Twelve pills, twelve days, twelve months.
I think you know what the pills are for. If you don’t, then I envy you, ignorant and naïve. But if you really want to know…
Suicide. You were all expecting it, the big s-word. The one no one wants to hear, well here it is. You better get used to it, because that dreaded word, the one people wish they didn’t have to talk about, it’s my life. So deal with it.
Twelve pills. I thought that was what it would take, end of the line, light in the tunnel, bullet through the head. But I’ll skip to the end of my sob story, it didn’t quite work. In fact, it didn’t work at all. So all happened was a badly damaged liver and twelve days in a coma. Which leads us to the next twelve:
TWELVE DAYS IN A COMA
You would think a hospital stay would be filled with crying mothers, serious fathers, and lots of vases of flowers. My parents only showed up once. The nurses felt sorry for me, or so they say. Apparently my heart stopped beating three times, once every day for the first three days. They say twelve days, but to me it felt like a second. Like sleep without dreams, when your eyes snap open to see that it’s morning and a new day.
For me it was like waking up to discover that I was in a nightmare. I was still alive for one thing. For another thing I was alone. I wondered if I was in heaven, or maybe just dead. I almost jumped for joy, finally rid of that stupid thing called life I’d had before. I sat up, and felt it. Pain. That thing you weren’t supposed to feel when you were dead.
Then a nurse walked in, holding a bag of liquid nutrients. She jumps, dropping the plastic bag and spilling the yellow pee-looking liquid. Then she ran out yelling down the hall.
Yep, wasn’t dead. I closed my eyes. Maybe I was having some sort of death-mare. But you didn’t feel pain in dreams did you, even nightmares. So I was alive. Back in the awful world we call our own.
“Hello Elizabeth… This may be hard to answer, but did you take too much Tylenol?” My eyes snapped open. In front of me was a balding man, wearing the white coat that symbolizes a doctor. His brown, almost black eyes bore into mine.
“I think you know,” I said, doing my best to weakly cross my arms. He nodded, grimly smiling. “And I think you know what that means,” he said. I nodded, “I do.”
Mental hospital. Only God knew how long. I shuddered at the thought, living with people, similar to me, with all of the problems. Peasants. Now, though I believed I was alone in the world, I knew that I was crazy. And melodramatic and awkward. I did not need to be surrounded by more of me.
“How long will I be there?” I asked. He looked at a clipboard. “Twelve months or more, depending on how you do.” I felt my eyes widen. I was screwed. Completely, utterly, fully, screwed.
