Dance Without Sleep

Tori Amos' "Silent All These Years." That was the last song I heard before I was placed in a psych ward. Most people referred to it as a "nuthouse" or a "loony bin." I thought that those terms were rather crude.

Case Number 65-667-767. Max Alexander Colvin. Hospitalized three times for acute depression and suicidal thoughts. Suicide attempts were unsuccessful. Patient ingested a large doze of a prescribed antidepressant. Substance in question, "Zoloft." Subject showed signs of obsessive compulsive behavior. Seemed to be suffering from low self-esteem and brief bouts of mania, which affected his mood from time to time.

In other words folks, I was absolutely crackers and I needed some serious professional help. And helped I was. At the Amelia Winterson Clinic For The Mentally Disturbed. Although, the part about the mentally disturbed was omitted from the plaque on the front gate. From what I heard, the term "mentally disturbed" wasn't appropriate for Lincoln Park.

I had a habit of shortening things. Phrases, words. The "Winterson Center" sounded much nicer. It went over better at social functions and family gatherings.

Our hospital used to be a therapeutic day school. It had that smell, that compressed, armpit like smell that was made worse by the generic floor polish that was applied to those hardwood floors, the ones that were found in a privileged public school. The third floor was untouched, the flip top desks were still lined up in rows of three and "Old Glory" was still bowing down to the blackboard. The pink crayola chalk was still on the silver edge, along with the erasers that hadn't been cleaned in god knows when.

There were five floors in our building. Our schoolhouse, if you will. The girls slept on the fourth floor and the boys slept on the second floor. The second floor and the fourth floor looked exactly the same. Each floor was painted lavender and each floor had three doors on the right. Three doors on the right and three doors on the left. The maximum capacity was twelve girls and twelve boys on each floor, twenty four psychotics in all. There were two girls to a room and there were six rooms in all. There was one minor difference. The boys ward had one window. It was in my room, the room I shared with Robert, one of my fellow lunatics. The girls ward didn't have windows at all, only heating vents. All of us, (boys and girls,) had heating vents. We all had desks. The desks stood against the wall and each desk had a lamp on it. Each lamp was shaped like a giraffe. The bulbs were as dim as shit. They barely gave off any light. Not enough to read by. The floors were granola colored. Were sticky, cold, and poorly washed. They had bleach stains on them that were shaped like Wisconsin.

The nurses station was on the first floor. All the nurses wore turtlenecks. They had beige pants that were creased rather perfectly in each leg. They wore Doc Martins. Their shoes had spaghetti colored laces. Johnny was the day guard. He had sculpted arms and an under whelming gut. He was the guy that announced your presence and your purpose to the nurse that was on staff. He whistled an Eric Clapton tune while he waited for the door to buzz him in. The door buzzed, Johnny whistled. He did a curtsey as he waved me by. He flashed me an impersonal smile. A smile that dripped of detachment.

I went ahead, saw the nurse station that looked like a Photo-Mat booth from the nineteen eighties. The phone behind the Plexiglas rang, the clock that was on the wall above the Plexiglas ticked towards eleven AM.

"Got another one. Mr. Max Colvin." Johnny smiled, took a breath that told everyone about his ambitions. This "psych ward" wasn't for him. Guys like him always breathed like that, especially when they hated their job. In his eyes, this whole nuthouse scene was downright monotonous. Johnny had dark skin, thick cheeks, a nose that was shaped like a cornstalk, and a diamond stud in his left ear. He slid a manila envelope under the hole, and then he shifted his body weight onto his right leg. I moved towards the day room. He looked at me with an aire of suspicion.

There was an olive green couch along the wall, opposite of the slightly open window that had its chicken wire screen down. A brunette with long fingers was eating a packet of sugar. She had an orgasmic look in her eyes when she swallowed. There was an all American boy sitting next to her. He sniffed his nose more often than usual, liked the way his fingers felt when they ran through his blond locks, which were sculpted in a mushroom style dew.

A rail thin girl with shoulder length black hair was sitting at an almond colored table. She was crossing and uncrossing her legs as she wrote in a journal. Its paper was unusually thick and it was bound with rubber bands. Her tongue protruded her teeth. She saw me watching her. She turned her head to acknowledge me. She made an "ummmmmmmmm" sound and closed her eyes. Her shoulders wiggled, her head swiveled. She was grooving to her own beat. A beat that only she only heard.

