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“You don’t think I look fat?” Becca giggles again.

Debbie jumps out of her chair and heads for the door.

“No, Debbie,” says Claire. “You need to stay here.”

Debbie turns around. Her jaw is clenched; a vein is pulsing in her neck.

Claire is pointing to Debbie’s empty chair. Debbie harrumphs across the room and flops into her seat.

No one moves.

Becca flips her hair over her shoulder. “So, what?” she says. “Are you guys mad at me or something?”

Sydney coughs. Then nothing.

“Yes,” comes a tiny voice from across the circle. It’s Tara. She’s looking out at Becca from under her baseball cap.

Becca grins, like she can’t believe it, like it’s a big joke. “Why?” she says. “I’m OK. See?” She clamps her teeth together and smiles hard.

No one says anything.

“Besides, I don’t see what the big deal is,” Becca says. She looks at Claire, then back at the group. “It’s not like I did anything to you guys.”

Debbie snorts.

“Yes,” says Tara “Yes, you did.” She looks down at her lap, cracks her knuckles. “What you did affected all of us. Me. Debbie. Callie. All of us.”

Us. This is the first time I’ve been included in us. My cheeks flush.

Becca’s gaze travels around the circle; she looks hopeful and doubtful at the same time.

“We …” Tara can’t finish.

“We were scared,” says Sydney, all in a rush. “We …you know, we want you to get better. That’s why we’re all here, isn’t it? To get better?”

I check to see how people are responding to this question. Tara nods. Debbie nods. Tiffany shrugs. Amanda checks her watch.

Becca looks stunned.

Claire finally says something. “Becca? How are you doing?”

Becca doesn’t answer.

“You look upset.”

Becca nods, then says to Claire, “Is it OK if I go back to the infirmary for a while?”

Claire says that’s fine, that maybe this is a lot to take in on her first day back; then she goes to the door and signals an attendant. Marie comes, releases the brake on Becca’s chair, and wheels her away.

When Becca’s gone, we all sit there looking at Debbie. Mascara is running down her cheeks and a muscle is working in her jaw, but she’s staring off into space.

“You OK?” says Sydney at last.

Debbie nods vacantly.

People look around, not sure what to do.

“Are you sure?” says Tara

“Yeah,” Debbie says, finally breaking off her stare. “Yeah,” she says. “I’m fine.”

Then she turns to me.

“What about you?” she says, wiping her face with the back of her hand. “Are you OK?”

I can feel heads turning around the circle to look at me. “Sure,” I say. “Yeah.”

Debbie smiles, then claps a hand over her mouth. “I did it again!” she says. “Taking care of everybody else. What do you call it, Amanda?”

Amanda’s face is a mixture of surprise and mischief. “Co-dependent,” she says. “You’re being co-dependent again.”

Debbie laughs. It’s a nervous laugh, but everyone laughs too, out of relief. All of us.

Now that I’ve been upgraded to a Level Two, I can escort myself places. Tonight I’m on my way to the game room, even though I don’t really feel like playing Connect Four, and even though everyone else is in the dayroom. I really feel like watching TV because I haven’t seen a single show since I got here, but I’m not sure I can just walk in and sit down with everybody after all this time. I walk past the door and notice Tara’s baseball cap turning as I go by.

“Callie?” I turn around and see her running down the hall behind me. She scuffs along in her slippers, then slides to a stop when she gets to me, like one of Sam’s hockey players.

“Hey!” She’s panting. The thought crosses my mind that Tara could have a heart attack if she doesn’t get better. I stop and wait for her to catch her breath.

“Whew!” She smiles. “We were wondering if you wanted to watch TV.” She tips her head toward the dayroom. “You know, with the group. Unless you don’t want to. It’s OK if you want to be alone.”

She’s still breathing hard.

“Sure,” I say, looking at her hopeful, embarrassed face. “Sure.”

Sydney and Debbie are on the couch. Tiffany’s on the floor, flipping through a magazine and watching TV at the same time. Sydney looks up when I come in, slides down the couch, and pats the seat next to her. “S.T.,” she says. “Sit here.”

The couch is a big bumpy overstuffed thing and when I sit back my feet don’t touch the floor. Tara sits down next to me and I notice that her feet don’t touch, either. They’re watching Jeopardy; it’s time for the daily double. A contestant named Tim has chosen Silent Film Stars for $500. The host asks the big question: “This actress, dubbed America’s Sweetheart, starred in the original film version of Heidi.”

