Unhinge

  When I was sixteen and first started driving, my brother teasingly said that if I needed protection, to put the length of my keys on the key chain between my fingers and use it as a weapon. I laughed off his comment then, but now it wasn’t a bad thought. My eyes opened. I blinked through the blinding pain, only to see my keys on the ground, daring me to pick them up.

  “Victoria?” Wes grabbed my chin and jerked my head up until I was forced to look him in the eye. “If you leave me, I’ll go after every single person you love.” With his other hand he brushed away my tears. “Renee. Your mother. Even Sinclair. All of them gone.”

  “Why are you doing this?”

  He frowned at me in confusion, as if I should already know the answer. “Because if you leave my world, what else do I have?”

  Without another word, he walked away.

  A hideous image comes to mind where Wes is eating my heart. He’s ripping it to pieces and I can feel every single tear as if it’s still attached to me.

  I know it’s horrifying. But the worst thing of all is that it’s not too far from the truth. Wes and I were eating at each other instead of building each other up.

  All we knew was distraction.

  If we continued down this path one of us would be dead.

  I don’t remember grabbing my keys. I don’t remember getting into my car.

  I just remember ending up slumped over my steering wheel, crying over the memories of Wes and me during the happier times.

  My heart saw all of this and whispered to me: But Sinclair Montgomery kissed you. Sinclair Montgomery touched you….

  November 2015

  There’s a stain on the ceiling.

  It breaks up the fine-fissured surface and makes me recount the perforated black dots spread across it. I’ve lain here for an hour, trying to focus my attention on anything but the fear building inside me.

  Who am I?

  Who am I?

  Who am I?

  I hate the person I’m seeing in my memories. It is excruciating, to look back at them. I compare it to being strapped down to a table while your skin is peeled back slowly. You sit there in pain, screaming for it to stop, and it never does. I want to reach through time and shake my past self. I want to tell her all the things she should be doing differently. But I can’t.

  I rub my eyes and take a deep breath.

  This room is sterile and screams of loneliness. The sheets are stiff against my skin and the mattress creaks every time I move. The pillow is lumpy. My neck has a crick in it from a restless night of sleep. How did I ever allow this place to become my home?

  Evelyn cries loudly and for the first time, I don’t reach for my daughter. I let her lie in her bassinet.

  Horrible mother. That’s what I’m turning into. Yet even as I acknowledge the truth, I still don’t try to amend my wrong. I let her lie there.

  My heart feels frozen. Young Victoria, her pain feels so fresh. So raw. I push up my shirt and glance at my ribs, expecting to see bruises in shades of plum and blue. There’s nothing. My fingers graze my skin and drift to the left until I find the exact spot where he hit me. I press down into my skin until I feel bone.

  Nothing.

  But it happened. Oh, it did happen.

  “Have a good day, Victoria?”

  Quickly I sit up in bed. Standing on the opposite side of the room is Wes, leaning against the wall and staring at me curiously. I’m still reeling from today’s session. The last person I want to see is him.

  “How did you get in here?”

  “I’ve been here the whole time. You didn’t hear me come in.”

  He’s lying. He’s lying and both of us know it. His words make me jump out of my bed. I tug at my hair and at the very last second stop myself from crying out in frustration. “You haven’t been here the whole time.” I start to pace, always counting to twenty-five. “I would’ve seen you.”

  “Technically, that’s not true. There are so many things you haven’t noticed.”

  I pause mid-step. Finally, something we can agree on. “You’re right. I really haven’t seen things for what they are.”

  Wes narrows his eyes. He takes a step forward. My first instinct is to take a step back, but I see past Victoria, flinching and cowering. Hiding in fear. I refuse to repeat the past. If he hurts me, I’ll scream and one of the nurses will show up.

  “I’m remembering things, Wes.”

  Wes stares right at me. He cocks his head to the side and gives me a blank look. “Like what?”

  “How messed up we were.” I swallow my fear. “How you hurt me.”

