A/N: for those of you not familiar with the terms.
schizophrenia - a long-term mental disorder of a type involving a breakdown in the relation between thought, emotion, and behavior, leading to faulty perception, inappropriate actions and feelings, withdrawal from reality and personal relationships into fantasy and delusion.
psychosis - a severe mental disorder in which thoughts and emotions are so impaired that contact is lost with external reality.
- - -
Once Matthew, Arthur and Adrienne were, on Alfred's misfortune, asked to leave, he was left at the mercy of the hospital and the psychologist he was assigned with. He found out her name was Emilia Steilsson, she was from Iceland or Norway, he wasn't paying too much attention to the country she mentioned just to make small talk with him. Immediately, she lead him towards the small room he would be staying in and helped him unpack the essentials for the night, putting a tight, white bracelet-like object around his wrist with his surname and his room number in handwriting, something that, apparently, each patient needed to have for identification.
The room he was staying in was cramped up, pretty small, but it wasn't as scary looking as he thought it would be. The walls were purely white, and there was a somewhat comfortable looking bed on the right. An empty desk stood in the top left corner, and there were two heavy, metallic chairs on each side of it. Since he wasn't one of those patients who were physically threatening to others around him, he wasn't put on special care and didn't get restraints, but in case anything happened, there were guards for each part of the hallway. That put him on edge. He didn't like to be constantly checked on and examined, it made him feel limited, but on the other hand he appreciated the care because there could have people much more aggressive than him, who were able to hurt others, and not only themselves.
The young, silver haired girl who took care of Alfred took him to an ordination where he got changed into first night clothing that the hospital gave each of them - a plain white t-shirt and grey trousers that reminded him of a less comfortable version of the sweatpants he'd usually wear. He had a blood test taken, height and weight measured, and a diagnosis which they managed to conclude by talking to him, getting into family history documents on the computer and examining his behavior, his disorganized speech and excessive blinking at times, unfocused look, dilated pupils, all of the things that followed his sudden rush of paranoia that came back to him right at the moment he was separated from the ones he loved.
He was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, and he didn't like the sound of that in the slightest. It was the most common type of this illness, which meant there were more resources to fight it. Yet that didn't give him much reassurance.
Apparently, he had a chance of developing it because it ran in the family - which was something he didn't know up until now - but what increased his risk was the car crash and the life threatening head injury he received.
It made sense, and he didn't know how to feel about that. He wished he could go back to normal, when he couldn't hear these sadistic voices and didn't have to bear with seeing a horror movie play out right in front of his face. But that was probably never going to happen again, unless he got heavily medicated, sedated and put to sleep. Which, obviously, didn't sound too appealing.
"I know you're really scared right now", one of the psychiatrists told him, "but things can change for the better. There are things such as group and personal therapy that can help, and a healthy dose of medication for the start."
Alfred sat on the chair across her, adjusting his glasses and fidgeting with the hem of his t-shirt, anything just so he wouldn't have to make eye contact with the doctors who were currently around him. Scared was an understatement. He was anxious to death, wanted to scream at the world, at the universe, and ask it why it had to be so goddamn unfair. What did he ever do to deserve this?
That was something that would never make sense to him.
"How long do I have to stay here?" He muttered the question insecurely, gaze firmly locked to the floor the entire time he was there, except when they asked him to look in required directions.
"Until the end of May, unless things don't change. Then it would be about six weeks." The doctor gently said, choosing words carefully with skill so she wouldn't say anything to make the boy even more paranoid than he already was.
What? That was such a long time! How was he supposed to finish his first year of college then?
It didn't even occur to him that he'd be staying more than a week, and that he would have to drop everything he was working on just for this hospitalization.
"I thought it would be only a few days." He admitted, a perplexed look on his face as he finally looked up to meet her eyes.
"You're not able to take care of yourself, and your roommate back at the dormitory can't do that for you either. Luckily, people here are specialized to do exactly that, so you'll have no problem. Trust me, you will get used to it in the blink of an eye. Most people do, and you seem like a bright, young man."
"Well, I'm not so bright anymore since I'm here, isn't that right?" He spat out almost angrily, surprising the lady with the sudden intensity of the words.
