Death, Or Something Like It

My chin resting on the table, I could see the file of everything that's ever been wrong with me laid open. The good doctor sits in the plastic chair across from me. Her plastic eyes searching mine, hoping to find insight into my troubled brain.
         
Troubled. My label. Some other good doctor wrote that on my file 7 years ago and it stuck.
         
She asked me a question, but I wasn't listening. I've been asked a lot of questions. Each one as well researched and supported by the latest studies as the last. I don't care. I don't fucking care.
         
“Maybe some people are just meant to die?” Wrong answer. Where the hell did that come from? Did I turn emo when I wasn't looking? It's not what she wants to hear, but I'm tired today and sometimes faking it takes too much energy. But it's true, it's what I think. At least, it's what I think right now, in this plastic room.
         
I lift my head up to listen to her retort but I'm distracted by the poster behind her. A girl sitting on some institutional steps with a pile of books at her feet. She looks at me with weepy, angsty eyes. Maybe her boyfriend date raped her? Maybe she throws up after she eats? Maybe the girl who sits beside her in math class called her a whore because she got a little too friendly with some drunk boy at a party when her parents were away? The text at the bottom of the poster tells her to call a 1-800 number for help. It won't, I've tried.
         
“What's going on for you, Jeanette, in this moment?” The good doctor puts her pen down on the pad of yellow paper and sits back in her chair. The pen thing is a good trick. By putting it down she thinks it makes her look like she actually wants to hear what I have to say. She's trying to tell me that she's not just there to record the troubling things I admit to, that she cares about me, wants what's best for me. She rests her hands on the table and subtly checks the progress of the clock behind me. But it's not subtle at all.
         
What? I ask her in my head. They didn't cover this in the role play? They didn't tell you that actually talking to a real suicidal teenager isn't really all it's cracked up to be? Fucking depressing, isn't it? Try being me for a day, then maybe you can tell me what's going on in this moment.
         
I want it to be over as much as she does. This goddamn room! No air, no sunlight. The lone flourescent light hums above us, leaking it's thick light down into the crevasses of this suffocating space. My plastic chair grinds on the floor when I shift my feet. My hands play against the cool metal supporting the table and I notice the gum some other troubled youth left behind. It's gross, but mushing the soft goo with my fingers is the most satisfying thing I can do right now. In here. With her.
         
I want to ask her how she got here. What misfortune of destiny caused her to end up here with me. Is she in it for the money? Her perfect manicure tells me someone else is helping with the bills. I know what this gig pays, I've done my research. Did her life suck like mine? Now she's motivated by some sense of duty to help those less fortunate? Was she hungover on registration day and chose the major with the shortest line? I want to ask her, but she won't tell me the truth. She's a liar, just like me.
         
“I don't know. Things have just been really hard lately.” Shit, wrong again. She wants to know why things are hard and I don't want to tell her. Didn't she read my file? Can't she put the clues together herself?
         
“School's been really hard this year.” I've done this before but I'm off my game.
         
“How's that?” she says, leaning forward in her chair, her eyes narrowing. She thinks narrow eyes make her look like she cares but it just looks like she's trying to read the fine print hidden somewhere on my forehead. I should forgive her because she's young and new at this, but I don't. Right now she's numero uno on the grudge list.
         
I look down and see my fingers covered in stringy, green gum. I rub them together to get it off, but the mess spreads. I hope I don't get AIDS.
         
She picks up the pen and writes something down. It probably says something like “unresponsive” or “reluctant to engage”. I don't care and I keep trying to work the gum off of my hands.
         
“Jeanette, I'm concerned that you're not expressing your feelings with me today.” She uses my name to personalize the process, but she never told me hers. She looks like a Monica or maybe Theresa. Something stuffy and overproduced. Plastic.
         
I rack my brain for something to say. Something that will make her happy and make her feel like she got somewhere today. I don't care about her feelings, not really. I just need her to stop and let it be over. She can go back to her colleagues and tell them what strides she was able to make and what wonderful progress she made with me. I'll leave untouched, unchanged, unprovoked. Some people were meant to die.
         
There's a polite knock at the door and some man sticks his head in before Dr. Monica has a chance to answer.
         
“Sorry Mel, we're going to have to cut this short, we need the room. Hey Jeanette.” For fuck's sake she's not even a doctor. Who the hell is this girl? How'd that guy know my name? I don't care, that man needs the room and this is over.

She's packing up her pen and yellow paper and telling me I can go. She looks at me when I stand up, probably expecting a thank-you for her troubles. A shiny medal to pin on the lapel of her ego. I stare blankly in return and stick my still gummy hands in my pockets.