Short Story that Takes a Person from Sanity to Insanity

“Get in there!” the guard shouted, as he threw me into the now universally known white fluffy room. “Fucking loon”, he said to the other guard who shook his head, “how do these people get this way? I mean seriously how?” I watched as they both walked away, I felt the blood slowly drip from my mouth and form a crimson spot on the cushy floor below me. I rolled over and sat up against the soft wall, it was dark all around for the lights were not on yet. The only light provided in the room came from the blinking red light of a camera in the top left corner of the ceiling, I starred blankly at the light as it slowly lulled me to sleep. I awoke shortly after, the lights had just been switched on, and it was blindingly bright, a single bulb in the middle of the ceiling provided this effulgence. I watched as a portion of the door in the front of the room slid open, “It’s lunch time, come and pick up your food” a tanned face called in. A lower portion of the door slid open and a plate was pushed in through the slot, which closed instantly afterwards. I looked at the plate for a couple minutes, deprived of my energy I slowly crawled over to it. As I made my way across the room I noticed that the floor felt awfully similar to my mattress at home, it was a familiar feeling that I was grateful for. I reached the plate and noticed they had not given me a knife or a fork, this made sense however since this was after all a place where mentally ill people were kept. I also caught sight of the plate itself, which was made out of a strange material. It was not made from plastic, ceramic or Styrofoam, but a material that eluded my knowledge and intrigued me for a good ten minutes. I tilted the plate over and around in my hand, as I studied it I noticed that it went soft and a bit mushy if I kept it still and became quite firm when I moved it around. As I studied the plate I heard a whirring noise coming from above me, I looked up and saw that the camera had moved a good 90 degrees to face me, I gleefully flicked it off with a smirk and began eating my food. The food tasted rather different from my usual diet, there was the meat which unfortunately tasted a lot like tofu, some Jell-O that imitated the plate at times, red rice, and vegetables. I guessed they could not give mental patients food that had bones due to the fact that must of them were good candidates for self-inflicted pain and suicidal tendencies. I finished my lunch and felt some renewed energy course through my body as I sluggishly went back to my now chosen spot in the back of the room. I leaned up against the wall and I felt the tears gradually roll down my cheeks, how did I end up this way? What happened to me? What made me commit such a heinous act? My poor poor mother she should not have to see me like this during her dying days, I should be able to say goodbye to her, not being able to tell her how much I truly love her will agonize my very soul for all eternity. To make you understand my predicament I will have to take you back a year or so, back when my life was much simpler with my one true love, my dear Jessica, she was the only person I ever thought of spending my life with. I thought I was right about my future marriage to her, the wonderful kids we would have, the obstacles we would overcome together, o how I was wrong, so very wrong.

A year ago

“Dude are you going to eat the last slice or not man?” “Eat it dude, I already told you I don’t want anymore, I’m full, these people seriously serve too much food”, I said to my friend Paul as he gobbled down the greasy slice of Chicago style crust pizza. “If I had a dime for every time I felt like throwing up after eating too much food hereâÂ?¦I would have $4.50”, “What? What the hell are you talking about man?” my friend asked a tad bit confused. “Holy crap, ok don’t turn around yet I’ll tell you when to” he said switching subjects almost instantaneously. “Why am I not looking again? Is it someone I know?” “Dude just don’t turn aroundâÂ?¦wait for itâÂ?¦waitâÂ?¦ok turn around!” he said suddenly. I looked back and saw a rather hot chick bending over to pick up some fallen napkins, a bright pink thong stuck out of the top of her jeans like a sore thumb. “Dude I already told you, I have a girlfriend”, “tell me that wasn’t nice man, come on tell me you didn’t like that”. “Ok it was nice, but I’d rather see my chick’s ass”. “You don’t even know what your chick is doing when your not around, for all you know she could be fucking me”, “What?!” I said out loud, “I’m just messing with you man, here have a mint”. “Dude you better be joking, cause I’m seriously pissed off at her already for not calling me when I tell her too” I said as I opened one of the many mints they included with our receipt. “Relax man, she’s not doing anything behind your back, dude have you ever wondered how they make these things?” he said as he sucked on the green striped mint. “I mean I know she loves me, the thing is we’ve been going out for five years already and I feel like our love has slowly faded, because to me its been five years, to her I can tell it seems like we’ve been married for fifty years because lately she has hardly shown me any affection”. “I know what you mean man, I use to have a girlfriend who use to give me head for over three weeks, then she stopped by the fourth week and said I wasn’t doing anything in return”. “Dude why are you telling me this? And for your information your suppose to pleasure your girlfriend as well, not make her do all the work” I said as I looked over the bill. “How much is it?” he asked throwing the mint wrapper into a nearby plant, “A lot, no wonder they give us so much food”. “Let me see it”, he uttered as he reached over for it, “$45.00! holy shit! for one whole pizza and two drinks, Jesus we need to find a new place to eat before the movies because this is ridiculous”. “Yeah definitely”, I said looking in my wallet for cash, “gosh dang it, not again, dude pay for me this time and I’ll buy your ticket and some movie food because I don’t have any cash with me”. “Dude when are you gonna learn that if you go out with your girlfriend to a restaurant or to the movies and don’t bring cash that that could be a bad thing?”, he said with that sarcastic look on his face. “Just pay the fucking bill man, I’m going to the bathroom I gotta pee”. “Alright well meet me outside afterwards, ok homeless guy?” he said smiling, “fuck you man, it’s not my fault I lost my wallet during your stupid party at the beach”. “Yeah well it was fun and there were hot babes, so be thankful”.