But she knew what frequent mood swings could do, and she learned to bite her tongue around patients overtime, since it wasn't them talking, it was their illness. They were there to get better, she couldn't shout back even if she wanted to.
"I'll give you your first dose of medication now, if that sounds alright with you." Instead of telling him something in response to his small frustration fit, she changed the topic and got up from her seat, walking over to the locked cabinets with see-through glass doors which were full of different bottles, boxes, colourful pills and with different labels. The box she took was white with green edges, and the text Haldol, haloperidol stood in the middle in bold letters.
"Are those pills?" He asked, raising an eyebrow in curiosity. He had no clue what they were going to give him and how his body was going to react to it, but he didn't like anything that was happening here. Each movement of the psychiatrist put him on edge, and he worried about what she was going to do next.
"No, the first dose comes in an injection. No more than two milligrams, don't worry."
"Great, more injections. Is this one strong enough to kill me?" He sarcastically shot back, but he immediately wished he could have taken back the words. "Shit, I didn't mean that. I don't want to die yet. Don't kill me, I'll do anything!" And suddenly, his mood went from defensive to scared once again, almost jumping out of his chair as an instinctive movement to run away.
"I wasn't planning to." She said calmly, rolling up the sleeve on his t-shirt and running over the skin of his shoulder with something cold, a transparent fluid with a characteristic smell, it kind of reminded him of alcohol. Perhaps that's what it was. This was the second time today he felt it on his body, and he couldn't say he enjoyed either time.
It only took a momentary stab of pain for his muscles to tense, and then relax again after a few seconds passed. "That wasn't too bad." He admitted, causing the doctor to lightly chuckle.
"I thought so. Now you're free to go to your room. Of course, ms. Steilsson will lead you to it." She looked towards the patient and reserved young girl who cleaned up the desk and locked the cupboard with medication.
"Absolutely." She replied with a small smile, letting her silver coloured hair fall as she untangled her ponytail, shoving the hairband into the pocket of her blue uniform. "If you're ready, we can go now."
As he got up from the chair, Alfred felt a little dizzy on a moment, seeing all black and stars in front of his eyes making him almost fall back down if it wasn't for the edge of the desk he was able to hold onto. He was utterly confused about what was happening, simply lost, scared, and didn't know how to react to any of this. So instead of overthinking, he obediently followed the lady out of the ordination and closed the door behind them without saying goodbye.
He didn't want to say goodbye. Those words were reserved for people he cared about, like Arthur.
Goddammit, Arthur. It hadn't even been more than a few hours, and he already missed him so, so much.
And the voices had their fair share of reminding him how he wasn't going to be able to see Arthur every day, which just made things so much worse.
"Hopefully these fucking meds work, and you sons of bitches will stop talking already", he muttered in frustration, but also devastation, not quiet enough for the psychologist to miss the words. She sympathetically smiled at him, placing a hand on his shoulder as she lead him into his room which was right down the hallway from the ordination he was in. Room 72. He was told that the recent patient just left the room yesterday, so it was freshly cleaned up and everything.
As if that made him feel any better.
"You're done with everything for today. I'll come check on you before sleep once more, around ten, and then you're free. It would be preferable if you tried to get some sleep, but I understand if you can't. I can even stay with you throughout the night if you're afraid to be alone, since my other patients don't require that very often." She spoke in the gentlest tone she could muster, trying to make him feel as comfortable as that was possible, even though she knew very well how new patients react to things. The lost looks on their faces always broke her heart, it was one of the hardest things she had to witness working here. All the emotional pain. And she empathized with people easily, that's why she wanted this job. To help, to heal, to rebuild what's broken in their souls and to see them smile again once they felt at least a tiny bit better.
"I just..." Alfred sat himself on the bed - if earlier he thought the bed was comfortable, all of that was gone once he sat on it - which felt like being on the bow of an old, wooden ship. Well, there goes his chance to sleep tonight. "I just don't want there to be silence. I hate silence. It makes the voices angrier."
