Madness (17 page)

Of course, I get up now and then. I get up to get another bottle. Then I put myself back in my chair, as if I am a little kid who refuses to eat her peas and is not allowed to leave her place until she finishes every last bite. I sit at the table with my feet on the chair, peeling the label off a bottle of whiskey, swimming in the drunken, tumultuous sea of my thoughts. I take a swig, set the bottle down, and study it as the liquor burns a path down my throat. It suddenly dawns on me that the drinking may be one of the things that is making me as crazy as I am. It is one of the things that has brought me to this point. I put my head on the table, hand wrapped around the bottle, and close my eyes. I know I can't stop. And I know, finally, that if I do not stop, the madness will get worse, that the alcohol is like pouring gasoline on an already smoldering fire.

I find myself opening the phone book and looking up a twelve-step group. A few minutes later I'm driving like hell toward what seems the only chance I have to save my own life.

Hi,
someone says. He's enormous, wearing biker leathers and a red bandanna.
I'm Steve, and I'm an alcoholic.

Hi, Steve,
the room recites. My vision veers in and out, and my hands shake so hard I can barely hold the Styrofoam cup of bad coffee. The coffee has little waves in it. It spills over the sides.

Hi, Susan. Hi, Sandra. Hi, Peter. Hi, John.

They come to me. I look around in confusion.

What's your name?
someone asks gently.

Marya,
I say, barely audible, my mouth sticky and dry.

They wait for me to say
And I'm an alcoholic.
A beat. They move on.
Hi, Andrew. Hi, Joan.

They talk for an hour. I have no idea what they say. My brain skitters over the sound, catching snippets of sentences, a laugh. The circle of faces revolves around me, the room spins, and I grip the arms of my chair to keep myself from tipping over. And then suddenly the meeting breaks up, I'm wandering outside, and it
seems that half the group hurries after me, calling my name. They crowd around, looking at me urgently, touching me on the arm. I look up at them, overwhelmed and confused, and try to follow the questions that come at me in a flurry:

Are you from around here?

How long since your last drink?

Are you feeling all right? You look a little—pale.

Have you eaten lately?

Do you need another cup of coffee?

Why don't you come back inside and sit down. You don't seem so steady on your feet.

I am pushed back into the meeting room and guided onto a couch. Someone hands me a cup of coffee. They pull up chairs.

So,
someone says.
Are you sober?

I stare at them.
I think so,
I say.

Have you had a drink today?

Just a couple.

When was the last time you ate?

I try to think.
I can't remember,
I say.

Someone produces a banana.
Eat this,
they say.
Come with us,
they say. I am being herded into someone's house.
You need sugar,
they say, and pour me orange juice and a bowl of sugary cereal and I try to figure out what to do with the spoon. They talk to me and I try to understand what they're saying, and my brain is soaked with booze, addled with madness, but they are good people, and they are feeding me, and I am so relieved I start to cry.

They pat me on the shoulder.
Hey,
they say.
'S'all right. You'll be all right.

I don't think so,
I say.

Inexplicably, my aunt—my mother's sister, whom I adore—is sitting at the kitchen table with me. I am very startled to find her here. She doesn't explain her presence. Turns out I've been hiding in the family beach house on the Oregon coast. It's hers and my mother's, so I suppose there's no real reason she
wouldn't
be here.

It seems I've called my mother at some point in the last few days. I've been gone for weeks. My parents—now divorced, my mother living in Minneapolis with her new husband, my father with his new wife in Arizona—knew only that I was on a hiking trip with a friend. They've been worried about me for months, listening to me get crazier and crazier during our infrequent phone calls. Whatever I said to my mother when I called from Oregon must have tipped her off that I was not doing so well. (No, not so well.) She called her sister, who lives in Oregon, and asked her to come get me. She also called my sister-in-law, a doctor in a Portland hospital, and made certain that a bed in the psych ward was waiting for me.

But I know none of this. All I know is that I am in the beach house, and my aunt is here, and I am near tears with relief. I try to feign normalcy—give her a hug, tell her I just needed a little getaway, the beach house seemed the very place. I don't tell her that I didn't even know I was
in
the beach house. I smile and tell her I'm writing. I babble and chatter, my speech getting faster by the second. I flit from topic to topic, unable to stop, and she nods, looking at me strangely, worried, and I don't want her to be worried, I don't want her to think I'm crazy.

Out of nowhere I hear myself lighting into HMOs and their evils, their failure to cover mental health services, and I am being extremely articulate, honing my argument, and now I am sobbing, and I say I don't know what I'm going to do, I have no way to get help, and I think it's possible I may need some help, nothing serious, but maybe just something to get me back on my feet, but they won't cover anything and it's all a bureaucracy with no connection to real people with real problems who need help. I watch tears drip from my nose onto the wood grain of the kitchen table and try to get ahold of myself, to start speaking in a nice, detached, intellectual way. This will surely persuade my aunt that I am perfectly fine, outburst aside.

