Jamie

4: Odd

From the outside, this place looks like a common red brick building. It’s inside when you feel the white walls closing in on you and you truly feel like a lunatic.

It got pretty lonely here. I used to have a friend, Ryan. He had an eating disorder, but got better and left.

My only friend, Jeyo, followed me to the juvenile ward. Gnomes have pretty long life spans. He came up to my knee and liked tangling my black hair in the night. He looked like a miniature, squatty, ambidextrous version of Napoleon.

My parents used to visit… until they had my sister, Lily, and figured I might influence her in a negative way.

I was just glad I wasn’t in the secure units. I’ve heard that the secure units were terrifying because they only put really insane people in those, from all ages. I would go insane in those prison-like cells.

Mr. Kaynolds dismissed me. He was my psychiatrist. He said I have the highest level of hallucinations. My parents had expected me to grow out of them, but I couldn’t change what I saw, heard, touched, felt, and occasionally, tasted.

I tried to ignore what they called hallucinations, but I genuinely couldn’t tell the difference between what they’re blind to and what they can see.

Warily, I went outside. A few years ago, I had found this loose part of the ward fence. I wouldn’t run away, though. I have nowhere to go.

I met a few guys my age playing ball around the neighborhood.

“Hey, can I play?”

“Sure, man,” says one of the guys. “We’re an odd number anyway!”

They were the most fun 10 minutes of my life until I dropped my card, stating my name and disorder, watching as it clattered on the pavement as if in slow motion. I grimaced as one of the guys picked it up before I could.

“Hey, dude, you dropped something!” A guy with blond hair had picked it up. Scrutinizing it, he gasped, looked up, and gaped at me. “He’s one of them. Those crazy people!”

It was amazing how fast they cleared the area.