“C’mon, Tim,” Sydney chants.

“Shirley Temple?” suggests Debbie.

“No,” says Tiffany. “It’s a silent film star.”

I know this one. I know the answer. I know it from watching TV with Sam on Saturday afternoons when our mom is resting. “Mary Pickford,” I whisper. Then louder, “Mary Pickford.”

Tim hits his buzzer. “Who was Mary Pickford?”

The daily double alarm goes off. Tim jumps up and down. Sydney thumps me on the back. “Way to go, S.T.! You win the daily double!”

The next morning at breakfast, Tiffany announces flatly that she’s going home. “The insurance ran out,” she says, pushing her scrambled eggs around on her plate. “They thought I could stay for a couple of months, but now they say they’ll pay for only a month—which is over today.”

“You lucky dog,” says Amanda.

Tiffany grunts.

“Aren’t you happy?” says Tara.

Tiffany puts salt on her eggs, pushes them around some more, then sets her fork down. “No.”

“Why not? I thought you hated it here.”

Tiffany shakes her head. “You think this place is crazy you should try living with my family.”

A couple of people nod. No one seems able to eat.

“What will you do?” says Sydney after a while. “You know, to get better?”

“They’re sending me to some outpatient thing. Some group that meets after school every day.” Tiffany waves her hand like she’s brushing away a fly.

“Why can’t you go to school and come to Group here in the afternoon?” says Sydney.

“It’s too far, I guess,” Tiffany says glumly. Then, quietly, “It won’t be the same.”

The chimes ring; no one moves. Then Claire comes over and tells us our group doesn’t have to go straight to our usual appointments; we’re allowed to walk Tiffany to the front door.

We all stand around in a circle in the reception room, waiting for Tiffany’s cab and not talking about her leaving —all of us except Amanda, who didn’t come out of her room when it was time to walk to the front door. Tiffany’s belongings hardly fill a plastic bag and she looks small somehow, fingering the latch of her purse and pretending like she could care less about leaving.

Finally a cab pulls up and blows the horn. Sydney gives Tiffany a hug. Tara says she’ll write. Debbie tells Tiffany she’ll actually miss her. “You never let me get away with …you know, crap.” It’s a big deal for Debbie to say crap and I think maybe she’s going to laugh, but her eyes are brimming with wetness.

Tiffany punches me in the arm lightly and tells me I have to keep talking in Group. I nod. Then I realize that nodding isn’t talking. “OK,” I say. I want to say “I promise,” but my throat closes up on me.

Just when everyone, including Tiffany, looks like they’re going to start crying, Sydney says, “Hey, now that you’re leaving …why don’t you tell us why you always carry that darn purse?”

Tiffany fiddles with the latch. “You promise you won’t tell?”

We promise.

She opens the purse and pulls out a ratty piece of pink fabric. “My old baby blanket.” She grins and shrugs and then turns to go.

When the automatic doors slide apart, a warm, moist riffle of air floats in, lifting the hair around my face. The snow has melted; tiny green buds are forming on the tips on the trees. It dawns on me that soon it will be spring. Then summer. Kids will be riding their bikes on the sidewalk, dads will be rolling out barbecue grills, moms will be making pitchers of lemonade.

The doors slide shut and it’s winter again inside Sick Minds.

An ache fills my chest. I want something, but I can’t put a name to it.

Debbie, Sydney, Tara, and I shuffle back to the dorm, not saying anything. When we get to the attendants’ desk, we drift apart; no one’s in a hurry to go their appointments, especially me, since I have Study Hall. I see Ruby putting on her coat, going off duty.

“What day is it in the real world, Ruby?” I ask, when the other girls are gone.

“The real world? What do you mean, child?”

“Out there.” I point to the window. “What day is it?”

“Wednesday.”

“No, I mean the date. What’s the date?”

She looks over at the chalkboard. Tiffany’s name has already been erased. Sydney and Tara have been upgraded to Level Threes, along with Debbie. Next to Becca’s name it simply says “H Wing.” Our group is down to five: Sydney, Tara, and Debbie, who are going to graduate soon, and Amanda and me.

“March 27,” Ruby says.

She says it’s time for her to go home and get some sleep. She says they’re doing construction in her neighborhood, and she sure hopes they’re finished with the jackhammer. She appraises me, then smiles. She says not to worry and slips me a butterscotch candy. But the wanting feeling still doesn’t go away.

