Insanity (Asylum 1)

When I was little, Daddy used to push me on a tire swing he’d made me. I’d tell him how I wanted to be a bird, a canary, because canaries are pretty and yellow and have beautiful singing voices. Mommy was around then and she always thought it was funny that I’d talk about canaries. “And where would you fly my little bird,” she’d say kissing the top of my head with a chuckle.

Then I’d reply with, “I’d fly to the moon.”

Mommy, Daddy, and me laughed. We were a happy family.

Until one day, I woke up and Mommy was gone.

And Daddy was never the same.

His friends used to come home with him occasionally, and after a while they came home with him everyday. I asked myself every day where my old Daddy went and thought about how bad I wanted him back.

But I never saw my old Daddy again. He left me, just like Mommy did.

I didn’t like my new Daddy. One time, I just looked at him, giving him a sad look, tears glistening in my violet eyes. He’d looked back at me and for a second I thought I might catch a glimpse of my old Daddy. He stood up from his reclining chair, walked to me, and towered over me, squinting down at me. I opened my mouth to tell Daddy how much I loved him and that I missed my old Daddy and he’s said, “You look just like that whore mother of yours.”

And then he slapped me across the face.

That treatment continued for the next eight years, but I’d learned to be quiet, to keep to myself. I’d learned to keep away from Daddy and obey him. Because I knew what would happen if I didn’t.

Then one night, Daddy’s friends were over and Daddy was getting aggra

vated. He had a little too much of them for one night. Daddy’s friends made him do crazy things sometimes. That night, the night they brought me in here, Daddy pulled out his rifle, aimed it…

BANG!

Then everything goes black and the shrieking begins.

Plodding footsteps drown out the sound of my screams.

I try and tell myself to stop screaming, but it’s like my mind and emotions are at war with one another. Before I know it, the door to my cell swings open. Four people. There are four people approaching me, arms outstretched cautiously like I am some wild, ravenous beast in need of capturing.

Four people.

I have nothing to defend myself with except for two arms, two legs, and a sharp mind.

But four to one?

I am severely outnumbered. This is a battle I am going to lose. Still, even though I know I’ll be defeated, determination pumps through me. I have never been the type to go down without a fight. Perhaps that’s why I spent the last eight years letting my daddy beat me within an inch of my life. I never wanted to give him the satisfaction of knowing that every time his fist connected with my jaw he didn’t mentally break me.

Darting from my bed, I start for the door. Swinging hands swallow me and capture me in a net of firmness before carrying me back over to my cot. Thrashing my arms, I backhand a nurse, knocking the cap off her head and she grips the rounded collar of my hospital gown, cutting off my air supply for a second.

“Hold her down!” At the doctor’s instruction a heavy-set nurse digs her kneecap into the small of my back and presses down.

No! Don’t hold me down! Set me free! I don’t belong here!

“No!” My voice is raspy and raw and dry, full of pent up fear and anger. “No!” I try to swat at someone behind me, but the two orderlies pin my arms to my cot. Wiggling, I try to free myself from their grasp, but the nurse with her knee in my back puts all of her weight on me, shooting shivers of pain down my spine and immobilizing me.

“Calm down,” my doctor says. He has a soft, soothing voice, but it’s deadly.

I peek through stands of my ebony hair, watching the sweet, sweet mind-erasing fluid spout from the tip of the needle like a fountain. The drug speaks to me.

Forget who you are. Forget where you are. Forget why you were brought here. Forget everything .

I won’t let them make me forget. I won’t let them neutralize me and turn me into one of their empty robots.

I won’t. I won’t. I won’t.

“Keep still, Adelaide. This won’t hurt. You’ll only feel a pinch.”