Medicated

"I’m not crazy," I stared at my mom, angry that she’d question my sanity. She was the one shoving the medication down my throat, not me. She was the one determined to kick the imaginary depression I had, not me. She was the one that asked for the medication for me.
Not me.
"I didn’t say you were crazy, hun, just that you’re reacting to the meds differently." I hated when she called them ‘meds’. It makes it seem like I can’t live without them. "I just think that maybe we need to change the dose of it a little. Maybe it’ll just take time to adjust, you know?" I rubbed my eyes and slid my hands down my face, frustrated with her. My gaze shifted and I zoned out. This repetition, this arguing, this frustration was all too common. I began just blocking it out.
"Joshua, what are you staring at?" She spun around aimlessly. Her voice shook me from my daze.
"Nothing," I said, sliding off the stool and walking out of the kitchen. My mom called my name again, and when I spun around, there she was, holding two small, circular, white pills, and a glass of water. I groaned and snatched both things out of her hands. I began to walk away, but she cleared her throat and stood there with her arms crossed.
"In front of me," she said. She knew I’d avoid taking them if I had the choice. I rolled my eyes, tossed both pills in my mouth, and took a swig of water. I opened my mouth and stuck my tongue out after to prove that I had obeyed her. She smiled. "Good." I left the glass on the counter and continued to my room.
As soon as I got there, I grabbed the trash can and spit out the two pills that were hiding under my tongue. They had begun to disintegrate, and the taste was horrid. I reached for the water bottle on my nightstand and took a few sips to wash the taste away. I laid on my back and stared up at the ceiling, arms crossed behind my head, spending another afternoon trying to think of ways to convince my mom to trash the medication and never go back to it.
"That’s impossible." I jumped up and looked around my bed. I tried to shake it off, but I knew what was coming.
"I’m not playing this game today," I said as stern as I could. But I knew she could sense my fear. My constant fear.
"But I want to play this game," the innocent voice said. She giggled. "Hide and seek, hide and seek," she whispered.
"I’m not playing hide and seek!" All of a sudden my door swung open. I jumped, knocking the lamp off of my nightstand, shattering the bulb. My mom stood in the doorway and shook her head.
"Joshua, who are you talking to?" She looked panicked. I sat silent. After a sigh, she said "Why don’t you go sit on the porch and get some fresh air," she suggested. "Your room seems... Claustrophobic."
Anything to get me away from her, I thought to myself.
I got outside and sat on the steps of the deck, watching the wind sway the orange and green leaves back and forth. One fell off the tree above me and landed on my lap. I picked it up by its stem and analyzed it. There was a hole in the middle of the leaf, probably where a bug had bitten through it.
"They ate its heart," she said. I turned my head to the left to see the little girl sitting next to me. Her dress was white, but the bottom was a charcoal black, the edges burnt, matching her hair. Her arms beneath the elbows were scratched, scarred, just as her legs were. I made the mistake once of asking what happened.
She said her house had burned down. "A giant piece of wood fell on my legs," She said, kicking a foot out in front of my face, showing me the deep, visible gashes. "No one heard me screaming. Mommy and Daddy didn’t come back for me. And there was black smoke everywhere." She told me she suffocated. Forty years ago.
Like I said, my mistake for asking.
I heard her familiar voice, but I didn’t jump, or run. I contended with the chills she gave me when she first appeared, like every other time, and took a deep breath.
"Leaves don’t have hearts," I said informatively. "They’re just leaves."
"And you’re just a person," she said. "If someone put a hole through you, you’d die too." I lightened my hold on the leaf and let it fall to the step under me.
"I guess so," I agreed passively.
"Let's play hide and seek now," she asserted, more aggressively than I had remembered before. I shrugged, and she jumped up giggling, hopping down the steps. "Cover your eyes!" She said, pointing at me with an accusing finger.
"I don’t really want to play..." I said, trailing off.
"Why?" She said. A sweet, innocent, but sad little girl’s voice escaped from her. I had never heard it like that before.
"I just don’t feel like it," I said, trying to be assertive. She immediately changed attitude and there was clear anger.
"Play with me now!" She reached across and swung her arm across my face. My initial reaction was a small flinch, but only because her hand was flying at my face. There was no pain... At first.
Within a small moment, there was a sharp, burning pain on my cheek. I threw my hand over it, but it burned even more, and continued to get stronger. I pulled out my phone and looked at my reflection in the screen.
It looked like a cat, no, a bear had clawed my face.
"Now, play with me."
I nodded slowly and put my head in my lap, hoping that when I lifted it again, she'd be gone.
"18...19...20." I lifted my head and heard her giggle again. I started walking around the backyard, looking behind the trees, in bushes, behind rocks...
My mom was looking out of the kitchen window, obviously worried.
"I'm over here!" I spun around and saw her run back in to her hiding spot in the woods. I slowly made my way back and took my first step. I retracted my foot immediately. Thorns. "Come on! Or I'm going to get really mad!"
I felt fear burning inside my chest.
"I'm coming," I sighed. I walked through, the thorns getting stuck on everything: my shirt, shorts, socks, and skin. I would pull away from one thorn, only to be stabbed by two more. I tried stepping on the thorns to get them out of the way of my legs, but moving one branch only brought on a larger branch. It was like a Hydra: cut off the head, bring on two more. Finally, I made it to the small clearing and stood face to face with her.

