Chapter 2 Dreams, Hospitals, Hopes pt 1
“Emily? Emily! It’s time to wake up!” I stirred awake from my dream/memory and let my eyes scan the room for my awakener.
“Is it, truly? It’s still dark,” I said as my eyes fell on my doctor.
“That, Emily, is because I have yet to open your curtains.” She was brisk and to the point, never a smile to cross those thin lips. I watched her through slit eyelids as she threw open the white starched curtains.
“Back away Doc, the light will bite,” I joked.
The Doctor snorted, glancing at me as she tucked a strand of straight, dull gray hair behind her ear. She was old; her face wrinkled forever into a harsh frown, her cold eyes forever judging, forever unforgiving, and her body weak and failing. I knew her as my captor and my caretaker, but more so, the doctor of my everyday torture.
“As I said, it’s not dark,” she said curtly.
“Ah…but if I close my eyes? The garish lights…close the curtains,” I groaned as I pinched my eyes shut.
“No, Emily,” she said as she walked over to the edge of my bed to start our morning routine. She stretched spider-like fingers and pressed a button to make me sit up, then she checked the leather straps that bound me and frowned as she saw that I had been trying to chew myself out. I shrugged and glared up at her.
“It’s time for your medication, Emily,” She dictated, not attempting to make eye contact.
I pretended not to notice, and she said nothing about my attempt at escaping. I know that the second I fall asleep again, she’ll have them traded out.
“Ah, the daily cocktail.” I stare at the little plastic cup of poison pills that unfortunately wouldn’t kill me, but numb me to everything. “Did the orderlies tell you I requested arsenic for today?” I snickered at the memory of attacking the new orderly and biting his hand until they agreed to tell Doc.
Who wouldn’t want to die in this situation? Humph.
“Yes, Emily, they did. And no, you may not have any arsenic. Orderly Peter is doing well, by the way, no stitches.” She tapped the pill cup and handed it to me, but I pushed her hand aside and ignored her.
“Little pills that resign me to utter darkness, silence, and they send all my friends away…this is supposed to help me?” I arched an eyebrow at her and she rolled her eyes. She forced my head back to pour the assortment of antipsychotic and antidepressant candies into my mouth with a chaser of the hospital’s famous chlorinated water.
And the countdown begins. I sigh dramatically after I swallow and she rolls her eyes again.
“Tell me, Doc, can I have the cards today?” I stared into her eyes with the most desperate, sad, and utterly pitiful face I could muster. She stiffened and took a step back, her eyes shifting nervously.
She’s afraid of me, of course she is, I love it.
Reluctantly, she pulled a tattered deck of blue Bicycle cards from her doctor’s coat…smock…whatever word they call it now, and set them upon my bed. With quick jerks, she unties my bonds and takes two lightning-quick steps back. I’ve lashed out at her several times; scratching her arms so hard they bled.
Her face contorted into a wary frown as she wrung her hands behind her back. “Now, Emily. You must remember the rules.”
I spared her only a nod; my eyes were already fixated on the tattered cards. I slipped my hands from the bonds and cradled the deck against my breasts with a sigh. Doc quickly left then; but not without barring, locking, barricading, and ordering a guard to watch my door before she left my earshot. The high security didn’t even bother me anymore; I’d been here for months and months. Besides, I had my cards now, my friends…
Nervously I checked my reflection on the wall mirror to make sure I didn’t look entirely horrid. I cocked my head to the side, studying myself; my long, tangled mousy brown hair was dull, the luster and shine long since faded, my blue eyes, full lips, shapely nose, and long neck weren’t swollen or blackened, which was as good as I could wish for. Beauty is not something insane asylums are usually worried about. But I was still me; a sickly, distorted version of me, but still me.
I find it funny. I’m under suicide watch, in a gray room with padded walls, and a barred window with plastic instead of glass and metal, and they let me have a mirror! Such dull people… or could it be a two-way mirror?
I stuck my tongue out at myself in the mirror and looked out the window, lingering on the shadow of a tree I'd never see as the meds began their assault on my body.
“Hurry, Emily,” I urged myself as I shuffled the cards and began to lay them out. “One. One, Two. One, two, three. One, two, three, four,” I counted as I set the game of solitaire between my knees.
Funny, playing solitaire in solitary confinement…
I laughed slightly as I ran the pad of my index finger over the first card. “Who might you be?” I asked the card conversationally before I slowly flipped it over, letting the edge of the card scratch the wool blanket.
“Hello, hello, hello!” cried a lyrical voice.
The joker, of course… I was too focused on my room and reflection to weed him out before starting. I turned my head slowly to find him sitting in the corner of my cell with his long legs stretched out and his arms limp in his lap like a rag doll. His clothes; triangles of blue and red, a four-part ridiculous hat, and pointed shoes, are all adorned in the bells that make any movement entertaining—to the royals.
Today his face was painted in a frown, the bright colors matching that of his skin-tight garb.
“Hello, Joker. You’re looking rather gloomy today. Why the long face?” I joked.
He sighed miserably and jumped up, did a flip, and bent like elastic before he landed at the end of my bed in a crouch. He looked like a frog sitting like that, his hands braced on the bed between his bowed legs.
“You haven’t played with us for a while, Emily…all four kingdoms complain of your negligence. There is talk of simply not playing with you at all. Even the Spades have grown impatient!” he pouted.
I gasped, terrified of losing my cards, and he stepped onto the mattress. He crouched over me, grasped my wrist, and stroked it like it was his pet. He always moved so fast that he was a blur, and as I stared into his shallow eyes, I wrestled with the sheer panic rising in my throat.
“Why would they say that, Joker? What about Jack of Hearts?” My voice raised an octave with every syllable, the last word rising into a shriek.
The joker bit his lip and looked away, his eyes downcast. “Well…it was he who mentioned it…” he said between clenched teeth, his lips twitching.
“No!” I shook my head violently as my body began to tremble. Such horrid hurtful news! I had to flip another card! Surely someone would tell me that the Joker was lying! He had to be lying! I reached for the new card and Joker growled in annoyance. He slipped off my bed and stomped back towards his corner, placing his nose into it like a child in time-out. I flipped the card, Ace of Diamonds.
“Emily!”
“Oof!” I gasped as he tackled me and my face was covered with lavish red velvets and the tresses of his curly blonde hair. He bounced up and down in his excitement, jarring my still-bound ankles horridly.
That will bruise… I sighed under my breath, but as I looked up at the smiling, beautiful face of Ace, any anger or frustration I could have held for him vanished. His blue eyes were simply glowing with excitement, an outrageous pirate hat rocking on his head so that the oversized feather jostled wildly. I couldn’t help but to be filled with joy.
“Dearest Emily! We’ve missed you as the flower misses the sun! Was I the first to be flipped today? I better have been!” Ace, no more than seventeen years of age, and yet a full-grown man with the mind of a ten-year-old, looked down between us at my completely undisturbed cards. I’m shocked, he’d been moving so much, yet nothing ever disturbed the cards except me. He scowled at the card beside his and sat up, straddling my bony legs and as he threw a venomous glance over his shoulder. Folding his arms over his elaborately stitched clothes, Ace opened his mouth to address the Joker, but I stopped him.
