches, bringing his face closer to mine.
I plug my ears when his face morphs into hers, squeezing my eyes shut and letting the tears fall freely. “Go away, go away, go away,” I chant.
The shadow pulls away, stepping around me and opening the door.
“Prep her for another procedure,” I hear the doctor say. “We’re losing her again.”