“You ever wonder what it’s like being blind?”, he said out of the blue as we made our way to the movies. “Is there a reason why you ask these random questions that seem to pop out of nothingness?” “No, not really, it’s just a thought, I mean what’s it like not being able to see your own penis?” “Good God man, why does every other word out of your mouth have to do with the male or female genitalia?” I asked as I watched a man run across the street. “Ok, tell me this, who has the babes calling him twenty four seven?, thought so”. “Dude as I’ve said before I have a girlfriend and she’s the perfect one for me, no other girl could love me and comfort me more than she does”. “Or pleasure you? Does she even give you head? Or is she afraid to go down there because of how it looks?” he asked smiling with that wide grin across his face again. “All right, you know what man, let’s talk about blind people because you’re pissing me off”. “Dude no matter what we talk about we’re always gonna end up talking about how your penis isn’t circumcised” he said laughing, “at least mine isn’t as small as yours, haha what now, did I get you good? That’s what’s up”. “Whatever dude” he said shaking his head and smiling.

We reached the movies an hour later and to our surprise the line was rather short, we bought or tickets and I called Jessica’s phone once again to see if she would be able to meet us before it started. “She not picking up?” he asked not looking the least bit surprised, “Nope, as usual her phone is off”, I said with a hint of disappointment in my voice. “I know she got off of work at least two hours ago, she would have turned her phone on by now wouldn’t she? Plus it’s a Friday, she should know by now that I wanna spend time with her”. “Dude as I’ve said before it’s not worth the time, effort and money, all they do is pretend to like you, take your money and bang some other dude” he proclaimed, as if to say my girlfriend was doing the exact same thing. “She isn’t like that, I’ve had some like that before and this one surely is not that type of girl”. “She’s the type that you go out with a few years, get engaged to, eventually marry and have children with, not some corner street hoe like the ones you’ve met” I said confident that my one true love would stay the way I’ve always known her.

We watched our movie, a rather dull and pointless one, about a man who turns into a psycho killer and terrorizes a town after finding his girlfriend banging some guy, which she met at a supermarket, on top of their bed beside a bouquet of roses and a package he had sent her via mail the week before he was to return from a business trip to Europe. “Poor guy, I almost feel sorry for him, if only he knew that true love doesn’t exist”, Paul said cynically with that crooked smile on his face again, “True love does exist and my girlfriend and I have proved that, in your face fool!” I shouted at him as I nudged him in the shoulder. “Where did we park again?” he said with a vacant look on his face, “Dude you’ve got to be shitting me right now, I swear if we don’t find where we park I will kill someone, I’m not spending three hours like last time looking for our parking spot”. We eventually found the car, not after going up and down the six story garage three different times before we finally realized his key chain had an alarm sounder that makes the car’s alarm go off for a few seconds if it could not be found. He dropped me back home an hour later and I walked in rather discontented that my girlfriend did not join us at the movies or have the least bit of decency to call and leave a message saying she loved me. I walked into my house very stealthily, I did not want to disturb my mother as I crept upstairs to my room for she was very ill. She had been to many doctors and not one could pinpoint what was wrong with her, what could be causing her so much pain and agony. She had been given numerous tests about a year or two ago for pains, but back then the pains were rather minor, now they began to worry both her and me. She was to take new tests in the coming weeks, maybe this time they could determine the source of her ill health. I slept that night thinking about Jessica and the reasons why she could be avoiding my calls, my mother and her declining health and other things that seemed to float into my thoughts every now and then.

