short short story: am i crazy, or are you?

am i crazy or are you?

"Ask me as many times as you want, but I'm not crazy!" I clenched my jaw and spat in his face. He wiped my saliva off with the collar of his button-down. I could feel swear sliding down my face from my forehead, along with streaks of blood from an earlier electrocution.

"How do you know if you're sane, then, if you ended up in a place like this?" He countered.

"I know because I'm not like these people. I've seen them and I'm nothing like them. How do you know if you're crazy if the only people you're surrounded by are actually crazy? You'll only end up acting like them because you won't know any better. You won't remember what life was like outside a nut house!"

He sat back and crossed his arms. His jaw twitched, his face getting redder. Apparently, I struck a nerve.

"How long have you been here, anyway?" I asked him. I twisted my hands in the manacles

"Long enough to know you're right. Hell, you're more than right. I don't know what a normal conversation is without random wailing interrupting every sentence. I don't know what it is to touch a nice, quiet, beautiful girl anymore. All I know is to clean off a humans filth off of rotting walls and to interrogate people such as yourself."

I whispered, "do you believe you're crazy?"

"Yes." He paused. "Do you?"

"Do I believe you're crazy?" He gave me a look. "That's for you to decide. But I'm not crazy. I can tell the difference between hearing multiple voices and hearing just my own voice in my head. I don't have random meltdowns. And for the most part, I look like a normal forty-five year old man. No, im certainly not crazy. But I can see you are. You twitch every time you talk. You constantly look to the side as if listening to someone speaking... I think we should trade places. I'd quit if I were you."

"You're wrong!" His voice pierced my ears. "You're wrong!"

"Am I?"

Days passed.

I went to the same institution where I was humiliated, beaten, and interrogated to visit my sister who, unfortunately, really is mentally wrong. I passed by a patient being walked on a leash. He was bald but had a lengthy beard, twisted into a braid, with a pink bow dangling at the bottom. I recognized who it was. I almost laughed. I wondered if he recognized me clean shaven and in a nice suit even though his eyes were milky and gray. I told him he should've quit when he had the chance.

As I watched my sister play by herself in a once-white room behind a one-way mirror, I couldn't help study the irony. I was never crazy. But a guy turns crazy from just working here. They took my crazy twin sister because they figured I was just as crazy. That guy and I really did trade places.