"Yay! You found me!" She snickered. "Ok, I'm done with hide and seek now. Let's go inside." I looked down at the scratches and thorns that had been ripped off their stems and stuck to my shorts. When I turned to look at my journey back, I knew that it would be twice as bad having thorns go in to scratches that previous thorns had created. I cringed at the thought.

She passed through the thorns unscathed, then turned to look at me and motioned for me to follow. I took a deep breath and began my painful journey.

My mom stared at me as I walked through the door, awe-struck at my appearance. She put a hand over her heart and gasped, "Oh, Joshua..."

My scratches began to seem like nothing compared to what would come. I’d end up with gashes from falling on pavement, I’d lose nails from getting my fingers caught in doors, and burns from trying to get some imaginary, but clearly visible toy, off of the stove. My mom began to worry more and more.

"Maybe we should go back to the psychiatrist," she would tell me as she handed me my medicine. I refused to answer and spit out the pills as soon as I got to my room, every single time.

I knew it would get to the point where I wouldn't be able to take it, yet I didn't think it would only take a month. I was home alone, the girl following me around the entire time, chanting, "Play with me! Play with me!" I walked past the kitchen counter where a candle lay, lit, flickering softly. She walked as far away from it as she could, afraid of the flames. Yet she kept chanting.

Her voice was driving me wild. I was shaking with anger, and as I walked by the candle again, she said "Play with me or else!" I grabbed the candle, spun around, and whipped it at her. She screamed with fear, but it passed right through her, shattering on the wall, landing on the curtain. I froze.

The curtain went up in flames faster than I could grab a cup of water. It soon caught both curtains, then began spreading to the rest of the house. The girl was still screaming. I turned to look at her, but as I did, she disappeared.

I ran to the closest phone, only to find that the cordless wasn't on its base. I panicked and began running all around the house, trying to find it. I turned over the living room, throwing pillows left and right, which caught fire as I threw them. The smoke alarms were ringing at this point, and I could see neighbors on their cell phones outside. I knew that at this point, I just had to get out.

I ran back and forth between the living room and the kitchen, but both doors were engulfed in fire. I was coughing now, and panicked as I thought of the little girl's fate. As I was thinking of my alternate way out, I heard the crackling of the burning wood around me. I was coughing harder, now, the black smoke all around me and nothing but darkness in every direction. I slowly felt my chest closing up, and it was hard for me to even realize I was slipping in to a different kind of blackness.

I woke up to an all white hospital room with the TV murmuring softly in the background. When the doctor and my mother walked in, they told me how my lungs had taken a beating from the smoke, my skin was charred and burned from the flames that had gotten close enough to me, and I was near hit by falling debris. They said I was a pretty lucky kid to have gotten out the way I did.

I wasn't lucky. I was alive.

As soon as they both walked out, the little girl appeared from behind where they were standing. My eyes widened, nervous because now I was confined to a hospital bed. "You didn't play with me," she said, walking closer and closer to me. I tugged at the bed, but between my fatigued body and the way I was held in the bed, the cords, the sheets, and these other seemingly minor inhibitions were keeping me from saving my own life.

In a hospital.

"I’m sorry," my raspy voice let out.

"You tried to hurt me." Her eyes held nothing but evil in them.

"I'm sorry," I said again, trying to make her calm down. "I'll play with you, I promise I will."

"You have no choice, now," she said as she walked forward. She was now standing on top of my bed, having the upper hand. She had my IV tightly wrapped around her hand, leaning in closer to my head. I could do nothing.
* * * * *

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Loren." The doctor looked at me with remorse. "I didn't know he was that unstable." I kept my sobs silent. I couldn't help but think this was my fault. I kept blaming him, forcing help on him. He told me no, countless times. I didn't listen.

Police officers and investigators were in and outside of the room now. I could hear the nurse talking to them, telling them how she found my only son, my baby.

"Well I walked in to change his bandages, and as soon as I walked in I could see that his feet were unreasonably still. I turned the corner and saw his hand with the IV cord wrapped around it, the the rest wrapped around his neck. His face was bright purple. There was no suicide note, no hint as to why, but his eyes were wide open, and it seemed like he was afraid of something." She paused. "His mom said he had been medicated."