Josh

The psychiatrist seemed undecided. Performed a number of tests, asked lots of questions, scribbled a lot, sucked the end of his pen. I figure he thinks I’m either as mad as the proverbial Hatter or I’ve got a serious eighties retro trip thing going on. He said the word ‘interesting’ a lot. The care worker didn’t seem to know why I was here. Or why she was here, for that matter. I asked her, ‘do you think I’m schizophrenic?’

‘Well, the preliminary report from Doctor Feltz – ’ she began. Then stopped. Doctor Feltz was the pen-sucker. Then she added, ‘It’s not really for me to say. But do I think you’re a danger to anyone or to yourself? No, I don’t. But if you’re going to get back into society, we need to ascertain some care provisions. Or at least, establish how old you are.’ Which was something.

And the priest? Man, he was something, too. Something else. The way he looked at me. The way he smiled. He smiled a lot. Most of the time his voice was very precise. Particular, soft. Then he’d look away and mumble pieces of scripture to himself, much as I had with the song lyrics months ago, whereas I was trying to see if I could get a reaction and I swear he couldn’t help it. It was like some kind of religious tourettes. I remember thinking, either I’m going to get out of here or I’m going to get you as a room mate. More than once, he asked me if I thought I’d come from an other. Or rather, an Other. Like it was a noun. A place. I thought, what the – ? And he’d gaze at me with his big, unblinking brown eyes and he’d smile his smile that veered from patronising to away-with-the-fairies weird and that showed his yellow teeth and I’d get all creeped out and clam up. All in all, I don’t think that my spiritual well-being took much comfort from our encounter. In fact, given that this trio have been the first outsiders I’ve seen in a year, they weren’t exactly a barrel load of fun.

But.

Kyle’s coming.

Soon.

They said, they promised, they’re setting it up.

And it’s then that I’ll find out just how fecked up I really am. How crazy. How deluded. How true. How real. Because Kyle will take one look at me and he’ll know, I’ll know, we’ll know and then we can start to rebuild, then we can start to untangle whatever unholy mess this is. Then we can start. Again.