Silver

Chapter 22 - now

Week two and I get my own clients. Hilary, forty-two, bipolar, Brenda, thirty-eight, severe PMDD, Rita, twenty-two, crippling social anxiety, Jenna, twenty-seven, unclassified bat-shit crazy, and Anita, eighteen, OCD, who I met on day two. We are sitting in the eatery drinking green smoothies and eating zucchini slice and a green salad. That same girl with the mousey hair is staring at me. The one I recognise, but don't recognise.

'Anyone know who that girl is over there?' I ask, my voice rising.

'Which girl?' Brenda asks.

'That girl, with the blonde hair. What's her name?'

'Yvonne,' Jenna says. I realise it's the girl who disappeared from school, the one who had cut the word 'Clint' into her thigh.

When I'm lining up to make the ladies green tea, Yvonne comes and stands beside me.

'What are you doing in here?' she asks.

'I work here,' I say.

'No you're not. You're a patient here,' she says. 'I always knew I'd see you here. I've told you before, I predict things before they happen. There was always something different about you.' Her hair is thin and frizzy. 'Those bitches at that school never believed a thing. You and I were different.'

She raises her wrists to show me. She has a white bandage wrapped tightly around each wrist. 'They put these on me every day to stop me from cutting,' she says. 'But there's nothing to cut with. Someone watches me all day long. And they've removed everything sharp from my room. You can't cut with a plastic knife. My only hope is the art room. Once, they had Stanley knives. The teacher was new, straight out of university. She got sacked.' Yvonne laughs, edgily. 'I miss it. The cutting. The physical pain blocked out the emotional pain.' She stops smiling. Her expression becomes harsh and determined.

We're almost at the front of the line.

'Who was Clint?' I ask.

'My true love,' she says. 'I'll always bleed for him.'

'Yvonne! Come back here. I'll bring you your tea,' it's her supervisor, an older lady Bernadette who looks slightly masculine. Yvonne creeps back to her table.

Misery settles on my chest like a bad cold. The fluorescent lighting is glaring, the plastic teaspoons are depressing, I don't know if I can last another afternoon in this place. It's been so long. Will I ever even find Jarvis? How many patients will I have to pacify, how many arses will I have to wipe, how many clients will I have to restrain, talk down, outwit, calm down? How many belly dancing classes will I have to witness with pity strangling my heart? He is my true love. I bleed on the inside for him. Still.