Mi
Emmet didn’t
come back until it was time to escort me down the see Doctor Jordan. I had wanted him to, I had wanted to
apologize or say something because I hated causing his tears. The next time I
saw him I almost expected him to seem different with me but after some time to
calm down and I had some moments to make my screaming head settle he seemed
that same as he smiled at me and said that Doctor Jordan thought it would be OK
for me to go and have the assessment that was needed for my discharge from the
ECA in his office. It was not really the result I was looking for. I hated
Doctor Jordan’s office and the way it tried to radiate its importance. I hated
the books and the filling cabinets and the framed pictures of family on the
massive desk that wasn’t needed. I hated the fact that every certificate he had
ever got was displayed in frames that towered over the person that sat opposite
him at his desk or on one of the more “informal” blue chairs that formed a
semi-circle and the fish tank that was meant to be calming was the worse. The
fish in there came in and out faster than we did and there was no thought for
them weather we liked it or not. I had always none we were his pet fish.
I was told to
sit on the chair opposite the desk by Emmet and Doctor Jordan before Emmet
retreated to the door to leave me in there alone with him. I wanted him to say.
It felt like he had my voice somewhere in his pocket and he took it with him
when he left the room leaving me with nothing to put into the conversation. The
trouble was things changed from over the days. The emotions of pain and fear
and dread remained the same but Sophie had become almost quite after her first
flare up that had landed me in the ECA so there wasn’t much to say about her.
After the fight I had almost learnt to deal with having a period like every
other girl in the unit. I felt broken I hated myself but it was impossible to
fight all the time against the big things so I felt crippling pain while I
worked with them.
“Right Mi, I
know that it is nearly lunch time but I think it is important that we get you
out of the ECA as soon as possible. To many days in there is not very
empowering to you but we also have to manage the risk that comes with your
discharge from there. We are going to have to think of your observations.” Doctor
Jordan announced as he finished typing on his laptop and he looked over the top
of it at me his eyes boring into my soul so I had to look down at the floor
trying to work out exactly how many colours where in the speckles of the
carpet. I wanted to run away from there. I wanted to feel the breeze on my face
that moved the trees just outside his window but even that was weird after two
days in the Prison that was the ECA there was no time inside those walls. It
was a constant night inside and outside my head.
“So Mi can
you go into some details to tell me why Emmet and Esmee thought that you needed
to spend the extended time in the ECA.” My heart froze slightly. It was there
idea that I spent so long in hell? They had blamed him and I had accepted that.
After all he had done the assessment that sentenced me to liquid meals and
pyjamas.
“It’s over
now isn’t it? How does it matter?” I moaned moving my eyes from the floor to
the fish tank then up to glance at Doctor Jordan. In a way I wanted to tell him
but words where useless they failed me.
“The thing is
Mi unless you tell me exactly what is happening and how you feel I do not know
the best way to help you. I will just have to go with the risk that you are
presenting and the way you reacted and move you to red observations but that
isn’t helping you is it? Now what I got from Emmet and Esmee was that you put
you a huge fight while they were trying to feel you after you refused breakfast
before you started screaming talking to yourself and then eventually presenting
as catatonic. Can you remember that?”
I remembered,
I remembered the way that Sophie exploded and soaked her badness into my blood
stream. I Remembered Esmee protecting me bringing me back. I wanted to say
something, I had to. For her
“I sort of
remember, but I don’t want to. It sounds crazy if I tell you will bang
me up again and I was hoping to leave here eventually.”
“If you don’t tell me Mi, I can’t help you and you will land
up staying longer all and all. Your section will not be reseeded while we think
that you are a danger to yourself or others now you can either talk to us and
use us for your recovery or fight us and remain here.”
“I sometimes hear things.” I sighed defeated dragging my
feet across the luxury carpet destroying the pattern of the tiny pink speckles.
It was against my better judgment to open my mouth and say anything but what he
said made sense and Esmee had fort for me I wanted to be better for her and my
way wasn’t working.