“Hey mom, how are you this morning?” I asked my mother the next morning bright and early, “Want me to make you some breakfast? I can make you my favorite recipe; eggs, pancakes and bacon, uhm uhmm uhmmm good”. “Sure, how was the movie last night, was it good?” she asked while she agonizingly sat herself up in bed. “Well, it pretty much sucked, since Jessica wasn’t there with me, she’s been acting quite odd lately, I don’t know what’s wrong with her, she’s been avoiding my calls, and it seems like were slowly drifting apart and I don’t want that to happen”. “It’s ok, don’t worry about it, things happen for a reason and if this doesn’t work out, then it was not meant to be simple as that, there are plenty of fish in the sea, tons of fish, just waiting for bait like you” she said with a smile. “Mom I don’t want those other fish I want Jessica, I want to spend the rest of my life with her, she’s my first girlfriend and she’s always been there for me through thick and thin, always”. “She has my personality, she’s anything and everything a guy like me could ask for”. “Awww I wish I had a boyfriend like you when I was growing up”, she said jesting my comment. “Mom, I’m being serious, she’s the one and I want it to stay that way, I hate how our relationship is turning out I feel as if I can’t trust her or anyone for that matter anymore”. “I don’t even know what my best friend Paul is doing behind my back maybe they’re doing something together and don’t want to tell me” I professed while searching for my mom’s remote. “Stop thinking like that, it will only make you stress and make those pimples you use to have on your face break out again”, “Mom stress doesn’t cause pimples, besides I use to eat chocolate and I wasn’t under stress at the time”. “Well just take it easy, you hear me, see where stress has gotten me, bedridden for two weeks now and not a single doctor has figured out what’s been wrong with me for the past two years”. “Ok mom, you already know I’m level headed and I deal with pressure well why are you even mentioning stress to me, psssh I strive off of stress” I said as I placed the remote beside her. “You say that now what till you get to be my age then you will really know what stress is,” she said with a tone that left a lasting impression in my mind. What would it be like years from now when life has gotten to me and Jessica is finally sick of our relationship, what would I do then? My dad was coming back later in the day from a four-day visit to his relatives in South Carolina, my grandfather had just been involved in a serious car accident and my dad was visiting him to make sure he would be ok. He was going to take my mother to get her tested for he had several additional days off, I had to work and go to school so unfortunately I could not take her myself. I couldn’t wait for his return maybe he could advise me on how to go about getting additional information out of Jessica, how to analyze her correctly and see through the gray spots and any lies she might be telling.

