An Unwanted Trip To Old Friends - Version 2?

My head hung low, my fists clenched, my breathing getting shallow.

How could he?

That was the thought running round and round in my mind. I couldn’t hear anything - it was all just … white noise.

I was marching down the high street, on the way home from school. Nameless, faceless people stared as I stormed past, but I just didn’t care. The anger and fear boiling up inside, forcing me on. I was blind with rage.

How could he? How in the world could he?!

I caught only blurry glimpses of the people I past … They were laughing, talking, chatting their way past me … but in my fury I couldn’t even begin to make out what they were saying.

Over the noise, I heard a familiar voice, singing a familiar song. Outside the post office, Homer Simpson was singing ‘Jingle Bells’ – complete with a fire engine red Santa Suit. Small kids laughed and danced along with the mechanical doll – laughing, happy. I remembered happy – just twenty minutes before, I was happy. A lifetime ago, I was happy. But not now, perhaps not ever again. Not after he …

How could he? How in the world could he? Didn’t he know what he’d said?

My breath was coming in great gulping gasps now … Ragged, coarse … My asthma kicking in.

“Damn asthma!” I hissed - gasping to take another painful breath, “he’s gonna kill me without even knowing!”

And I stormed on – locked in my tussle with the world and everything in it … My battle with him and the memory of what he said …Especially that …

How could he? How in the world could he? Didn’t he know what he’d said? Didn’t he understand what he’d done to ME?!

“Why did you run off like that?” He asked, grabbing my shoulder and turning me to face him. “Just what’s wrong with you anyway?!”

And there we stood … In the car park of Sommerfield – me and him, him and I … And as he kept on talking and talking and talking I just stared at him, listening to every word he said, but not hearing him… not hearing anything …

*
Everything is white … But not snowy white, not the white of freshly washed sheets … sickly white, milky white, deathly white …
I open my eyes.

I’m at home, back in my room, my own dark purple place …

“Oh, get over yourself!”
“Shut up, leave me alone!”

But she won’t, she won’t go, she won’t leave me be, she’s never done anything I’ve asked her before and she’s not about to start now.

“Look at me ..” she demands.

But I bury my head in my hands … “Leave me alone,” I say again, “you’ll get me into trouble again if you don’t.” I plead with her.

“You can’t keep blaming me for all your problems,” she says, “after all … I’m not even here.” When I look up at her, she smiles, her favourite, mocking little smile. I turned away and closed my eyes - She is not here. She just a stupid hallucination! That’s all… She is not real.

“I am real,” she laughed, “as real as you are anyway!”
My eyes flew open.
“You know I hate it when you read my thoughts!”
I picked up my bag and headed for the door.
“I can’t believe you’re going back to him. Especially after what he said.”
I turned back, to tell her exactly why … But there was no-one there to tell.

*
The white flickered and flashed on the edge of my vision … But I blinked it away and walked, with false confidence, into the restaurant … Looking for him.

There he was, in the corner. He looked up as I flopped down.
“Hey,” I said, and received a hey back. And it was all fine, easy, entirely sane … Cheese burgers - check; large cokes - double check – with ice. Just, me and him and a room full of familiar strangers..
“I can’t believe you, I can’t believe you just sit there like that – after what he said!”
Fortunately he couldn’t hear her – no one ever can – and I tried my hardest not to. But she’ knows me too well.
“You remember don’t you, you remember what he said, even you aren’t so stupid that you’d forget that!”
“I’M NOT STUPID!”
“I didn’t say you were,” he said. But it was too late.
I stood up and just screamed at her … incapable, unable, unwilling to stop.
“Why do you always do this to me?! why can’t you just leave me alone?! Why do you have to be so cruel!”
“Who are you talking to?” he shouted, “what is wrong with you?! Are you mad?!”

And that stopped me dead, stopped me cold.

And she sat there next to him with that smile, you know the one, that smile that says everything.
“See” she said. “I told you …”

And I turned and ran, and ran and ran … Into the night, into the darkness … Back towards the white …
*

“… ‘people in mad houses should all be killed’ …”
“What?”
“Apparently, that’s what he said to her”
“Who?”
“The boyfriend …”
Flash, flash, flash … The lights flare and fade through the blood red darkness of my tightly shut eyes. But I can’t shut out the voices of the two of them - My ‘carers’, my ‘keepers’, my ‘captors’ – as they push me closer and close to the white …
“Boyfriend? Well … I suppose she’s pretty enough … For a mental!”
And I could hear her smiling at that, her silent, endless laughter ..

*
“Here you go love,” the older one said, opening the door and helping me out of the chair. He was all white, white clothes, white hair – pale, lifeless white …
“You’ll be ok now, safe in here …”
I felt his bony hand on my back.
Push.
I Hit the floor.
Slam.
“Hi,” she said, with a knowing smile.
The heavy key turning was still loud, even through the padding on the door.
White, all white. Soft, safe … But not welcoming, never that.
“Here we are … home again … safe again” she whispered … “It’s just me and you again …”
And I couldn’t help it, I laughed … After all, that’s what mad people do, right?