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Lost, spiralling ti in and out of reality Moone, reclaimed by madness and demons
Clarity A warm room Police officers I&039; of hot chocolate I take it He&039;s asking questions His words sail over and through in to fade out of reality To avoid the return to night lips
For a long ti up the volume on the TV Not all his wordssound insideabout the murders
"De cry
His face lights up and he snaps forward More questions Quicker than before Louder More urgent Amidst the babble, I hear him ask, "Did you see the else I tune out The world flaes A ball ofht than the last one Not as gentle Asking questions loudly, facingmy head up until our eyes raph - red, a body torn down the middle
"Gret," I moan
"I know it&039;s hard," an officer says, sympathy mixed with ih
"Derowls "You&039;re old enough to know that Look, I know it&039;s hard," he repeats himself, "but you have to focus You have to help us find the people who did this"
"You&039;re our only witness, Grubbs," his colleague murmurs "You saw them Nobody else did We know you don&039;t want to think about it right now, but you have to For your parents For Gret"
The other cop waves the photo in !" he pleads "HowBye-bye officers Hello horror
Screa who&039;ssilenced Then I realise it&039;s ht white jacket I&039;ve never seen a real one before, but I knohat it is - a straitjacket
I focus onthe screams stop and they slowly die away to a whi, but h I&039;ve been testing its limits for weeks without pause
There&039;s a hard plasticset in a holder on a small table to my left A straw sticks out of it, I ease my lips around the head of the straw and s Flat Coke It hurts going down, but after a couple of mouthfuls it&039;s wonderful
Refreshed, I studyplastic panel in the upper half, instead of glass
I stumble to the panel and stare out Can&039;t see much - the area beyond is dark, so the plastic&039;s mostly reflective I study my face in the makeshift mirror My eyes aren&039;t my own - bloodshot, wild, rimmed with black circles Lips bitten to tatters Scratches on hter than I&039;d like A large purple bruise on lass I fall backwards with fright The door opens and a large, s woman enters "It&039;s OK," she says softly "My na after you"
"Wh-wh where aasp
"Someplace safe," she replies She bends and touches the bruise on ers "You&039;ve been through hell, but you&039;re OK now It&039;s all uphill from here Now that you&039;ve snapped out of your delirium, we can work on"
I lose track of what Leah&039;s saying Behind her, in the doorway, I iine a pair of demons - Vein and Artery The sane part of me knows they aren&039;t real, just visions, but that part of ainst one of the padded walls, I stare blankly at thecrude gestures and inary Vein and Artery go on dancing I slip back into the shell of ratefully
In and out Quiet moments of reality Sudden flashes of insanity and terror
I&039; held in an institute for people with problems - that&039;s all any ofwith the other patients White rooms Nurses - Leah, Kelly, Tim, Aleta, Emilia and others, all nice, all concerned, all unable to coax htmares when they strike Doctors with na They exaular intervals Make notes Ask questions
What did you see?
What did the killers look like?
Why do you insist on calling them demons?
You know demons aren&039;t real Who are the real killers?
One of therey-haired, sharp-eyed woman Not as kindly as the rest The &039;bad doctor&039; to their &039;good doctors&039; She presses esher Doctor Slaughter, but only to myself, not out loud When she cohter to embrace me - and lose myself to the real world After a few of these intentional fade-outs, they obviously decide to abandon the shock tactics and that&039;s the last I see of Doctor Slaughter
Tihts Theto htet me back to real time They surround me with clocks Make me wear tatches Stress the times at which I&039;m to eat and bathe, exercise and sleep
Lots of pills and injections Leah says it&039;s only te patients here They prefer to talk us through our probleht else Impossible to feel interest or boredom, excitement or despair I wander around the hospital - I have a free run now that I&039; at clock faces, counting the seconds untilfits Fighting the nurses Craving nunoreI&039;s put a stop to the nightmares and anchored me in the real world - step one Now I have to learn to function in it as a normal person, free ofo away, because the demons I saere real - but she refuses to listen Nobody believes me when I talk about the demons They accept that I was in the house at the ti dreadful, but they can&039;t see beyond huined the demons to mask the truth One doctor says it&039;s easier to believe in demons than evil humans Says a wicked person is far scarier than a fanciful demon
Moron! He wouldn&039;t say that if he&039;d seen the crocodile-headed Vein or the cockroach-crowned Artery!
Gradual ier throw fits But I don&039;t progress as quickly asback into the world of nightrip on reality I don&039;t talk openly with my nurses and doctors I don&039;t discuss my fears and pains Sometimes I babble incoherently and can&039;t interpret the words of those around h one of the institute s all day long, or not get up in theefforts ofthem They don&039;t believe my story, so they can&039;t truly understand ht them Out of fear and spite
Somewhere in the middle of the confusion, relatives arrive The doctors want me to focus on the world outside this institute They think the way to do that is to reintroduceisolation I think the plan is for the visitors to fuss over me, so that I want to be with them, so I&039;ll then play ball with the doctors when they start in with the questions
Aunt Kate&039;s the first She clutches ht and weeps Talks about Muood tis et better and go ho, just stare off into space and think about Dad hanging upside-down Aunt Kate leaves less than an hour later, still sobbing
More relatives drop in during the following days and weeks, rounded up by the doctors Aunts, uncles, cousins - both sides of the family tree Some are old acquaintances Some I&039;ve never seen before I don&039;t respond to any of them I can tell they&039;re just like the doctors They don&039;t believe me
Lots of questions from my carers Why don&039;t I talk to my relatives? Do I like them? Are there others I prefer? A here and staying with one of the ishers for a while?
They&039;re trying to ship me out It&039;s not that they&039;re sick of me - just step three on my path to recovery
Since I won&039;t rally to their calls in here, they hope that a taste of the real world will reat insights into the hu - I know all this because Leah and the other nurses tell ood for , what their plans are)
I do ive them what they want - I&039;d love if they could cure me - but it&039;s difficult The relatives remind me of what happened They can&039;t act naturally around- sometimes fearful expressions But I try I listen I respond
After much preparation and discussion, I spend a weekend with Uncle Mike and his faer brother He has a pretty wife - Rosetta - and three children, two girls and a boy Gret and I stayed with them a few times in the past, when Mum and Dad were away on holidays
They try hard to make me feel welcome Conor - Mike&039;s son - is ten years old He shows ht and friendly Talks h his comics collection and tells me I can pick out any three issues I like and keep thelish Not sure why I&039;m here or aware of what happened to me But they&039;re nice They tell me about school and their friends They want to know if I have a girlfriend
Saturday goes well I feel Mike&039;s optimism - he thinks this ork, that I&039;ll return to my senses and pick up my life as normal I try to believe salvation can cowith Lisa and Laura on the swings Pushing the a watchful eye on me Mike on the roundabout with Conor
"Want off!" Laura shouts I stop her and she hops to the ground "Look what I saw!" she yells gleefully, and rushes over to a bush at the side of the swings I follow She points to a dead bird - s, its body ripped apart, probably by a cat
"Cool!" Lisa gasps, co over "It&039;s sad"
"Can we take it home and bury it?" Lisa asks
"I don&039;t know," Rosetta frowns "It looks like it&039;s been - "
"Deirls stare at me with round, wide eyes "One of the out Like from a tap"
"Grubitsch, I don&039;t think - " Rosetta says
"One of the demons had the body of a child," I continue, unable to stop "It had green skin and no eyes Instead of hair, its head was covered with cockroaches"