Coin

Coin

Last summer I was in a dark place. i had just gotten out of the psych ward for my OCD. On my way out i overhead the doctor telling the nurses i had one of the most extreme cases they had ever seen, that i would surely be back soon. He didn't even whisper. For me it was the repetitive motions over and over telling me terrible things would happen if i didn't complete them. It was almost as if i felt that every little motion of my body would somehow connect me with the future present and past, and that by stepping an extra time or by choosing the yellow shirt over the blue, i was somehow saving a life. i also had a special twist to my condition called Pure O. It's a type of OCD that pretty much feels like turrets in your head. All day i would hear the worst possible profanities play over and over in my head like a record player. I lived in fear that they would come out of my mouth when i spoke. But that wasn't it. It was also the visions. Constant images playing over in my head like a movie. Picture your own personal clockwork orange but instead there are people getting hurt, graphic things you pray would never happen. That was my life.

When i got discharged my parents thought it would be a good idea for me to make up for the lost time in my summer, after all i was sixteen. In July they sent me to my mom's friend Diane's house in New York. They did this mainly because i used to be friends with their daughter Hailey when we were kids and my mom thought that i might enjoy spending some time with her. It took just few days after pulling into her immaculate gated home to find out that we weren't going to be friends.

Hailey had gotten tanner, better spoken and suddenly had so many new best friends. Gone was the shy girl that liked to write songs in her diary and wear thick rimmed glasses because she couldn't figure out contacts.

It took her a few days to figure out that i didn't have a big social media following, or a single pair of Louboutins or anything else that she found particularly interesting. So we talked only out of obligation. We had cereal or oatmeal with berries in the morning and pretended to be friends and then she would go off in her white Mercedes to do exciting things with incredible people. We rarely talked after breakfast.

I wanted to explore New York City but there were a few problems. First we lived in the suburbs and i didn't have a car. Second, i had no idea of where anything was and no one to guide me. Diane and Henry Vermont were always working and hardly noticed that i was there, though they always left lots of goodies around the house and told me that i was free to help myself to any snacks that i wanted.

I usually spent the first few hours of the day watching TV and then laying out on the patio or reading a book in my room. Then i would make myself lunch and try to pretend like i was having fun. I had a lot of free time, too much. And when i was alone was always when my demons came out.

The house had 7 bedrooms. My room was right across from Hailey's powder white room. Mine was one of the guest bedrooms. I was allowed to pick one out of the three they had. My room was a light ocean green with teal curtains and it was filled with paintings of pirate ships, old historical artifacts and a vase of peonies that the maid replaced every other morning.

I liked to gaze out of the window at the green fields, the perfectly foliaged backyard and all of the nooks and crannies that filled the gardens. By 3 pm someone would usually be home, usually it was Diane or Hailey. They would say hi if they saw me and then they would leave. Hailey to go to the beach or shopping with her girlfriends. Diane would go run errands. I usually hid in my room during this time, just to spare myself the embarrassment of admitting that i had nothing to do. Because i could see so clearly that they truly didn't care about my whereabouts at all. I would watch them drive away, Diane in her white BMW and Hailey in her white Mercedes. Then i was alone. At least that's what i thought.