A Dream by Noon.

CHAPTER 2.

I feel unsteady as I shuffle down the hallway and I can't remember how long I've been sitting in Dr. Andrews' office. Yellow, fluorescent lights line the ceiling and are both too bright, and also dreary, at the same time. My eyes search the wall for a clock that I know doesn't exist. Why they seem to think we cannot handle basic things like the time, is beyond me.

To my left, the hallway lets out into the 'day room' which consists of a large vinyl couch, a tv on the wall that seems to only loop The Prices Right, and in the center a square wooden table with four chairs. The two bodies on the couch watching tv glance at me and then quickly back at the tv as I pass by. The two sitting at the table with Uno cards don't turn. I pass by as always, continuing straight down the hall, passing the nurses station on my right, and then counting the doors, all identical, none of them numbered, 1, 2, 3... until I count to 8. Take a right, close the door, and sit on my bed.

The sound of the door clicking shut offers a small amount of relief. I need to squint a bit for everything to be back into focus. It always feels that way after my sessions. My parents signed off on the hypnotherapy sessions. The dr. convinced them it would be a great form of therapy for me – a great way for me to remember and complying with their therapeutic program is the only way I'll be able to leave, so I pretty much don't have a choice, but, I think I'm on thin ice. Dr. Andrews has brought up a couple of times that she does not believe I'm trying hard enough.

Next to me, a bureau that could weigh no less than a thousand pounds. Either that or it's screwed into the floor, I assume so that we cannot move them. In its drawers are the clothes my mom picked out for me while I'm here. Things I would never wear, especially not here. Nice clothes, the kind meant for nice dinners out, or holidays. I've taken off the sweatpants and hoodie that I had on when I arrived only to shower. On top of the bureau, a thick notebook with a hard pink cover. It's meant for me to write my thoughts in each day. A form of 'self-therapy' they've told me. They even reward me with a gold star sticker for each day that I write in it. 'We only glance at the pages to see that you've written, never to read it word for word. This book is for you.' The nurse told me as she gave me the rundown on check-in day. Bullshit. Bullshit that it's 'just for me' and bullshit that they don't read it. I know they do.

The hypnotherapy, the journaling, they are all just a way of finding out what happened. 'We all just want to know what happened, where you were all that time' my mom repeated to me after I returned home, and before I arrived here. The doctor echoing the same in our sessions. 'It's important for your healing, Sam' She told me. I was being honest with them when I told them I didn't remember. It is the reason I didn't fight over the admission to Walden. I knew I must have gone crazy. That was the only explanation for what had happened. Over the past few days though, little by little, flashes of memories have returned. Memories that I'm not ready to share with them.

The thing is, writing really is my escape, but I wasn't dumb enough to put all my thoughts into a book for them to read. I pick up the pink notebook, and the dull colored pencils in the cup next to it and start sketching – green for long vines around the borders of the page, then leaves branching off, and then spending nearly an hour filling in the vine page border with colorful little flowers; roses, daisies, dahlias, peonies, sunflowers... Inside the floral border I write a poem I remember from when I was little.

The Bloath

In the undergrowth

There dwells a Bloath

Who feeds upon poets and tea.

Luckily, I know this about him.

While he knows almost nothing of me.