  He frowns at me. “I treated you like a queen.”

  “No, you didn’t,” I whisper fiercely.

  “I”—he takes a step forward—“would never”—one more step and he’s directly in front of me—“hurt you. Ever.”

  “That’s not true. You hit me here.” I point to my cheek. “And here.” I lay a hand on my stomach.

  “What is that doctor telling you?” Just for a second, part of the venom he threw at me in the past comes out. A flash of anger, his words dripping in hate. It’s there for a second and then gone. But I saw it and that’s all that matters.

  “She’s not telling me anything. She’s showing me—”

  Abruptly, I stop talking. Remembering has put a crack in Wes’s masquerade. I can’t see him in the same light anymore and that means I can’t trust him.

  “What were you going to say?”

  “Does it matter? You’re going to deny everything.”

  “Of course it matters! You’re being fed lies.”

  “It’s not lies!” I scream.

  Walking around my bed, I put as much distance between us as I can and grip the edge of Evelyn’s bassinet. “You need to go.”

  “Don’t believe them, Victoria.”

  “Go.”

  “I’ve stuck by you when no one else has. Shouldn’t that say something to you?”

  “Go.”

  “Someday you’re going to regret everything you’ve accused me of. Someday you’ll realize that there’s no one in the world who will love you like I do.” He shakes his head, looking at me with anger and disappointment. As he brushes past me, my entire body locks up. “Instead of looking at me,” he says, “perhaps you should consider looking at yourself. Maybe you’re the villain in the story of us. After all, you’re the one who’s locked away. Not me.”

  The second he’s gone I try to close the window. Aren’t these windows impossible to unlock to begin with? It should be a breeze to lock back up. I put all my strength into twisting the lock but it doesn’t budge.

  I take a deep breath and tap my head against the wall.

  This man used to be everything to me, but now I see he’s my Achilles’ heel. So I cover my ears and scream.

  I wake up Evelyn. She screams in fear, but I scream louder.

  A nurse runs into my room, looking every which way. “What’s wrong?”

  “Wes was in here.”

  Within seconds, her expression relaxes. I want to shake her, make her see the truth. “Victoria, he’s not here.”

  “Yes, he was.” Anxiously I rush over to her and grab her hand. She tries to pull away but I tug her close to the window. “He escaped from here and now the window won’t lock.”

  She jerks her hand away from me, shoots me a dirty look, and inspects the window. Furiously, I rub my hands together. Evelyn’s wails have died down. A good mom would be comforting her child right now, but this need, this obsession to have someone catch Wes has taken over.

  “What did you do to this damn window?” Kate says between grunts. She tugs on the lock and just like me ends up failing to flip it back into place.

  “I didn’t do this. He jammed the lock!” I point at the lock smiling and she looks at me like I’m truly, positively insane, and I don’t care. “Don’t you see? This is my proof. He was here.”

  The nurse drops her hands to her sides and gives me a thorough once-over. I catch
the fear in her eyes. “He wasn’t here, Victoria.”

  “Yes, he was! And now he’s probably right outside my window, waiting for you to leave just so he can sneak back in.”

  “I promise you, no one’s out there, okay?”

  She doesn’t get it. No one gets it and it doesn’t matter how many times I try to explain it to them; they’re not willing to listen to what I have to say. She works on the window and after a few minutes, finally gets it to lock. She tugs on the cord and the blinds slam down onto the windowsill, blocking out the clear black sky and full moon.

  “He was just there a few minutes ago,” I say weakly.

  Kate’s face drops in pity. “Why don’t I get you something to help you sleep?” She reaches out and pats my arm. “Would you like that?”

  I jerk out of her grasp. “I don’t need medication.” It’s on the tip of my tongue to tell her I haven’t swallowed a single pill in months. “I need you all to believe me.”

  Kate tries a different approach. “Why don’t you lie down? Maybe if you take a quick catnap you’ll feel better?”

  “I’m not a baby. You can’t talk to me as a child.”

