A State of Fear

As the days pass I see that Emily spends most of her time in a sedated slumber, which suits me perfectly. She’s only awake for about five hours a day during which she invariably throws the most childish fits and is stabbed with needles, sometimes more than once, before she calms down. Nurses fly in and out of our room to sedate her. I’m sure the nurses must flip coins or draw straws to determine which of them will be dealing with Subject 1003.

Emily has a number of different personalities- or ’alters’- that she exhibits. My favorite one, which of course is the least common, is a mute ninety year old woman. She sways herself back and forth on the bench, teetering so much she occasionally falls over. She’s sitting in a rocking chair. That’s why shy sways and bobs so much. The only thing I dislike about Ethel is that when she falls, I’m the only one she likes to help her back up, so occasionally I have to put my book down to lift an eighteen year old, ninety year old woman off the floor where she’s fallen from her invisible crocheting chair. Ethel can’t speak so she spends most of her time rocking and crocheting me a sweater. It’s almost ready, apparently. She told me all this with body language. It was like playing charades, and it was actually somewhat fun.

The worst alter is Emily. I don’t know if she’s even real. I believe the real Emily may be another one of her alters, Rhonda. Rhonda is more withdrawn and seems reluctant to engage in conversation. She’s forgetful, never recalling what happened the last time she was here. I don’t know what makes me believe that Rhonda is the primary identity. It just seems to fit with her body, her eyes, her movements.

Emily is a malcontent toddler-like individual who seeks only to destroy and to inflict suffering upon anyone she is able to. She bellows like a child when she doesn’t get whatever it is all of her incomprehensible wailing is over, and for twenty minutes to an hour I suffer through this until a nurse comes along to silence her.

I try to refer to all of her alters as ‘Emily,’ simply because it’s overwhelming to keep track of them all. Only Emily responds to that name, however, so if I want to talk to someone else, I have to address them by their name, which can lead to a lot of confusion for both of us because only a few of Emily’s alters are aware of each other.

When Emily’s awake I wait with trepidation for her to stir. I can tell who she’ll be before she even speaks. Something changes in her posture, or her facial expressions. I have to be wary at all times. Every time this girl opens her eyes she is someone else. And I’m jealous of her.



“Athena, take your pills,” the nurse says. I roll out of bed and make my way to the door where the nurse hands me a Dixie cup with red, white, and blue pills in it. I grab the cup with my shaking hands and swallow the contents, not bothering with water. The nurse sighs. Her other hand is outstretched with the water I’ve ignored.

“I really wouldn’t recommend that you take these without water. You could choke to death,” the nurse says with a small frown. Most of the time one nurse is indistinguishable from the others. But this one frowns, and she calls me by my name and not my number. She must be new. There are a lot of new nurses here lately.

“Sorry, I forgot,” I say. I didn’t. I just like to make a small decision for myself once in a while, even if it’s as simple as taking my medication without water.

I take the shot of water and lie back down. I see that Emily’s asleep. She much have already taken her medication. I, too, close my eyes and prepare to slip down and away into a post-medication slumber.

“Athena, Emily. We have to go downtown. You can’t have a nap today,” the nurse says, interrupting my peace. Her voice is calm, but I can sense the exasperation. It’s written on her face, somewhere generally hidden from others, perhaps within the taut muscles of her sunken cheeks, but I can read it. I can read all of their expressions, no matter how blank they may appear.

Most of the nurses and all of the doctors adopt a condescending tone with the patients. I think it’s because we’re Unstable, and most of them believe that we haven’t matured a day past the age at which we were put in the facilities. They ascribe us a stupidity that would be insulting if we had actually received a formal education. They’re always on a mission to keep us calm and sedated. If our medication cocktails are the proper mixture of sedative and anti-depressants, barbituates and benzos, we should act like zombies. While under the influence of our pills our sensory input should be slowed. We should perceive the world as if it’s shrouded in a substance so viscous that even words cannot penetrate it properly.

“Okay,” I say. I roll back over and I look just beneath my painting. I stare at a specific brick in the wall into which I’ve carved my initials. I avoid looking at the painting after I’ve taken my medicine. If I do look at the painting in this condition, I’m always overcome inexplicably with shame. Even if I knew the reasons behind the shame, I’m sure I would tuck them back into some distant corner of my mind, hiding them so I could never reach them again. I’m constantly concealing my feelings from myself.

I wait for the pills to kick in. Currently I’m on three pills a day. When I was first admitted I was given just one pill for a while. At some point the doctors took me off of that, instead giving me an injection of some sort that was supposed to serve the same function as the pill, only its effects would last for a decade. After that I was given another white pill. I took that every day for a few years. The pills gave me terrible side effects, some of which were even more unbearable when I stopped taking the medicine.

