Four White Walls

Chapter One: The Confrontation

One, two, three, four. 

I combed my short brown hair while counting out every single stroke. I set the comb down on the edge of the sink and walked to the door very slowly, my eyes on my brand new sneakers. I sucked in my breath and counted my footsteps as I walked.

One, two, three, four.

My counting continued until I got to the kitchen where my breakfast was waiting for me. A steaming pile of scrambled eggs sat on my mother’s good china. Beside the eggs rested strips of bacon and sizzling pieces of sausage. My mouth watered as I looked down then counted. I had one piece of bacon and two pieces of sausages. Three. My heart began to pound hard and beads of sweat formed on my forehead. Heat began to radiate from my palms as I felt an anxiety attack coming on.

“C… can I have another piece of b… bacon?” I asked my mom uneasily.

She looked over her shoulder, sandy blonde hair cascading down her back like a golden waterfall, “Malakai, don’t you do this to me again.”

“It’s just… it’s just a… another piece of bacon…”

With a hand on her hip, she swiveled around, “You don’t want it because you want the bacon, you want it because of that thing you have,” she spat.

I bit my tongue uneasily and tasted blood. She was talking about my Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. It was acting up again. I looked around nervously. My breathing was becoming even more unsteady, “Please… just one more piece of bacon…”

“Why not another piece of sausage?” she asked mockingly.

“Because then it would be uneven,” I replied quickly. “The number would be odd… I can’t have odd numbers.”

My mother slammed her spatula down and grease splattered. Some landed on her skin and made a sickening sound, but she did not even flinch. I winced.

“You are getting help! You need help!” my mother came over to me and took away one of my sausages. “There. One of each. That makes two. Can you live with two?”

I shook my head, “I need four.”

“Why do you need four? The world isn’t going to end if you don’t have four!”

Tears began to form in my eyes. I could not explain it. I could never explain it. No one understood me. Four was just something I needed. I just felt something bad was going to happen if I did not have my little ritual of four. Something could go wrong. Of course, I knew this was not true, but I couldn’t help myself. My poor mother had put up with me for so long, but now that high school was over, she just couldn’t take it anymore. She snapped. She broke.

“You’re going to the institution.”

My brown eyes widened, “Institution?”

She nodded and shoved the sausage link in her mouth, “Beauville Mental Institution. It helps people like you get better.”

I stared down at my plate and fiddled with my fingers. I couldn’t go to a mental institution. That would make me crazy wouldn’t it? I’m not crazy. I’m just a little… different, right?

“Mom, I don’t think I should go,” I said cautiously.

She scoffed, “You’re going. You can’t get a job because of this problem. You can’t moved out of the house because of this problem. This problem has to be removed before you can do anything! You’re definitely going to the institution.”