Haunting Jessika

I could feel their eyes, like bugs crawling on my skin.

I was so angry when that doctor told my mother his lies. He said I had schizophrenia. That I saw things that weren't really there. That it might get worse. He convinced her it was possible I could hurt someone.

"I couldn't kill anything, not even a fly." I said, but they didn't say anything. "I couldn't hurt anyone," I pleaded louder. "I'm just scared to fall asleep, that's when she comes."

Neither the doctor or my mother listened to me. They only looked at each other, pity on their faces.

"I'm not crazy!" I yelled. "All I want is to be left alone!"

Nothing I did changed the doctor's opinion. They feared me, and my mother wept. The doctor continued speaking his lies to her, as if they were alone in the room, like I didn't exist. My mother sobbed, but she agreed to put me on medication. At that point, I curled up on my bed and drew the covers over my head. I wanted nothing more than to disappear forever.

They were wrong. I told them the truth. And I tried to explain it to Mother again, later.

"Medicine doesn't stop what I see!" Her mind was already made up. She wasn't listening to me anymore. And as I discovered later, she told the doctor everything I said. They hurt me and tortured me for what I said. For what I saw. I should have kept quiet. And after their Electroshock Therapy, it was the last time I admitted to anything. It was the last time I spoke to either of them.

I was ten when Father disappeared.

Mother said he was fighting a war, but I didn't believe her. All day, I watched from my window and thought about him. Where he was. What he was doing. Every evening, I waited on the front porch, hoping to see dust in the distance. The sign his car was driving up the long gravel road that led him home. Every day I would wait until it was dark, but Father never did come home. And every night, I would walk, with a heavy heart, back to my room. It didn't matter how many times I repeated the process, I still went to my room alone and in sadness every single night. I still loved Father more than anything.

I didn't buy the war story. Not for a second. Mother had something to do with him refusing to come home, and I was sure of it. One day after reading the mail, she started hiding. Except for meals, she seemed content to stay locked in her room. I heard her crying. All she did was cry. No wonder Father wouldn't come home. Mother was waiting for him. And who wants to hear her crying all day long? I didn't.

By the time I was twelve, I was more than lonely. I was terrified. It was the first time I remember being truly afraid.

It was just before the doctors, their poisonous medications, and their electrocutions.

And it was just after I saw... her.

By twelve, my mother's sickness had infected me. I started crying and regardless of how hard I tried, it wouldn't stop. I hated her for giving me her sorrow. I cried as I watched for Father all day and I continued until I fell asleep at night. If he couldn't come home, I thought, I just wanted to be wherever he was. I missed him so much it hurt.

I woke late one night, to the sounds of painful sobbing coming from somewhere outside my window. I climbed out of bed and peered into the darkness and saw what looked like my mother in her robe. She was kneeling on the grassy hill, looking up at the full moon, and wailing in heart-wrenching sorrow. I was drawn to her. Wanted to help her. Maybe I only needed to understand it. Whatever it was, I ran downstairs and out the front door. As much as I was angry with her for driving Father away, I realized I didn't hate her. Not now. Now I worried that she was not locked in her room, that she was no longer hiding her tears. I didn't know how to fix her.