I don’t remember when I was started on the blue pills, but I liked them instantly. I took those with only the white pill until a few years ago when the doctors at the testing facility decided that my diseased brain necessitated three pills a day.

I liked the blue pills the best when they were administered to me by themselves, not with other pills whose names and functions I don’t know. The blue pills seems to isolate my fear and push it far away. I felt like a human being when I took them. I always thought the blue pills were the best treatment for my disorders, but of course I’ve never told the doctors that. They don’t allow a patient to have any input when it comes to their treatment. The blue pills gave me a sense of what it would be like to be Stable, but I can’t feel that way. Instead I feel like I’m the zombie they want me to be.

I don’t believe my mind was broken by genetics or by my environment. I believe, for the most part, that it was taken from me. I am definitely anxious and depressed, but there’s something else that’s missing and it has been ever since I first stepped foot into this room. Sure, I was a prisoner of myself before the doctors found the best way to treat me, but now…well, I don’t really know what’s happened. All I know is that I’m still trapped within a prison, both of my own creation and of theirs.

My medicine kicks in and I latch onto the thought of the blue pills. The thought brings me immense relief and I start to become drowsy. Blue. The color of my calm.



“Subject 412, Subject 1003, it’s time to go downtown. You have ten minutes to get dressed and ready. You’ll be in the hall in ten minutes,” a nurse says. A different nurse. She wakes me up from my sedated slumber and I peek over at Emily. She’s awake, eyes heavy-lidded and her hands are curled up. Great.

Ethel will be accompanying us to testing this month. I can’t imagine what the doctors are going to do with her, and I would love nothing more than to listen in on Emily’s testing just to find out, but that sort of thing isn’t allowed at the testing center, so I’ll have to settle for imagining the doctor’s reactions to Ethel. Emily isn’t likely the first person with such a disorder that the doctors have tested, so they must have a protocol for situations such as this one.

I stand up to pull the government-issued garment I’ve been wearing every day for ten years over my head. A plain, white tee shirt is worn beneath a button-down blue shirt. My pants are blue draw-string pajama bottoms. I love the color blue, but the color of my uniform is bland and dull. It inspires nothing but boredom.

I often wish for a mirror so I could see the full extent of the mess of myself, but I’m only allowed brief glimpses of my reflection in the crowded shower room. I haven’t seen my reflection in years, but I know that my black hair is dry and wiry. Whenever I do catch a glimpse of myself, I never see what I expect to. It’s a thing best avoided. We’re not allowed mirrors. They are sharp objects with which we can’t be trusted. I comb through my hair, tearing pieces off at the root in process. It’s a straw-like nest. If I saw a someone with hair like mine, I would assume them to be homeless, which I suppose I am as this is not really a home. I give up halfway through. It’s too challenging. I suppose that the raised-by-wolves look will have to do today, just like every other.

My face probably doesn’t tell a better story, but I can’t wear makeup. Even if I could I would have no idea how to apply it; how to accentuate my good features and downplay the negative. Such feminine lessons are not ones easily learned in captivity.

Who am I trying to impress, anyway? The doctors at the testing facility? They don’t even ascribe human emotions or tendencies to us. Last month I asked them if I could take a break from testing to use the bathroom. The two doctors stared at each other quizzically. One even asked if I was certain I needed to use the toilet, as if I were somoe alien thing that didn’t need to shit like they did. I said no and sat back down. Any further plea on my part would have felt desperate at that point. Everything is always so spotlessly clean in the testing room. Perhaps my need to use the facilities offended their sense of cleanliness. I don’t know. I don’t know how they think.

I fear the doctors at the testing facility, but I also look to them for salvation, as if they are the ones who can free me, give me a real life. But they’ve never let anyone go. I know this. I still hope I will be the one that they will cure. We all know that there is no cure; we’ve been told more than enough. They’ve told us that we should just hope to live a long life. They say nothing about happiness, security, or love. Just life. As if that by itself is enough to sustain a person. As if having a pulse is the staple of humanity in our world. I can’t even disagree with them.



Ethel is sitting on the bench with a comb in her hand, trying to mimic what I’ve just done. She can’t get a solid grip upon it so I grab the comb and begin the process of grooming this girl. Her hair is so easy to comb I could probably run my fingers through it. It’s feather-soft. She thanks me by pressing her hand to my cheek, which is an odd feeling to me. I don’t know how to respond. I brush my teeth, but don’t help Ethel do the same. Emily and Rhonda are both capable of such things. They’ll do it after we get back. If one of them is available.

I help Ethel into her clothes. I am clumsy in the action. Caring for another person isn’t something I’m capable of. I can’t care for myself let alone someone else, but I do manage to get her dressed before the nurse comes by to shoo us out of my room.