Writing 6

Danny left before Stacy did.

They had talked about it on their walks around the grounds and knew that one of them would end up leaving the hospital before the other. It took Danny awhile to earn the privilege to leave the building unescorted, but once he did the four of them would slowly wander down the shaded blacktop driveway to the gate. As soon as they were out of eyesight of the guards and cameras, they would separate into couples. Danny and Stacy. Ted and Amy. Or sometimes the guys would be stuck with each other while the girls went off to talk.

At first he was left inside, while Stacy was out walking with Ted. Danny knew there was no reason to be jealous, but that didn't stop the dark emotion from bubbling inside him. The window grills separated and marked them as wild animals with strange patterns. They were roaming free and he had to watch while Stacy and Ted slowly left his view.

It was easy for him to move up to GP (grounds privileges). He wasn't in for wanting to hurt himself or others just for the pain that was swallowing him. He wanted to ask Stacy to come out with him, but was afraid that would be too obvious. Danny waited until the chance finally presented itself, and he asked to join her and Ted and have them show him around.

The heat felt good as the sweat started to bead on the back of his neck. It was like the doors opening at the end of a long flight when the temperature stayed the same and the recirculated air tasted stale. Danny wasn't sure if it was the smell of honeysuckles or Stacy's skin that left him dazed from a sugar high. "Danny.... Danny?"

He woke to Stacy's hand on his arm. "Are you alright?"

He shook off the light touch thinking a bug had landed and saw her eyes look into his. Dark, and haunted.

Stacy asked him again and his tongue stuck to the roof of his mouth. It was dry like the cotton the dentist would use. He was nervous that his deep voice would startle her to turn from him. He managed a "mmm hmmm." She glanced into his eyes again, and he could only think of how he wanted those deep pools to sparkle in the sun. A butterfly landed on his shirt and for the first time he heard her sweet laugh and it fell like soft rain cooling his skin.

Writing 5

There came the time when the show could no longer go on. Danny just couldn't do it. It took too much effort to be the person, the people others wanted him to be. He decided to cancel the act but couldn't find the lines to say that fit who he really was. He was lost in other's ideas of "Danny."

The only thing he knew was the pain. The ache in his empty soul that only tears could fill. He was afraid that if he let out the flood it would wash away any slight remainder of who he thought he might be. What Danny didn't realize was that the water could be a refuge and tears could transform him in a pool of rebirth.

He made the decision to go to the hospital on a hot sunny day. He was cold inside and couldn't even be bothered to fake a return smile to the people who claimed they cared about him. He wanted his life back.

No, what he really wanted was a life of his own choosing with the ability to feel all that the world had to offer him; to travel through suffering and pain with tears and anger and arrive at happiness and accomplishment with love and sharing.

What Danny desired was understanding... of who he himself was. What he didn't realize was that he desperately wanted someone else there to be able to do that with him.

And that is how he came to love Stacy. She stood silently and accepting beside him with patience in her slow breaths, and scars of suffering dotted with faded marks from stitches up and down her arms.

Writing 4

He wanted the ache to stop, and the tears locked inside his chest to evaporate. He didn't want people to know how much he hurt and why. The thing is he didn't even want to admit it to himself. Most of the time he was pretty good at acting like everything was fine. "The Danny Show" was what he called it to himself. There were only a couple people he let behind the curtain and even then he didn't or couldn't express everything that was going on with him.

How could he when he didn't understand it himself? All he knew was the frustration, the pain, the longing, and the dreams. "How did he get here?" Was something he asked himself every so often and then he would stuff the questions down and try to forget about them. He would clear his head with a slight shake of no and get back into character.

Writing 3

It was summertime when he was admitted. Whenever he told the story that’s the word he used… not committed. Committed reminded him of commitment and love and he certainly didn’t feel that way about the hospital, about Stacy, yes, but not about that place.

Packing, driving there and even entering the building didn’t bother him. It was when he walked onto the unit. Keys had to be used to open the door, and when it closed he was extremely aware that he wasn’t the one holding them. In his ears, the soft sound of the door clicking shut echoed like the clang of prison bars. He felt like an inmate and was stuck inside just like one.

There were a couple of sofas, two tables, and some chairs around. All of them colored beige. People were hanging out and even though everyone was looking at him his head wasn’t faced down and he wasn't focused on trying to memorize the pattern of the maroon industrial carpet beneath his feet.

He was looking at the windows. They were big and the length of the room. They reached to the ceiling, but what pulled his eyes to them was the mesh grill that covered them. Another reminder that there wasn’t a way out.