  “Victoria, lie down or I’ll get the doctor.”

  Translation: Either listen to me or the doctor will knock you out with drugs.

  Anger festers in me, running through my veins, begging for a way out. But I slowly move to my bed. I lie down in the exact same position I was in just minutes ago.

  How? How is that even possible? Time trudges by but then it’s gone in the blink of an eye.

  I’m so tired of looking like the crazy one. I’m so tired of looking like a liar. As I lie there in bed I know I shouldn’t back down to Kate, but I’m too tired to care.

  Kate draws the sheets up to my chin like I’m a child and gives me a plastic smile. “Thatta girl.”

  Like a mummy, I lay there unmoving.

  “I’ll check up on you in a few minutes.”

  Tonight, I have no doubt she will.

  “If you’re still bothered by this tomorrow, maybe you should bring it up with your doctor,” she says.

  “Maybe,” I reply dully.

  Kate walks to the door, but before she leaves she looks over her shoulder. “Do you need anything else?”

  “No,” I whisper.

  Last night’s events trail behind me like a ghost.

  I didn’t get a wink of sleep and now I’m paying for it. My eyes feel heavy. They keep opening and closing, over and over again. Evelyn didn’t sleep much either, but that’s my fault. I held her in my arms all night, paranoid that Kate or the night shift doctor would stop by my room for an impromptu visit and either knock me out with medicine or steal my daughter.

  The phone rings loudly. Everyone stops talking and glances at it. Reagan, who’s been pacing in front of it for the past thirty minutes, pounces.

  There are two forms of outside contact: visiting hours and the phone.

  Everyone, and I mean everyone, vies for the phone. Besides board games and television this is the most coveted piece of entertainment here. It’s a beige wall phone with a cord that has been stretched so much over the years it practically skims the floor.

  Reagan cradles the receiver between her shoulder and cheek and leans against the wall looking like a teenage girl talking to her crush. In a sugary-sweet voice she says, “Thank you for calling Fairfax Behavioral Health Unit, where we don’t condone murder, or thoughts of murder, but the doctors will shove enough pills down your throat to choke a horse. How may I help you?”

  She stares down at the floor for a second and then rolls her eyes. She holds the phone away from her, not bothering to cover the speaker, and points to Alice. “It’s for you.”

  Alice stands up. She turns pale. “Who is it?”

  “Satan. He wants to know why you’re not manning the portal to hell,” Reagan replies deadpan.

  Alice rolls her eyes and Reagan cracks up laughing until tears are streaming down her face. “Oh, that was good. I needed that….I needed that.” Then she glances at the new girl. “Stella!” she screams dramatically. “STELLLA, it’s for you!”

  A new girl jumps out from her chair and snatches the phone. “God. I’m right here,” she hisses before she places the phone next to her ear and faces the wall.

  Reagan shrugs and starts to make laps around the room. She’s always mischievous, with a gleam in her eyes. But today she’s edgy, staring everyone down, looking for a fight.

  “I’m so fucking bored!” she announces dramatically as she weaves around the tables.

  A few patients look up, but no one really pays attention to her.

  She spins a chair backward and straddles it, sitting directly across from me, and points to the wall. “There’s something wrong with that clock.”

  The nurse doesn’t even bother to look in the clock’s direction. “No, there isn’t.”

  “There is! It was twelve fifteen when I walked in. I’m pretty sure hours have gone by and look. It says only twelve twenty!”

  I have to agree with Reagan. If anything it feels like the clock is moving backward just to taunt us.

  “I repeat, there’s nothing wrong with the clock,” replies the nurse. “And if you’re really that bored why don’t you go to art class. It starts in fifteen.”

  “Art class?” Reagan claps her hands and gives the nurse a mocking smile. “Enough with all the choices! I’m so excited I’m about to queef out a unicorn riding on a rainbow.”

  The nurse spins on her heels and walks away.