I went to school later that day and eventually encountered Paul who had a flurry of things to tell me, 99.9 percent of which would be useless information about girls he had boned the night before or another adventure in scouting out potential porn shops. I hate to say it but I really do think at times that his penis is his only brain and without it he wouldn’t be able to function daily on a normal level. “Dude guess what I just saw!!!” he shouted, grabbing me hard by the shoulders, “let me guess, a chick with her ass crack hanging out?”, “Nope, guess again”, “A chick with really big tits?”, “Dude no, it has something to do with your girl man!”, “what? Jessica? what does Jessica have to do with any of your sick fantasies?”, ” I saw a guy kissing your girl dawg!”. “You better be telling the truth, because I will seriously knock you out man, are you being serious?” “Dude I’ve never been more serious in my life, I couldn’t lie about something like this, some dude just kissed your girl and they were holding hands for like ten minutes before they kissed!”. “Holy fuck!, I knew it!, I knew she was doing something behind my back, shit!, what do I do man?”. “The only thing you can do bro, ask her why and how long” he said as if he had been through this same situation dozens of times before. “Dude, you don’t understand, Jessica is my EVERYTHING, if this is true my whole world will come crashing down, will you be there for me?” “Like always, I will be looking out for you man, just like I did in high school”, “thanks, that means a lot to me” I said giving him a hug, the kind of hug best friends give in their moments of crisis.
I walked to class thoughts swirling around in my head, this could be it, this could be the last straw in our already crumbling relationship, who is the guy? How long has she been seeing him? And how could she do this to me after five years of me showing her love and affection, how could she turn my life upside down. Fuck, what the hell was she thinking? I arrived to class, yet my mind was elsewhere, I had no desire to sit through another lecture while thoughts of my lover with another person wrecked my mind. I left class early and went back home, my dad had arrived and he welcomed me with arms wide open and a big smile on his face, he told me that grandpa was all right and that he had just suffered some minor fractures and contusions. I was happy to see him again and now that he was home my mom could finally get herself checked out.
Several days later after still not speaking with Jessica my mind was numb with so many thoughts of suicide I didn’t know what else to do. I contemplated it for a while, but eventually I talked myself out of it, I came to the fact that if I didn’t live and take care of my parents when they got older nobody else would, so I would live for them. I went to school day after day avoiding any contact with Jessica until it felt right to tell her what I had heard and get her side of the story. It was a matter of time before we would cross paths and we did on a rainy day in February several days after Valentine’s day, not the best of days. “Jessica, I’ve been meaning to ask you something”, I confronted her with a concerned and serious look on my face, my hands twitching a bit at my sides. “Hey hunny!, I missed you!, where the hell have you been?!, you didn’t get me a Valentine’s day gift I’m very disappointed in you snookums” she reached over and gave me a long kiss while she wrapped her arms around me. “Baby I have to ask you something” I said pushing her gently off of me, “Yes babe?”, “UmmmâÂ?¦I’ve been hearing rumors from reliable sources saying that you’ve been seeing another guy”. “O really?” she said looking quite astonished at my question as if she quoted her words from a script she concocted just minutes before. “Babe have you been cheating on me?” I asked bluntly “baby I would never dare cheat on you, you know that already, why are you asking silly questions?”. “You want to know why? OkâÂ?¦I’ll tell you why, well my best friend Paul caught you and another guy holding hands and kissing about a week ago in one of these hallways and being the good friend that he is, found it in my best interest to inform me of the possibility that my girlfriend for five years who I love and trust could be cheating on me with another guy behind my back”. “So I ask you this question again Jessica, have you or have you not been cheating on me?” A solemn silence filed the space between us as we stared into each other’s eyes, I couldn’t tell what she was thinking maybe she was trying to think of another lie to tell me at that moment, maybe she had another skillfully crafted excuse to narrate to me. “DavidâÂ?¦yes I have been cheating on you, I don’t even know what to say because, this is really the worst way you could have found out other than me telling you straight forward. “I’m guessing you would also like to know how long we’ve been seeing each other, well I met this guy named Jonathan about two years ago andâÂ?¦I’ve been dating him for the past nine months now”. “We have grown greatly attached to each other, so much so that I fear my love for him is much deeper than my love for youâÂ?¦if I have any left”. “I didn’t know how to tell you what was going on seeing that you loved me so much”. “I couldn’t bear to break your heart because I knew I was your first love, I admit my first love broke my heart too, because I was soooo deeply infatuated with him, that I couldn’t see myself being with anyone else, but I found you and now I’ve found Jonathan”. “I truly am sorry David for not telling you this sooner, the only way I figured your love for me would somewhat wane was if I avoided you as much as possible, but it seems that I can’t avoid you forever and now the truth must be told”. I stood there speechless for minutes, what she just told me seemed unreal, as if I were watching myself being told those exact same words, I did not want to hear the truth, I could not handle the truth. I just walked away, I couldn’t even say a single word to her, what more could I say? My girlfriend of five years just admitted to cheating on me with a guy she new for two of those five years, there wasn’t much more I could say or do except leave. “David wait!, listen to me I really didn’t mean for it to end like this, I had strong feelings for you up until I met Jonathan!”, she ran after me and grabbed my arm, “Don’t!, leave me alone, just fucking leave me alone, don’t even fucking call, do nothing, just disappear right now, I never want to see your face again, understand?”. I took my arm from her grasp and kept walking. She stood there with tears running down her face, a pitiful being who failed to realize that her actions could and can have terrible repercussions.