Emilia nodded in understanding, but she knew that no electronic devices were allowed in the room for him to play music of any kind. Unfortunately, there had to be silence. "I know what you mean, but I can't give you music. Luckily, you shouldn't be hearing the voices for much longer, since she gave you some really heavy medication. And if you're really bothered by the quiet for a longer amount of time, you can tell me and we'll talk once I come back to check on you. We can talk all you want."
He sighed heavily, curling up to his knees as he tried to regain his thoughts. It seemed like the dose wasn't affecting him yet, which was perfectly normal considering it hadn't even been ten minutes since he got it. Soon, he hoped, soon they would stop telling him to hurt others and himself. Soon they wouldn't chase him through the dark.
At least he hoped.
"I understand." He said in a soft voice. "I guess I'll try to draw to take my mind off things. Is that okay?"
"Sure thing. I'll come back soon." She responded in the same manner, patting his shoulder as a non-verbal sign of encouragement before she left the room, firmly locking it behind him and rechecking twice to make sure it was locked properly.
Then, he was left completely alone, at the mercy of his unstable mind.
In silence.
What are you going to do now?
There's no one to protect you.
Did you really think you could escape?
Everybody hates you, that's why they put you here.
To isolate you from them.
You're just a burden. So stupid. Pathetic.
Worthless.
Hopeless.
A mistake.
Disgusting.
And now you just sit in silence.
We're your only friends.
"I don't think I want to have friends if they're this mean to me." He replied to each of the words, falling back down onto the uncomfortable bed that felt like it was made of wood. God, that hurt.
You're locked in here forever.
Your dreams are dead.
You're a horrible artist.
"Now you've done it." Alfred scoffed angrily, the last statement bothering him more than any of the other words. His art meant the world to him, and there was nothing that would take away the satisfaction of drawing or painting. Especially painting, but that was something he couldn't do right now.
But he still had a bunch of pencils and a sketchbook that he placed on the desk as an essential item to have.
He sat on one of the horrible looking metal chairs, taking the pencil into his hand and flipping the notebook to the first clean page. He couldn't let the voices win, so he had to draw to defeat them.
Stop that! Drop that pencil! It's going to kill you!
Despite partly believing their delusional words, he started drawing a creature similar to the shadows appearing in the corner of his eyes every now and then, but instead of colouring it all black as it was, he filled its inside with all the hateful words and surrounded it with lines that were supposed to represent cobwebs, a way of saying he was glued to these words and they didn't want to go away, no matter how hard he tried.
"Can you still say I'm a terrible artist?" He shouted at them, taking the sketchbook in his hands and slamming it back on the desk fiercely, throwing the pencil on the floor in rage.
Horrible. Disgusting. Terrible artist. The three words repeated in his head like a broken record, and he wished to scream in agony at the top of his lungs.
But he couldn't. People could hear. He could be caught.
Angrily ripping out the drawing from the notebook, he crumbled up the paper and threw it at the wall, more specifically, at the dark figure he saw standing there observing him from afar. "Go away! Leave me alone!" He yelled in desperation, dropping his face into the palm of his hands as he burst into tears, constantly taking deep, but frantic breaths.
Nothing would ever be okay again. At least he believed so.
These voices were bound to follow him through his entire life until he or someone else ends it.
And it was all his fault.
All your fault. It's all your fault. Everything is your fault.
So worthless.
- - -
A/N
So, I hope you liked this. I'm actually pretty satisfied with this one, and that doesn't happen often, whoa.
Anyway, to clear some things up:
Alfred is diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, but he doesn't have the negative symptoms (withdrawal, low emotional expression) as much as the positive (psychotic features).
We call them negative because they take things away, and positive because it adds onto a person, not because they are good. That can be a common misconception with those who haven't learned much about the illness.
Haldol, or haloperidol, is (I think) one of the heaviest antipsychotics. Usually, people feel apathetic and appear zombie-like a few hours after the first dose. The first dose is most commonly given through an injection, and it's about 2 - 2.5 milligrams. The patients are then switched to taking oral doses, a.k.a. pills.
Yeah, I've done my research pretty well. I'm really interested in this stuff.
Thank you for reading!