  I keep my eyes glued to the page in front of me. I’ve been rereading the same page over and over for the past forty minutes, just waiting for the words to string themselves together and for me to slip into the beautiful world of the story. But it’s not working; there’s a black cloud over my head, leaving me in the foulest mood. I want to lash out at anyone who looks my way. It would probably be in my best interest—and that of everyone around me—if I stayed in my room today, but I can’t sit still even if I try.

  Normally when I’m this nervous, I have Evelyn to comfort me. To hold and to hug. But for the first time she’s with one of the nurses and now I’m starting to regret my decision. It sounded great this morning. Evelyn had spent the entire night wailing in my ear. It didn’t matter how many times I comforted her. It was as though she too understood Wes’s parting words to me, and now doesn’t trust me.

  Susan, one of the kind nurses here, offered to watch Evelyn. She said that sometimes moms need a moment to themselves. So I agreed. Her shock was visible. Normally, I would never let anyone take care of Evelyn. But Susan held her arms out, and very gently I placed Evelyn in them. Almost instantly the tears stopped.

  The silence was deafening and since then all I can hear are Wes’s words echoing around me: “Maybe you’re the villain in the story of us….Maybe you’re the villain in the story of us….Maybe you’re the villain in the story of us….”

  Reagan leans back until her chair taps against Xander’s. His reason for being at Fairfax is unknown. I just know that he talks to pretty much everyone and he’s been here longer than I have. Reagan says none too quietly, “What are you doing?”

  “Quietly reading!” Xander shouts back. “You should try it sometime.”

  “You guys,” a nurse warns. “Keep it down.”

  Reagan catches me staring. Her chair lands on all four legs loudly, making me flinch. She rests her chin on the back of the chair and stares at me. “Whatcha doin’?”

  “Watching you talk to Xander.”

  “How long have you been here?” she asks out of nowhere.

  “A long time,” I reply tersely.

  “How long?” she repeats. “Four years? Five? Two? Gimme a ballpark figure.”

  If this is her way of striking up a conversation she needs to do better. Anger simmers inside me, just begging to rise to the surface. I try my hardest to push it down. “Does it really matter?”

  “Of course it does. One month in this pla
ce is the equivalent of a decade in prison.”

  I bite down on my tongue to keep from saying something I know I’ll regret later. It’s obvious I don’t want to talk to Reagan. Yet she stays put, and stares at me.

  “How’s your daughter?”

  “Fine.”

  “Where is she?”

  I sit up straight and glare at her. “With the nurse.”

  “So not only is Fairfax a loony bin, it’s also a fucking daycare center. How quaint.”

  I don’t respond.

  “We should have a sign made for outside. I can see it now.” She spreads her hands in the air, as if a rainbow will appear between them. “ ‘Fairfax: Making your kids crazy one day at a time.’ ”

  Reagan’s words run alongside Alice’s perfectly: “Fairfax is no place for a baby.”

  The very thought makes my anger grow.

  I should take deep breaths. Smile and pretend she’s not there. But my world is in a downward spiral and I’d love to wrap my hands around Reagan’s neck just to get her to shut up.

  “I’m dying to know why you’re here,” she says.

  Before I go, I place my hands on the table and lean in. “The cardinal rule at Fairfax is to never ask someone how they got here, why they’re here, and how long they’ve been here. And something tells me this isn’t the first time you’ve been to a place like Fairfax. Surely you know the rules of the game by now.”

  I know my words touch a nerve. Her eyes slightly widen before she smiles slowly. “That’s a fucked-up thing to say.”

  I shrug. There’s a good chance I might be sorry later, but not right now.

  “Here’s why I think you’re here. You wanna know?”

  I walk away and say over my shoulder, “No.”

  “I think you’re here because you’re weak!” she shouts. I stop walking. The blood drains from my face. I don’t turn around but I can feel Reagan’s smile on my back.

  “Yes, that’s right, you’re weak. You walk around like you own this fucking place, thinking your facsimile life is perfect, but the truth is you’re weak and spineless. You’re a victim.”