Johnny made a motion with his index finger. He asked me for one more moment, and then he cursed me under his breath. He stepped behind me, put his hand on my shoulder. I felt his Cheeto breath on the back of my neck.

"You'll meet them later." Johnny smiled at the light skinned nurse with the purple nails. He dismissed me with his eyes. I was just another scared little boy who had taken the road less traveled. I had to admit, he wasn't that far off.

"What's the secret to this place?" I asked, thinking about his height, how he towered over me. I wondered if my voice had any chance of reaching him, if he was even listening to me. I just saw a head, a huge head. His nostrils looked three dimensional.

"What was the question, kid?" he asked, rather annoyed. He smiled at the day nurse and she flashed him a smile that said, "leave the kid alone."

"What's the secret to this place?" I asked again, like some pre-schooler in a cheesy holiday commercial.

Johnny looked at me, and I looked at him, and he looked at the day nurse. She wondered about him. Was he being difficult or was just he being indifferent?

The players:

The girl with the sugar fixation was named Glory. She was hospitalized for an eating disorder. Namely, anorexia nervosa. The only thing that she ate was sugar. Sugar for lunch, sugar for breakfast, sugar for dinner. Even the feeding tube didn't change anything. Glory still ate sugar and she still refused to eat anything else. In the morning she ate sugar. In the evening she ate sugar. At bedtime, she took her nighttime sleeping meds. She took her meds, she drank the water, she ate some more sugar. Glory was an angel. She never talked and she never caused trouble.

There was a blond haired guy with a mushroom cut. His name was Robert. He talked fast and he talked often and he talked like a junkie and he made jokes that weren't funny and he sniffed his nose every few minutes and he had the mood swings of an addict. At once he was happy. At once he was mellow, withdrawn, and disillusioned. Incidentally, he was a cocaine addict. Although, he hated that word. The word "addict." He was hated by all of us. The stupid bastard was so lucky. He had a dad that really cared about him. The asshole took it for granted. He didn't understand that someone had to pay for the hospital. His father was deeply in debt. The "Winterson Center" was his latest creditor.

Diana was the girl with the journal. Like Glory, she was on the unit because she wasn't eating. Unlike like Glory, Diana managed to avoid the feeding tube when she was threatened with it. Diana's mother visited her every once in awhile. She was intent on lowering her daughter's self-esteem. Diana's mom was alot like my father. She had to put someone else down in order to feel good.

Saturday was visiting day. Parents and patients gathered in the day room and when there weren't that many chairs available, the patients sat down on the floor.

I remembered one occasion. Diana was sitting by the window ledge. The window was open but the chicken wire screen was down. She was blowing smoke through the chicken wire and her mother, who had some sort of inferiority complex, had trouble sitting still.

"This is what I'm paying for?"

"You don't have to pay for it," Diana used to say, trying to pretend that her mother's disdain didn't hurt her.

"You threatening to check out again," her mom would say, annoyed by the phone in the nurses station. It rang and rang and the ceiling tiles creaked and they hunched forward and Diana's mom thought of the check, the one that she was going to stop payment on.

"It's not a threat," Diana used to say.

"Oh Diana. Suicide is such an original idea."

Group:

We had group therapy on every other Thursday at Noon. It was lead by Nathaniel Sawyer, PHD. His hair was mostly gray, though some black hairs had managed to hold their ground. Dr. Sawyer had this awful ponytail extension that was reminiscent of road kill. It had a plastic look and it was to gray to be real. It hung obediently at the base of his neck.

As was his custom, the good doctor was always late. He always had a pack of Camels in his shirt pocket. He always wore a shirt that was wrinkled at the bottom. His shirts had brown iron burns near the small of the back. The good doctor's eyes were bloodshot, which lead me to one conclusion. Our fearless leader was into chemistry when he wasn't boring us to death in group. I mean, group was totally unnecessary. I had Group at noon and then I had a therapy session at two. When group ended my verbal wad was usually blown. My therapist and I usually engaged in a staring contest for sixty minutes.

I looked at the clock, saw the hands as they convened at the number twelve. It was a sight. Sawyer was sitting there with his black composition book and his lucky bic pen, and his purple squeeze ball that he always carried in his left hand. His legs were crossed and his gapped, yellow teeth flashed proudly when he smiled. The bastard was actually on time. I couldn't believe it. He gave me a therapeutic smile. The smile that all the new people got. Sawyer wanted to come across as a tireless worker. The caring warden of the lunatic asylum. The man who wasn't looking for an emotional connection.