“Can other people here these things?” Doctor Jordan asked
sipping from a mug on his desk as he typed ferociously onto his laptops, the
keys sounding angry as the had to write in my darkest secrets that made Sophie
more than angry as she snapped out of her hibernation.
“ What the hell do you
think that you are doing Mia? You can’t tell them about me! I am your only
friend, they will try and get rid of me ant then they will make you even less
then you are. They will make you fat
Mia, that’s all they want. Do you want to
get fat?”
“If they could it wouldn’t sound crazy would it.” I snapped
trying to shake off the voice of Sophie.
“So you here sounds? Voices?”
“Just one voice,” I stuttered as my legs started bouncing
under the table my who body protesting the fact that I was speaking about something
that I had told my head that should remain silent about. Voices in your head
where taboo, you went from someone who could be normal to a freak as soon as
you said anything. Things didn’t make any sense.
“Someone pacific.”
“She calls herself Sophie and she says she is my only friend
she says she will make me thin and perfect, she says with her I will
survive.” I almost shouted in a rush
trying to get the words out before a shrieking Sophie could freeze them in my
mouth.
“It’s OK Mi, we are really getting to places here ok. I just
need you to try and stay with me and keep answering my questions the best you
can. Is she talking to you now Mi?”
I nodded swallowing hard against the nausea as I pulled on a
lose thread from my top and bounced my legs harder. I kept my head bowed to my
legs and my eyes closed trying to block her out trying to listen to doctor
Jordan but she didn’t like him and in a way neither did I. This was the man who
locked me behind a padded door and shoved a tube up my nose for what he said was
my own good, but Sophie scared me so much more than she ever used too and Doctor
Jordan was willing to listen.
“What is she saying
Mi?”
“She doesn’t want me to say anything or to talk to you, and
she screams at me when she is unhappy, she gets so loud in my head?”
“So how do you feel about Sophie then. Do you like hearing
her? Is she a comforting thing to you?”
“I used to, now I have seen the real her and it was the most
terrifying thing.” I squeaked shaking my head from side to side to try and drive
the misty images of the monster Sophie changed into out of my head before the
screaming inside could become vocal.
“You’re doing brilliantly Mi.” Doctor Jordan encouraged.
“For what it is worth I don’t think you’re crazy. I have a few more questions and it will be
really good if you can answer them. Have you ever seen Sophie?
“She used to live in the mirror and I could steal quick
glances but she was a shadow not really real. But I have seen her once. That
morning in the Clinic when I wouldn’t let them tube me. She was so persistent
and I was so confused and scared because of getting my period again and then
she was just there so real. It seemed impossible that she wasn’t and she was so
angry and she changed from beautiful to terrifying and then I don’t remember
and now you know as much as me.” I could feel tears poring out of my eyes as I pushed
against her.
“Do you want Sophie to go away?”
“I am not sure. I have never lived without her.” I confessed
trying to rub the tears out of my eyes as quick as they kept coming.
“Mi it’s OK just try and listen to me over her,” Doctor
Jordan said gently getting himself up from his side of the desk and coming
closer to me, placing his arm over my
shoulders. “Sophie is a form of psychosis. She is something the sick part of
you has made up she fuels the bit of you that is sick without her you have a
better chance of getting better.” Doctor Jordan said softly getting up from
behind his desk and coming over to sit on a chair close to me. “I bet she had
never really said anything nice to you.”
“She was trying to help. If I could of just stuck to her
plan. If I was stronger.” I spluttered shaking my head again as my breath
caught in my throat making me squeak. I want to be thin. I just want to be thin
and pretty. I want to be thin!” I said desperately looking into Dr Jordan’s
eyes the tears building in mine and falling over the edges as the dark blue
depression paralyzed me.
“Mi honey.” Doctor Jordan said holding onto my hand. “ I can
guarantee you, you will be dead before you are thin enough for Sophie.”
