Dementophobia • tyler joseph •

isle of flightless birds // entry

June 18th, 2013

Yesterday, I saw my mother and younger sister, Madison. It was the first time that I had visiting day in this place. Mrs. Eva took me out of class because they dropped by unexpected.

Normally, mental hospitals are really strict about visit times and didn't want people dropping in left and right, but since my family lived a few hours away and had to drive here, they made an exception.

When I was walking out of class, I ran into Courtney, who was coming into my classroom to grab a textbook she didn't have back in her room. I reached out to grab her arm to help her regain her balance, but she cringed away from my touch. She didn't say a word in return, but she gave me a small smile before darting into the classroom.

Mrs. Eva, who must have seen the confused look on my face, explained that Courtney hasn't had a lot of social interaction, so she wasn't good with someone touching her.

Did that mean she didn't even let her own parents hug her? Her siblings? Maybe she didn't have any parents or siblings, I had no idea. The only thing I knew was her name and it was a beautiful one.

Visiting with my mom and sister was fantastic until they started asking me if I was making friends and if I was feeling any better.

I really didn't have an answer for any of their questions. It wasn't because I didn't have any friends or because I wasn't feeling better. It was because I was afraid if I told them the truth, they would be disappointed. But if I lied, they would be disappointed. Either way I would disappoint my family, so I chose not to answer at all.

My thoughts weren't even making sense, not even to me. Now I understand why Mrs. Eva never understood what I was talking about when I actually did talk. Mr. Baker was the only one who could actually figure out what I was saying.

The conversation was going okay, but then Madison had to bring up Courtney.

That was the day I learned that Josh couldn't be trusted with anything involving Courtney.

I planned to not tell anyone, but Josh about Courtney because I didn't want my mother to assume that I was getting better just because I was interested in a girl that didn't even really talk to me.

Courtney said only a few words to me today. We had support group and we supposed to get into pairs. Of course, she and I were the only ones that didn't have a partner, so we had to go together.

The only words Courtney uttered were "hi Tyler," and "I'm sorry for barging into your session with Mr. Baker."

I did most of the talking and she smiled quite often. That was a good sign, wasn't it? It meant that she was actually listening to what I had to say.

The partner thing was for a little project that Mrs. Eva was making us do. We have to make a poster board listing our likes and dislikes. It had to include multiple pictures and explanations too. It shouldn't be too hard and at least I could get to know Courtney that way.

Overall, today was okay.

Tyler Joseph, entry number eight in Isle of the Flightless Birds.
Written on June 18th, 2013 at 4:42 pm in pen.