Sawyer coughed. He looked at Diana. He wondered what she was smiling about. Glory felt for her sugar packet under the couch. She looked like she was constipated, and then she sighed rather contentedly when she felt the flimsy white paper of the Domino sugar packet. Robert sniffed his nose, did his best James Dean. He looked at the clock, wondered when this pointless exercise was going to start.

Sawyer scanned the sacrificial lambs, was suspicious of Diana's smile. Sawyer looked at me and he wondered why I wasn't smiling. He scribbled a note in his composition book and I noticed his hands. They moved like a symphony conductor.

"Glory, do you want to start?"

Glory clapped her hands, looked at the clock. She mumbled an expletive under her breath and looked up at Webster. She cursed him with her eyes and she wondered what the hell he wanted from her.

"Not today doc."

She shook her head, flashed Sawyer a smile. The smile was rather informative. She, Glory Skyler, had nothing witty to say.

Sawyer sighed a disappointed sigh, scribbled in his notebook. He cursed himself. He knew that Glory wasn't going to talk. Diana told me about Glory. She had never shared anything in group. Glory only spoke when it was absolutely necessary.

Diana raised her hand and Sawyer's mouth froze. His lips were suspended in mid-sentence. His feeble little mind was flooded with quotes. Quotes from the psychology book that he had studied in college.

Her eyes closed, her head did a sexy little shimmy. Diana threw her shoulders back and sighed. She wondered if she was capable of playing it straight.

"May I speak, Jackson?"

"Go ahead," Sawyer nodded. He wondered what Diana was up to.

"Who's, the ne-wwwwww guy?"

"Well, he's..."

"He's definitely not a Sera," Diana remarked, giving me a territorial look. A look that told me where I stood. She wanted me to know whose turf this was. Diana grinned, crossed her arms, leaned back on the couch.

Sawyer collected his thoughts. He went over his battle plan. His battle plan for the rest of the group. Sawyer looked at me with pleading eyes. Since I was new, I was supposed to save him.

Glory picked up her head, shot Diana a dirty look. Glory wanted this madness to end. Diana's semantics were just going to prolong things. Sawyer was working till three. He had no place to go.

"Play it straight," pleaded Robert, trying to offer constructive criticism without pissing Diana off. She stuck her tongue out at Glory, dismissed Robert with a wave of her hand.

"Does the Sera, have an opinion?" Diana inquired. She looked at Sawyer and Sawyer looked at me. She reminded me of a professional interviewer. Her fingers were on her chin. Her eyes gave me special attention. They told me something. My words really mattered.

"He can't be a Sera. A Sera is always female." Glory chimed in. She spoke rather softly. Diana conveyed a sense of mock surprise. Her mouth was wide open. It refused to close. She wanted everyone to laugh. In her mind, this situation was absolutely absurd. Glory Skyler had finally spoken. Her words were unsolicited, a gesture of unbridled spontaneity. Robert, (the coke addict,)looked at Diana. Sawyer looked at Robert and Sawyer begged him not to laugh. Robert did laugh. He laughed and then Diana laughed. Diana laughed and then I laughed. Glory shrugged and looked at Dr. Sawyer. She wondered what was so funny.

"What did I say?" wondered Glory.

"You spoke!" chirped Diana, waving her finger rather dramatically. The gesture reminded me of Bob Barker. Bob Barker and the showcase showdown.

"Hallelujah," nodded Robert. He wondered about this moment. Was it ironic?

"Can we..."

"May I say, you're doing a hell of a job." Diana grinned, tried to turn her put down into something else. I always remembered her grin. It stayed with me. It stayed with me after I left the ward. I didn't know what the hell her grin meant. I knew one thing though. I wanted to see it as often as I could.

Sawyer scribbled in his notebook and looked at the clock. It was only twelve fifteen. We were far from done.

The Lingo:

Girls were nicknamed "Sera's." Only females were known as "Sera's." That was an unspoken rule on the unit. Of course, Diana always broke the rule. She called everyone a "Sera."

"Welcome to the room, sister Sera." That was Diana's greeting. She always said that to me. She said it to everyone in fact. Glory always objected to the greeting. She thought that the word "Sera" was being misused. Glory never acknowledged the greeting. Robert didn't either. Although, he thought that Glory was being overly dramatic. Robert hated conflict.

