One Flew INTO The Cuckoos Nest

Chapter One

"Now Mr. Cross don't be ridiculous!" Doctor Baker yells at me. Her notepad is filled with dark pencil lines where she has continuously scratched out my story again and again.

"What now?" I ask throwing my hands in the air. It's been 3 hours since my arrival here at the ward and I've yet to even get to look around.

"You say your teacher Mrs. Randall turned into a large purple skinned monster and ate another student?" she acusses.

I nod, "Yes mam, poor old Jared Richards." I tell her shaking my head sadly. He'd been a nice kid. Maybe a little scruffy around the edges and certainly not my friend but he'd been nice. "That old beast swallowed him whole!"

"That is not true!" she says running a wrinkled hand through her greying hair. I swear I'm watching the strands turn silver now.

I jump to the top of my seat, planting my feet where my butt ought to be and exclaim, "It's the truth even if it didn't happen!" quoting my favorite Bromden quote from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, which happens to be clenched in my hand.

Doctor Baker sighs, exasperated, and puts a finger down onto her phone machine. It beeps and she tells it, "Dipper could you please come get our new patient Ethan Cross and get him associated with his new home?" she asks rather sweetly as if she hasn't just been screaming with me. I hate when people do that. When they're all mad one moment but in the next they act like it never happened. Hunky dory they call it. Bull shit is what I call it, but I can't ever say that around mom.

The machine tells her that he's on his way and I sit down, my eyes focusing on some random spot on the wall as I daze off remembering how in my book everything in the ward is a machine. Sitting here I can hear the walls hummin just like Bromden does. But I think they're hummin with anticipation instead of evil this time.

Dipper walks in moments later snapping me into reality, or at least I think so. My therapist said that I live in lots of realities and that I make up some of them but you know what? I didn't feel crazy or even think I was until everybody said so. Dipper takes my wrist but he isnt rough with me as he pulls me from my seat and guides me out of the room. He's tall, maybe just as tall as Bromden in the story, I smile thinking of the 6 foot native american. Dipper is also dark skinned like the black boy nurses only he doesn't wear white, he wears blue and he smiles and I don't think he has anything bad in store for me. Even still you can't ever be too careful, so I pull my hand back from him.

"You're not planning to stick a thermometor in my butt are you?" I ask uneasily and the tall man stops. He pauses looking at me a moment and then laughs a big hearty laugh.

"What in the hell are you talking about?" he asks tears in his eyes. Instantly I relax. I guess this ward isn't like the one in my book, 'cause in my book you don't laugh just 'cause unless you're Mc Murphy, and if you're Mc Murphy you're no enemy of mine anyway. I look at him with wide eyes and wordlessly hold up my book. Dipper examines it a moment and the says thoughtfully, "I've read that before! That's about that 1960's mental ward!" he says with a grin.

"Yeah, though this place isn't too much like it." I say with a look around at the children's drawings hanging on the walls.

"No, no, not really." he tells me putting a hand on my back and guiding me down the hall. I watch my feet as they swing over the tiled floor propelling me forward. "Okay here we are. This is the main room." He tells me. I nod in response. "Your room number is 25 so when it's time for room time you'll go there okay?" He asks kindly.
"Okay." I say and look up. The room is large and wide but it has big windows along the side that lead to a little walled in yard. I squint at the sun comin in and look around. There are kids all around, but I don't see any vegetables or wheelers. I don't see a single person with his hands against the wall like Jesus. I raise an eyebrow as I walk in deeper. Some kids are playing games at the tables. Younger kids play go fish. Older kids play monopoly. In the corner a group is even playing that dance video game. Jamie used to love that game. Then there are other kids who are keeping all to themselves only glancing over their books to peer around the room nervously here and there.
This is my moment when I decide my path. Should I be loud and lively or quiet and reserved...
I take my book and join the quiet kids. I claim my very own table put my feet up and open my book. With in moments I'm sucked into the story. I always found it scary out how enveloped I can get into things. My one physiatrist called it hyper focus. I just stare at something and I carve into it with something sharp until I've made a me sized hole. Then I back into it and cover the hole again from the inside. I'm already deep inside my book, wrapped in it's pages when this girl rips me from it's binding.
"Whatcha reading?" She asks curiously.
I look up, "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. It's about a crazy man and his crazy life in the ward." I tell her taking my book back from her grip.
"Hmm, okay, and are you crazy?" She asks.
I grin, "That's what they tell me. But that's what this place is for! The ward is a place for the crazy!" I say.
She looks at me a moment and cocks her head to the side her blond hair falling to the side of her shoulder, "No. This place is for a lot more than the crazy."
My eyebrows come together, "What do you mean? What are you in the ward for?" I ask. I watch the freckle on her top lip move as she speaks. I always loved freckles. They're like sprinkles on ice cream, they just make everything look better.
"I'm here for depression!" She says with a wide happy smile and I raise an eyebrow, "And this isn't a 'ward' it's Brain's Band-Aid. Aren't wards from like the 60's?" She asks.
"No wards are still around!" I argue, "And this is one of them and you are too crazy!"
The girl just chuckle and stands up taking my hand in her small pale one, "I'm Jenny by the way, I'm going to give you a little tour."
I stand up and take my hand back feeling it prickle in hers like pop rocks on your tongue. I haven't felt that sensation since Jamie and I were friends. Jenny leads the way out of the main room and I watch her skirt move to and fro.
"You don't need uniforms here?" I ask as I examine her legs within her see through black skirt. A short solid skirt stops right at her thigh leaving her white little legs on display. They remind me of them sculptures at the museums my class used to visit. Jamie told me them things were made by mastermind artists. Right now I couldn't agree more.
"Uniforms?" Jenny laughs, "This isn't a prison!"
I give the back of her head a quizzical look even though she can't see it. I'm not too sure she's right yet. This may not be the ward but I bet it's got something like it goin on. I'm keeping my eyes peeled for that evil nurse Ratched and her fiendish black boys.
I'm so busy thinking about my book and the evil this place could hold to realize that Jenny isn't walkin anymore and I just 'bout run her tiny frame over.
"Watch it this isn't some game of bumper cars!" She scolds and I shrug taking in her angry blue eyes as she steadies herself. "Now, I wanna show you my room!" She says opening her door. The number 24 hangs in it in silvery metal. I guess my room is across the hall. I follow her in and she closes the door.
She sits on the bottom bunk of the bed in the corner an I walk around looking at the pictures of her and I guess the other people would her friends. I look at the band posters and then to her nightstand. "Why's this picture frame empty?" I ask.
"Because, I want to make happy memories again one day. I want to be better." She says looking at it herself.
"What about all them?" I ask pointing to the pictures in the wall.
"Those are from before. I want to remind myself that I can be that again." She says with a smile.
"You don't seem too depressed or crazy. Are you sure you even are?" I ask.
She shrugs, "That's what they tell me."