Later, after Study Hall, I escort myself to your office. The lights in the waiting area are off and the UFOs outside all the shrink offices are quiet. I sit down in my usual chair outside your door and wait. I check my watch. If this were a dentist’s office, there’d be old National Geographics to look at; here, there are only tissue boxes and more tissue boxes.

I check my watch again.

You’re late. Fifteen minutes late.

I count the tissue boxes and the UFOs. I do the math; there are 1.5 tissue boxes per UFO. I check my watch again and know that you’re not coming. That something’s wrong.

I must have made a mistake. The chalkboard probably says my appointment was changed. That happens sometimes. I decide to wait until you’re twenty minutes late; then I’ll check the chalkboard.

Then it dawns on me: Wednesday is your day off. I remember you saying See you Thursday, last time. You didn’t say See you tomorrow. You said See you Thursday. I feel annoyed for some reason, then scared. Thursday is a long time away. What will I do till then?

I decide to go to Study Hall and figure out how many hours till tomorrow. How many hours, then how many minutes, then how many seconds. That will at least help pass the time.

Study Hall’s closed, too. My only other choice is the dayroom. When I walk in, the TV’s on, but no one’s watching it; then I see Amanda lying down on the couch. She notices me before I can sneak out.

“So,” she says, “you were onto Becca’s scam?”

I don’t know how to answer. Her voice is cajoling, full of encouragement; I think I’m supposed to say yes, but somehow I don’t. I shrug.

“Cool,” she says, sitting up. “Very cool.”

I sit down on a chair far from her and act very interested in the show on TV, a rerun of Family Ties. Alex is trying to keep his mom from opening the closet.

“So, S.T.,” Amanda says. “What do you use?”

I don’t understand.

She pulls up her sleeve and points to a line of purplish bumps on the inside of her arm; she twists her hand so I can see that the bumps go all the way around her wrist, like a bracelet. “You know, scissors? Glass? Wire?”

I try to concentrate on the TV. The Family Ties mom turns her back and the person hiding in the closet opens the door; Alex slams it shut, looking innocent. I can’t exactly follow it with Amanda bugging me.

“I knew a girl who used her father’s credit card. Nice touch. Little hidden psychological message in that, don’t you think?”

I don’t say anything.

“My personal favorite?” Amanda maneuvers herself so she’s blocking my view of the TV. “A safety pin and hairspray Rubbing alcohol’s good, too. But hairspray’s the best. It makes your scars puff up.”

She lies down again. “By the way,” she says, “I found this staple. Underneath one of the chairs in the study lounge. It works really well.”

I remember the look on her face in Study Hall the day I saw her rubbing her arm on the seat of the chair while she pretended to be asleep.

“Third row, last chair,” she says. “Just thought you might want to know. In case they find your metal thing.”

On Thursday I don’t wait for you to ask me where I want to start. While you’re still closing your door, I ask if you want to see my scars.

Your face is neutral. “Do you want to show me?” you say.

I nod. I pinch my sleeve between my thumb and index finger, but instead of pulling it up, I pull it down. Until it covers my wrist. Until it covers my hand. Until my whole arm is hidden inside my sleeve.

“I use my mom’s Exacto knife.” I stare at my shirtsleeve. “Or her embroidery scissors. Once I used the paper towel dispenser in the guest bathroom here.” I feel the corners of my mouth turn up; I’m not happy but somehow I have to fight the urge to smile.

I check for your reaction. You’re expecting something, I can tell. Your normal, calm face shows a hint of waiting. Waiting, and something else, something like hope.

I roll my sleeve between my thumb and index finger, then deliberately, with a kind of reverence, I pull my sleeve back, all the way up to the elbow, and extend my arm to you.

You’re not disgusted or frightened or any of the hundred wrong things you could be; you look like yourself, serious, curious, and maybe, maybe, just a little bit proud of me.

I look at my arm. It’s crisscrossed with pink lines, lines that strike me as delicate and faint, lines I remember making.

I gently pull my sleeve back down and decide it would be good to make some kind of joke right about now.

“Guess I’ll never wear a strapless ball gown,” I say.

You look perplexed.

“Debbie, you know Debbie from my group, she’s always drawing fancy ball gowns. I’ll have to ask her to design one for me—one that has long sleeves.” I laugh. You don’t.