A "frontliner" was someone that had to be constantly watched. All the frontliner's, male or female, were on suicide watch. When you were on suicide watch, you were placed on level one. Level one was the lowest level on the unit. There were no phone privileges on level one. The staff confiscated your shoelaces when you were on suicide watch. You couldn't eat with metal utensils when you were on suicide watch. These were all safety precautions. No death by hanging. No death by cutting. Hence, shoelaces were confiscated. Hence, the utensils were plastic.

When you reached level two when you were taken off suicide watch. On level two your phone privileges were reinstated, but you weren't allowed visitors. You weren't allowed to use the bathroom without supervision. Level three was the highest level. Visiting privileges were reinstated, walks around the courtyard were permitted. On level three, you were allowed to eat with metal utensils. Oh yah, your shoelaces were returned. Actually, they were placed in your possession box. Your possessions were returned when you left the unit.

During my stay at the Winterson Center, no one reached level three. Diana and I got as high as level two, and Robert was on level three for a day. Then he failed his piss test. After Robert got to level three, he earned himself a day pass. During the pass, Robert relapsed. He relapsed on coke and he blew off curfew. Robert missed his curfew and he dropped a level. It was that simple. It was my attitude that kept me on level two. I refused to be therapeutic. I took my meds, but I didn't do the work. I talked to my therapist when I wanted to and I rarely spoke in group. I called the art therapist a "fucking loony." As for Diana, she didn't say much in group. Mostly, she read the newspaper. Sometimes she read a book during art therapy. She liked Jay McInerney.

The staff didn't know what to do with Glory. I mean, she wasn't that much of a problem. Glory never ate though. Glory was supposed to eat. That was her goal. She was supposed to put on 15 pounds in six weeks. Of course, Glory dropped more weight. She kept eating sugar. Subsequently, she was forced fed with a feeding tube and she remained on level two. On the ward, only a person with behavior problems was supposed to be dropped to level one. That was the staff's policy.

There was a white board on the right side of the nurses station. It looked like a grilled cheese sandwich. The names were listed in the following order.

Glory Diana Robert Max Level 2 Level 2 Level 2 Level 1

The first three names were written in red. Red symbolized the second level. My name was written in green. Green symbolized newness. I was the newest addition to the "Winterson Center."

Therapy:

My therapist was named Ginny. She wore a rather gothic shade of eyeliner around her eyes. It accentuated the blueness of them. Granny skirts were Ginny's trademark. She wore these baggy sweaters that engulfed her body. Her face was disjointed, and the bones meshed in an uneven sort of way. She talked like a therapist. Every sentence came from a psychology book. Ginny's body had a coat hangar sort of look. It curved abnormally in the strangest of places.

Ginny's office was rather basic. Light blue walls, a dirty white window blind that desperately needed dusting, a pop tart colored bookshelf that had tiny holes in each of its sides. A red desk featured a generic brand of laptop, a cracker shaped clock radio, and two manila folders that were stacked neatly on either side.

The clock ticked, the heating vent hummed. Ginny leaned in closer, clapped her hands together. She flashed me a smile. It was supposed to be reassuring. Ginny sighed, looked at me with awe and wonder.

"Why are you here, Max?"

I laughed and I wondered if some bullshiting was in order. I thought therapists were like mobsters. In other words, they came with smiles. In other words, you couldn't trust them.

"I took pills Ginny." There was my answer, simple and direct. I was proud of myself.

"You can do better than that," she laughed, sitting straight up. Ginny brushed the lint off her skirt, the granny skirt that she was drowning in. I knew one thing. Ginny wasn't going to let up on me.

"It's all Catherine's fault."

"Who's Catherine?" asked Ginny, humoring me before she pounced on my answer.

"She was a girl," I sighed, breathing a breath that was supposed to exude coolness, obliviousness.

"And?..." urged Ginny, moving her hands in a circle. She was exerting just enough pressure on me. Ginny didn't want to be the heavy. A therapist never wanted to be the heavy. Ginny had all the bases covered.

"And..."

"Yes, Max."

"She's gone."

I smiled. My hands fell against my thighs. I threw my head back and I closed my eyes and I took a breath. I wondered if god was mocking me. Afterall, I had renounced Catholicism.

"Can you be more specific?"