She had her toenails painted purple-a hideous, sickly, Easter-bunny shade of purple. I was sitting there fixated on her toes, and wondering why a doctor would be wearing open toed shoes, when she spoke up.
“Is there a boy involved?
They always asked the stupidest questions.
I looked up at my doctor, Dr. Lansing. She’d asked me to call her Melissa, but I had an aunt named Melissa, and I couldn’t bring myself to make that connection. My aunt Melissa was beautiful, though a shallow soccer mom. I wondered if Dr. Lansing was once beautiful, if she had ever had a boy involved or stayed out all night dancing or smoking or whatever they did for fun in the 60s. May be she was a pothead, or a hippie or the girlfriend of a draft dodger who went to Canada and never came back. Maybe she went to John Hopkins and forgot about him, or maybe not. Maybe she still wondered about him—if he would still love her today, even with her red eyes and double chin and purple toenails. People like Dr. Lansing made me very sad, ugly people who were trying everything to salvage a little beauty, not realizing that they looked worse with makeup caked on then without it.
“No, there is no boy involved. I don’t date”
My own voice sounded hollow to me, rough and husky. I liked to pretend that it was because the hospital had clean air, unlike my house with chain-smokers crawling everywhere and yellowed ceilings-but that didn’t make any sense. I’m a very good liar, though, especially to myself.
Dr. Lansing shifted a bit in her chair, and glanced over at the orderly. He was a Hispanic, and that worried me a little, because all I’ve ever heard about Hispanics is that they talk Spanish behind your back and carry switchblades in their socks. And I’ve never trusted moustaches either.
My stomach growled loudly and Dr. Lansing looked at me sharply. The cafeteria orderlies must be telling her that I stopped eating on Tuesday. I just didn’t see why I should be eating, when there were homeless women out on the street under my window. I should sneak them food, but there’s no pockets on this damn hospital smock.
She didn’t say anything about eating, though. Dr. Lansing spent a few more minutes asking me more stupid questions about how I was feeling, if my room was comfortable, and if there were anything I’d like. I asked her if I could have pencils yet, so I could draw. But she told me I wasn’t well enough to have anything with metal on it yet. I asked for paper then, to fold a crane for the Hispanic, but she said there was no point in paper without a pencil. I liked to think that he would have brought the crane home to his daughters and they could unfold it and learn how to make their own.
Finally another orderly walked me back to my room and watched until I had sat down on my bed and swung my feet until the blue flip flops flew off and landed with a thud on the floor. She looked at me, and I stuck out my tongue and she left.
I kept swinging my feet slowly, watching the scars on my ankle catch the shaft of light from the window. I tried to remember how old they were, and what had made me make them, but I couldn’t. Maybe it was the medication.
I lay back on the bed, and talked to the little stuffed frog my sister had brought last week.
“’Ello ol’ chap!”
He didn’t reply, so I threw him across the room and watched him bounce.
The clock was stopped. They must have come and took out the batteries after I mentioned that two triple A’s were enough to burn holes in your wrist if you got the acid out right.
But I knew that the nurse would be by shortly. Before the sun came down, for sure. She’d bring me a piece of toast and a cup of juice and a little cup with the pills to make me sleep. And I’d tuck the pills into the toast and put it all in my mouth and swig back the juice and grin at her with crumbs. She always got disgusted and left.
Then I’d spit out the toast and pick it apart until I found the pills. And those would so safely into the pages of the bible in my dresser along with all the others.
I just had a few more nights to wait.
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I’m going to be honest, I love where this story is going. You introduce a complex character who hates her environment. Your seventh paragraph confused me a bit, but I re read it to make sure the Dr. wasn’t a transgendered. Your writing is dark, yet comical, and that’s a huge +. I have to agree with another reviewer that you just throw the reader into the Drs office, could use something leading to that point, a flashforward/back to the Hispanic, maybe? Don’t stop, don’t stop! Love where it’s heading and your style of writing. =]
i like your writing style, its very as a matter of fact and fits the character since its in first person. too many things here try to be more then they are by using big words anywhere they can.
i have a few minor points.
ive never been on sucide watch, but i would imagine that if they go through the trouble of taking the batteries out of the clock, they would make sure she swollows her pills and isnt stacking them up somewhere. second, your character doesnt seem to be too dim and already spent some time at the clinic and knows how it works… so does she really belive she can overdose without beeing discovered within 15 minutes and easily revived?
aslo, i dont know what kind of anti-depressants they are giving her, but im not sure (dont know) if you can even overdose on those kind of pills.
these things make me doubt that what im reading is a fact and make it harder to get into the story.
It sounds like an interesting story. I just wish I knew what she was waiting for…...
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First you are showing and not telling with the middle paragraph. Also you don’t have an introduction you just sort of leap in there with the opening of being in the therapist office.
Keep enhancing it I look forward to reading any improvements.
Well, you’ll want to figure out where you want this to go. It’s very Plath-ish, so you’ll want to distinguish it from all that came before. In any case, we need motive. It’s not enough that this girl hates the world and everyone in it, give us the motive for her pain and self-effacement. Dig deep and find that kernel of truth and heart. Keep it going. Thanks for sharing this piece.
October 14, 2006
This is a good start, maybe you’ll figure out where you’re heading with it? I like your writing it’s clear and crisp without too much flowery filler in between. I didn’t see any obvious mistakes, so well done and I hope to read more.
~D. Marlar
Kind of a tidbit of a story, but I can completely understand starting something and not knowing where to go with it. I am giving you an eight for two reasons.
One, I like the way that you write. A sense of comedy in the darkness of suicide, grimly reminding me of stories from the distant past. Your style never faltered, which is another good thing. Good work on that front.
Two, because I think if there was more of a story around the piece this character could be very believable. The hint of prejudice and the mocking way that she judged all people gave me a feeling of a character that would do well in a story like Girl Interrupted.
Good writing, extremely short and unfulfilled story. Try fleshing it out some, but I would keep the end with the description of the bread and the pills the same.
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