The Bucket List

32

It was seven weeks later when they let me go home. I had needed surgery. I had fractured my ankle and then continued to put pressure on it. They had to pick all of the glass pieces out of my skin, leaving little scars that I was told would fade with time. I had broken four of my fingers and needed stitches on my palms from squeezing and throwing handfuls of broken glass. I had ripped part of my eyelid with glass that had flown into my face. I had strained my throat from screaming so much that I wasn't able to talk for almost two weeks. I had a cut on my wrist from the glass, which they thought was a suicide attempt. Maybe it had been. I didn't know.

After I was physically okay, I had to go to a psych ward. The actual program wasn't that bad. I just listened in group and took the pills they handed me and ate just enough food for them to not label me as anorexic.

I couldn't sleep, though. I was so, so tired, but I wouldn't let myself sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, all I could see was Colby's face, my blood on it, tears streaming out of his eyes. I couldn't stand the silence, either. When I was alone with no noises to distract me, I could hear myself, screaming at my friends, over and over. I could hear Colby screaming back, begging me to let him help, asking me what was wrong, telling me that it was okay.

I memorized every single word I had screamed at them and hated myself for not answering what Colby had screamed back. He just wanted to help me. They all did.

I was scared to leave the hospital, scared that I would go back home, and that everyone would be scared of me.

I stopped talking, even after I got my voice back. I was silent for weeks. Even though I could only hear my awful words when there weren't any sounds around me, I learned not to care. I told myself that I deserved every bit of it, that I deserved to hear myself screaming every second of every day. The doctors ran out of ideas because I was taking my meds and listening when I was supposed to.

They tried giving me sleeping pills, but I could never sleep for more than twenty minutes without waking up and crying. I convinced myself that Colby hated me, because why wouldn't he? Why would he like someone that blamed him for their best friend's death?

The doctors tried to get me to journal, too. I would only stare down at the blank pages, unable to even hold a pencil, because I was afraid that my hands would write out all of those awful things I had screamed at all of the people who were just trying to help me. I forgot who I was, but never forgot what I had done.

I just wanted to see Colby. Eli was a nice guy, but Jess had been right about Colby. I couldn't just throw that away. But I never let him visit. I didn't know how I was supposed to look in his eyes again, knowing that I had hurt him so much. The nurses eventually stopped asking me if I wanted to see Colby during visiting hours. I told myself that he had finally given up on me.

I didn't let most of them visit. I was terrified that they would look at me, see how pathetic and miserable I was, and blame themselves. I didn't want them to see me when I was broken because I didn't want them to think that they were the ones who had broken me.

Dozens of flower bouquets and hundreds of cards were sent to me. Several people tried to visit, Jess, Sam, Kat, Tara, Eli, and Colby. I would only let Devyn, Jake, and Corey in. One of them was always there when I was in the first hospital, and one of them visited me every night in the mental hospital.

Every time they saw me, they looked like they were staring at a wounded animal. I didn't let myself look anyone in the eyes, though. I just couldn't look at them, because eye contact was a sign of respect and I didn't deserve their respect.

I knew I probably looked terrible. I didn't let myself look in the mirror. Not once. I didn't want to see my hair matted with blood, which I was convinced they couldn't have washed out, or stare down at the ribs I knew had started becoming more and more visible or see the scar on my eyelid from where I had cut it.

I knew that I was hurting all of them, all of the people who visited, but they still chose to come see me. I didn't cry anymore. I was completely devoid of all emotion. The psychiatrists were just waiting for something. For me to smile or laugh or cry or even say more than three words at a time. But that didn't happen until one day in the psych ward when Devyn visited me for the first time.

That innocent girl walked in, terrified, clearly never having been near a mental hospital. Her eyes were big and quickly filled up with tears when she saw me. I knew she barely even recognized me until I whispered her name. Devyn ran up to me and I could see the nurses about to warn her that she shouldn't move too suddenly around me when I jumped up and ran toward her, too.

"Aw, Rose," Devyn said, crying into my ear. I could handle not talking to the guys, trying to just silently say thank you to them for being there for me. But I couldn't do that to Devyn.

"I'm okay," I whispered to her, crying.

"You're talking again?" she asked, pulling back. "Corey said you weren't talking."

I shrugged and we both kept crying.

"She'll only talk to you, apparently," said one of the nurses.

"What?" asked Devyn. The nurse looked at me and I nodded my approval for her to tell Devyn what she meant.

"She has a visitor every night. Same few people, but she hasn't said a single word. Not except hi and bye, but she only says that sometimes. Just to that one guy. Eli? I don't know. But no, she's only talking to you, out of everyone, after basically being silent for about 4 weeks," explained the nurse, who's name I hadn't bothered to remember.

"Oh. Can... do you want to tell me what happened? It's okay if you don't," said Devyn. I nodded. I hadn't told anyone yet and I needed to get it out. I needed to stop torturing myself by replaying those words I had screamed almost two months ago.

"I got fired from Starbucks because the company didn't like me associating with some of my friends. I got mad at everyone because they were all the reason that happened in the first place, and I had called my Krystal's mom because I couldn't think of anyone else to talk to. But she answered and told me Krystal was dead, and I was already blaming Jess and Colby for my getting recognized, so I blamed them for that, too. And Colby had been convincing me that it was okay to let people in, but right after I did that, my life blew up. I probably could have gone the rest of my life thinking she was okay, and I hated that I felt the need to call someone else's mom and not Colby," I explained. Devyn just stared at me for a minute, and it broke my heart that she seemed to understand my pain.

"Did you want me to explain what happened to anyone else?" she asked.

"Everyone," I whispered back.