“What are you thinking about, Isabel?”
She looks up.
“Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Yeah. Nothing.”
“Your mind is blank, then,” Dr. Seidler prods.
“No.” Annoyed, Isabel answers as though she is explaining something to a child. “I’m thinking of nothing. I have nothing. There’s nothing in my life, not one living thing. My plant was the only living thing in my life that was still mine and I came back from my last out-of-town trip and there it was, all shriveled up. Dead. The perfect metaphor, really. When you think about it.”
The tears that had been balancing precariously on her lower eyelids finally push past the dam and make tracks down her hot cheeks.
“Are you thinking about suicide, Isabel?” Her doctor looks earnest, concerned.
“Yes. If you must know, yes. There. I’ve said it. I know that means I’ll never get out of this place, but shit, yeah I’m thinking about it. I could walk down to the end of the driveway and step in front of an oncoming car.”
“There are other options, you know.” Dr. Seidler’s tone is urgent. “You have a lot to live for—”
“Before you go on and on about how many people would miss me if I died you can just save it,” Isabel cries. The therapist lets her continue. “It would be a relief.”
“A relief for whom?”
“For me, first of all. I wouldn’t have to figure out each and every single goddamned day how I am going to haul myself up and into this meaningless world. I wouldn’t have to fight the silent scream—you know that painting? Actually, I think it’s called The Scream—the one where that person has its hands on either side of its scary face? People look at me and they see this happy face, but inside I’m screaming. It’s just that no one hears me.”
Dr. Seidler waits for her to continue.
When Isabel doesn’t she asks, “You don’t think anyone would be sad if you killed yourself?”
“Who?” she challenges. “Who? My parents? I haven’t been close to them in years.”
“Can she call you back, Katherine?” Alex took a sip of his cappuccino. “She’s taking a nap and I hate to wake her since she’s been so tired lately.”
Sip.
“I know, I know,” he said, trying to make his voice sound as if he were smiling, “she’s terrible about returning calls. But I’ll make sure she calls you back this weekend, okay?”
Sip.
“Good to talk to you, too. I will, I will. Okay, bye!”
“Who was that on the phone?” Isabel rubbed her eyes as she shuffled out of the bedroom. She yawned.
“Oh, no one.” Alex turned toward his sleepy wife. “Telemarketer. How’d you sleep?”
“Like a rock. What time is it?” Isabel turned Alex’s wrist so she could see the face of his watch. “Why’d you let me sleep so long? Damn! I have so much to do today.”
Alex stroked her hair. “You need your sleep, Isabel.”
She curled up on the couch alongside her husband. “You take such good care of me,” she purred. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“You won’t have to find out,” he said somberly. “You won’t find out.”
“Plus, my parents have two other children to think about. My brothers are healthy and successful and happy. No. They’d be sad for a while but they’d go on.”
“That’s depression talking, Isabel,” the doctor says. “It’s hard for you to see beyond your feelings right now, I know that, but a lot of people would be sad, very sad, if you killed yourself.”
Silence.
“I just want to go.” Isabel is exhausted. “Just let me go.”
“I can’t do that and you know it.”
Why? Why can’t you just let me go?
The next morning it is impossible for Isabel to pull herself out of bed. She lies on top of the covers and stares at the acoustic-tiled ceiling, focusing on the mess of holes punched in each square.
Someone has the mind-numbing job of running a machine that pokes the holes into each of those perfectly measured squares. How can they live with themselves?
A knock on the door breaks the embryonic whoosh of her sound machine. “Yes?”
“Isabel, you’ve got to take your meds.” The nameless nurse pokes her head in the door.
“Okay, okay,” she sighs, not moving from her bed. “I’ll be there in a minute.”
Here we are, scurrying around like ants: “You have to take your meds, Isabel”; “Line up, kids”; “It’s time to file your income tax returns”; “Would you like this for here or to go?” Each person has their little job and they do it, then they go home, then they eat, then they sleep and then they get up and do it all over again the next day. What’s the point? We’re all just filling up space. Why do people want to reproduce? So they can bring more children into this already overpopulated world so they can fill up space with some meaningless job and then go home and do it all over again the next day? Like those ceiling tiles.
The knock comes again. “Isabel?” It’s the nurse again and this time she looks annoyed when she sees that Isabel hasn’t moved. “You have to come get your meds, Isabel. After that you can get back in bed for a little while if you want, but you have to come take your medicine,” she says emphatically.
I wonder what she thinks of her job. What does she do when she leaves here? Does she talk about all of us to her husband?
Isabel hauls herself out of bed and puts shorts on over her boxers.
“Okay, okay,” she says to no one in particular as she heads down the hall to the medicine distribution window. After swallowing the controlled substances that will beat back nature until the next dispensation—all have foreboding names packed with too many late-alphabet consonants like Serzone, Zyprexa, Trazodone—she shuffles back to her room and crawls back into bed, this time assuming the fetal position.
Doesn’t anybody else see how meaningless this is? How we are all consumed with our chores, which are ultimately useless because with the swipe of a broom we can all be swept away into the abyss. Here I am in a mental institution, trying to get better so that I can go back into the world and rush from job to job, killing time until I die of something other than suicide. I take medicine to help me deal with the nothingness of my life. Millions of us have to take pills to distract us from the sheer boredom of it all. We hurry from thing to thing like ants when we’re all going to end up suffocating, anyway.
“Isabel.” The voice on the other side of the door sounds like Kristen’s. “We’re getting ready for the morning meeting. You coming?”
Isabel looks at her watch. An hour has passed.