It is eleven o’clock and most everyone has gone to sleep. But not Sukanya. She is still sitting in the common room and staring straight ahead. At first glance it looks as though she is watching television because she is staring in that direction. But a closer look proves that Sukanya is looking through the TV, past it.
Isabel stands in the doorway of the same room.
“Topping tonight’s news, a five-alarm fire is finally out this hour.” The earnest tone of the TV anchor coaxes Isabel a few steps into the room. “It was a grueling day for firefighters, some of whom are being treated for smoke inhalation tonight at St. Luke’s hospital….”
Isabel eases into the wing chair alongside Sukanya’s. The plaid upholstery is tattered but soft. Sukanya gives no indication that she is even aware of Isabel’s presence. Minutes pass.
“And now, in our continuing series called ‘Taking Back the Neighborhood,’ a profile of a little boy—” the anchor cocked her head ever so slightly to the left, coordinated perfectly with a hint of a smile: clues that a heartwarming story was moments from unfolding “—who took on a giant…and won!”
Isabel lets the sounds of the television wash over her. She looks at Sukanya. Then, as she turns back to the screen, she relaxes all the muscles in her face, her neck, her back and legs and finally exhales into a stupor.
The pictures of angry neighbors picketing in front of city hall, once clear, blur into a comfortable kaleidoscope of color. The voices, once a cacophony, blend into a symphony of sound, and become a waking lullaby for the two women, side by side, late at night in a mental institution.
Night after night Isabel and Sukanya sit immobilized in front of the television. To Isabel the newscasts that just months ago were precision Swiss timepieces are now melting clocks that litter barren dreamscapes. The stories that once implied competitive edge are now superficial jumbles of words tied together by nursery school segues.
“Isabel?” Connie the night nurse calls into the room halfheartedly, assuming Isabel is elsewhere. But the twin wing chairs intrigue her. “Isabel? You in here, hon?”
Go away.
Isabel feels the spell of the stupor being broken as the nurse calls her back into reality.
No. Go away.
Connie peers around the chair and looks surprised to see Isabel sitting there.
“You must not have heard the call for meds,” she explains to her mute patient. “I brought them in for you.”
Wordlessly Isabel turns her palm upward and watches as the small pills roll out of the white Dixie cup and into the center of her hand. She takes the cup of Hawaiian Punch from Connie and stares at it with an equal amount of blankness.
“You okay, hon?” Connie’s face crinkles up. Isabel watches her mouth move. “Do you feel all right?”
Isabel looks back and forth between her two hands and, in one smooth motion, brings the pills to her mouth. Slowly she follows with her Hawaiian Punch and swallows the sleeping pills. Connie hesitates before moving away and, eventually, out of the room.
Isabel turns back to the TV. Sukanya has never looked away.
There is comfort in being left alone. Something about the numbness hugging her feels familiar.