I got home later that day to find that it was not going to get any better. As I stepped through the wooden doorway of my house I was greeted with my father crying on the couch and my mother with her arm around him. Then and there I dropped to my knees and started to cry, I couldn’t take it any longer, I could feel my sanity leaving my body, I did not even get the news that my mother was terminally ill with cancer at that moment. Yet everything during that day culminated to that very instance in time where I realized that my life as I knew it, would never be the same again. My mother took me to her room and sat me down and told me that the doctor had performed new X-rays and found that cancer, which originated from her left prostate, had metastasized to surrounding lymph nodes. The doctor had given her at the least two months and at the most nine months to live. She vowed that the sickness would not get her down, that she would fight it with every last bit of courage and determination she had left in her. I cried and I cried, I had never ever cried so much in my life, I cried for my lost love that day and for my dying mother. I cried for myself, I didn’t know what to do anymore, I felt lost and helpless, and it felt as if it was all over at that moment.

Three weeks later found me on the brink of losing myself, I found that I couldn’t cope with life much longer, and that anything I did really didn’t matter, so much as making myself feel a little bit better about my current situation with my family and my ex-girlfriend. I walked to school that day armed with a knife I had snuck out of the kitchen, I had seen them kissing and making out every single day since that faithful day three weeks ago, in a hallway adjacent to the one I use on route to my class. She had not shown a single ounce of regret, I expected her to walk the hallways with her head hanging low, no, it was all up in his face, kissing, exchanging bodily fluids. I had revenge on my mind, I had to vindicate the love she took away from me by taking away the one she had now. I hide behind a wall and watched them as they kissed and as his hand touched her behind and slowly caressed it, it fueled what was an already boiling pot of fury. As soon as she said her goodbye to him and left for class, I walked over and confronted him. I told him that she use to be my girl, that he was the one she cheated on me with and asked him how it made him feel, I asked him politely not letting him in on my secret agenda. He smiled with a wide smirk, showing his sickening pearly white teeth and said “Maybe it’s because I’m that much better than you are, your just a poor pathetic sap, who lost out big time to someone who can surely turn her on, you should see what I do to her at night, it’s unbelievable”. With those last words I wielded my knife high in the air and plunged it into his chest, I went at him, stabbed him right between the eyes, into his arm, his stomach, again and again, and I kept going and going until blood splattered everywhere. I couldn’t stop myself, I felt such relief, such vindication, I watched as he screamed in pain crying out for help, but people in the vicinity were too late to save this wretched being. I had stabbed him over fifteen times, I made sure to carve out his heart and crush it with my foot before anyone had time to pull me away from him. I laughed as they held me back, I looked at him and screamed “How is your love life now, you fucker!” I watched as Jennifer ran back down the hallway screaming, she ran up to him and knelt down in his thick blood, shrieking and putting her hands on his bloody ripped face. “Even in death he still gets your affection, you know what? fuck you both!, fuck you, you dirty little slut!”. They dragged me off into the back of a police vehicle, but I felt happy at that moment.

During the next few months I sat during an arduous trial the facts were made clear, and I didn’t stand a chance. My attorney pleaded the insanity curve ball by telling the jury that a very traumatic event can create a severe psychological and chemical imbalance in the brain, and not only did I have one but two in the same day. The verdict was read, and although I could have gotten the death sentence or even worse life imprisonment without parole, they sentenced me to a place much worse. This mental institution, where I sit day and night, not knowing how the world is coping without me on the outside, and how my family is doing. If I had the choice I would have chosen the death sentence to put me out of my misery, so my mother’s final days can be pleasant. I never wanted her last thoughts of me to be of a mentally insane killer, I wanted her to remember me as the loving son who took care of her during the last few years of her life. The son that always gave her a hug whenever he returned from a long trip at boy scout camp when I was younger, the one that made her smile. All I can think about now is death, nothing but pure unrelenting thoughts about silencing this cruel life. This is my story, If this ever happens to you remember to always follow your heart, seek what is right, and not what your mind tells you to do.