His heart was thumping in his chest really pounding hard and he wanted to get to his room as quickly as possible. He was scared, terrified, and wondering what the hell he had done.

Ted looked up as he entered their room and said, “Hello, you must be the new guy.” It was almost funny to hear that tired cliché. He felt like he should be in an office wearing a suit and shaking hands.

Danny just nodded his head and noticed that the windows were here in this room too. They weren’t as big and had brown curtains hung in front of them, but they were still covered with the grill.

“Freaked out? First time?”

Danny just nodded again. Angry that Ted knew what he was feeling, but also relieved that he wasn’t the only one who had ever felt this way.

Ted walked past him on the way out and said, “The bed by the windows is mine, your’s is against the wall, and that’s your dresser. There was one opposite the foot of each bed in a bland wooden color and made of heavy duty plastic. With a night table next to each bed of the same material.

“Scared. I’m scared.” Those words kept on going around in his head. He was almost glad to be feeling something other than the numbing blackness that filled him. But then he felt the tears starting to rise. The reason he was here.

Writing 2

He never went to the meetings while he was at the hospital. It wasn’t required for him to go. In fact, they would’ve wondered why he wanted to. Everyone in the unit knew they were friends and romantic relationships were discouraged and frowned upon. So he tried to hide his true feelings for her in the friendship that the four of them shared.

They hung out together... smoking, playing cards, talking and playing more cards. But he didn’t smoke. It was just another thing that set him apart. They looked so cool with those cigarettes in their hands and blowing smoke ring after ring.

He wanted to fit in, be cool, manly... and he trusted Ted to show him how. They sat at the table and he learned how to pack the cigarettes by tapping the box so they would burn better. Stacy wasn’t around. There was no way he was going to make a fool of himself in front of her. He knew from watching tv that the first time someone tried to smoke they ended up coughing and looking ridiculous.

That’s what happened to him. His first puff was fine. Then Ted told him to really inhale and bring the smoke down into his lungs. The coughing fit started and so did the laughing. But he didn’t give up. He kept on trying intent on being able to smoke like a natural by the time Stacy got back.

It didn’t work. As soon as she walked through the door, most of the people on the unit including the counselors were vying to tell her how big strong Danny was brought low by some paper and tobacco. While trying to play it off, he noticed a little spark in her eyes and her lips tilted up at the edges ever so slightly. Danny decided that it was worth the attention and humiliation. But that was the end of his smoking.

Writing

I started this months ago and just found it. It's the beginning of a story or something. I usually write poetry but this just flowed out of me.



MEETINGS

He would go to the meetings with her. He wasn't exactly sure why he did it, just that it felt like the right thing to do. But it didn't really feel right. He didn't fit in. He wasn't a drinker and didn't even like beer, something he had never told his buddies instead usually volunteered to be the designated driver.

They met in a hospital. He saw her and wanted to save her, and he always wondered what she saw in him. He wanted to erase the scars on her arms with kisses and show her that life was worth living. He wanted her to live to spend her life with him.

He was so naive.

It wasn't the first time she had been here or even hospitalized. She knew her way around, the schedules, the terms, how it all worked. She seemed to know the staff, the counselors, the doctors, and even the cafeteria workers. She said hi to them all, but rarely smiled back at them.

He followed her around with his eyes. He didn't want to draw any undue attention to himself. The fact was she brought him out of his own misery. When he was thinking of her he wasn't wondering how the world could be so black with only a little gray. He wasn't stuck in his mind and his chest wasn’t aching with all those unshed tears.

Lying on his bed after he unpacked he discovered that he was only allowed to be in his room to sleep. He had to socialize. Just what he didn't want to do. He wished that his hair was just a little longer to cover more of his face. It didn't make sense and he knew it, but he felt that if he couldn't see them they couldn't see him.

Only after they became closer and would sit and talk at the round table playing crazy eights or hearts with other patients, did she lift her head to look at him. He felt her eyes studying him, but he was never quick enough to meet her gaze. He still had no idea why she was in. The scars on her arms were definitely a year or two old, and she hadn't said much but her name when they were all together in group. He felt a kinship with her, even though things had never been bad enough for him to try and disappear from the pain forever.

The longer he stayed in the hospital the more comfortable he felt there. But that’s not where he wanted to be. A little apartment with Stacy was what he was dreaming of. He kept that to himself. It was a dream just like the ones he had while lying in his bed waiting for sleep to close his eyes. In his dream they were happy and together. Her dark eyes would meet his with a smile. And that’s when he usually fell asleep. Thinking of those dark eyes filled with happiness.