Oh, sweetie,
she says.

That makes it worse. I crawl up the stairs to the bedroom and climb into bed, sobbing so hard I am pretty sure I am going to break. The feeling of despair is so pure and clean it seems to slice a razor-sharp path through my body. My body gapes open, filling in slowly with the knowledge that there is no hope. I find this peaceful. My aunt is bending over me with the phone. I hold it to my ear. My mother's voice. More soothing noises. I am crying too hard to hold the phone, so I hand it back to my aunt.

Now I am in a car. The towering green-blue pines and rocky cliffs that crowd against the two-lane road go by. Now we are at a hospital. Now we are in a tiny, windowless room. Now I am in a chair. My aunt is here. We are locked in. I do not understand the room. There is a TV screen that shows someone in a uniform pacing back and forth outside. My aunt explains that it is a security guard. To secure what? Me. I am concerned and ask if the figure has a gun. She tries to explain. The uniformed person makes me incredibly agitated. I have a great many questions about this new situation. I cry, wanting to know if they will come to get me, if they will let me out, if they will help me.

I don't know what happens next.

I am in a cage. I am dreaming, but I am not asleep. It is a
daydream.
But then it is night; I do not know how to explain it to the figures in the room, who surround me. I cannot move; I flail but in
a very contained sort of way
because it would seem my ankles and wrists are restrained. The figures in the room
murmur,
which must mean I'm crazy again, because otherwise they would speak in normal voices. But I am strapped down + they murmur + I cannot lift my head + for it is
full of medicines to calm me
+ aha! It is not a cage for there is
no roof!
Which means = it is a bed with bars. And the figures peer over me and study me as if I am a rat. Or perhaps I have just been born and they are admiring my perfect little ears. And then a face comes into focus: a savior! Surely he will tell me where I am, for if he is here and I am here then = he must know
where we are
but there is a sudden flower;
it is a sunflower; I shriek,
Sunflower!
It is the color of rust; is that even possible? Is there a flower the color of rust? I realize it is threatening; why has he brought me this flower; it seems to say
I know you.
Rather than saying, for example,
Get well, obviously.
As a daisy would say; however, I dislike daisies, have always disliked them, to the point of
truly hating them,
for no reason that I am aware; van Gogh painted sunflowers! The sunflower is redeemed. So I take it and eat it. Then they take away my sunflower, which I love very much; they say,
We'll just put this in a vase;
which is so uninspired a notion I laugh at them for they must be very boring to one another and themselves; I am not boring; I am, I discover, full of ideas; I mention the green beans; I can lift my head! I announce that I will leave if they don't give me a dress to wear to the occasion; and some
fabulous shoes.

The next thing I know, I am coming to, and everyone in the world is standing above me. My mother is in here somewhere. I am aware of her presence. My father is or is not here, it's not quite clear. I understand that if he is not here yet, he will be soon, for this is a highly unusual situation, and he will need to come explain it to me.

There are bars on the bed. The people murmur. I am here, and they are here, which means I am somewhere, somewhere safe, and I don't have to drive anymore, and the shrieking has stopped, and my mind floats in a bath of sedatives, sunning itself on its back like a seal.

I am mad. The thought calms me. I don't have to try to be sane anymore. It's over.

I sleep.

When I come to again, the sound has been shut off. My head has become a kaleidoscope. It turns and turns, and the shards of color tumble and arrange themselves differently every time. At some point the colored patterns organize themselves into the
shapes of people and things, and my head becomes a telescope instead. I watch them on their little planet, unsure how far away they are. They come and go, the view from the telescope emptying out, focusing now on the plastic light on the ceiling above, which is another strata of space, which has a light, which is possibly a star. Then they reappear in the telescope again and I am much relieved. When I move my telescope from side to side, the figures and the colors pan past so fast it makes me dizzy.

I am sedated. I don't understand what's going on. I know only that I am in a hospital and that my family is here. Someone is beside me, my doctor, my mother, my friend, and I murmur a few things, and I hear my sentences begin to tangle into incomprehensible, nonsensical gibberish, and it frustrates me, trying to make myself understood, and I slide back into sleep.

The things that happen are out of order. Nothing follows. My facts are my facts alone.

I travel from bed to bed. Today I am in a bed without bars. A nice woman with short blond hair is talking to me. I feel as if I am underwater. I establish for myself that she is my doctor. Her voice echoes, garbled, in my head. I concentrate on what she is saying. I try to keep myself afloat.
Do you understand me?
Oh, yes, I nod, wanting to be polite. She is saying something about medication. She uses the word
helping. We are trying to [burble burble]. We want you to know [burble]. Your mother and father are here. Tell me how you. We are. They are. We will. Better soon. As soon as we.

I hear myself say something. My own voice is very near, so near I am not sure if it makes it from the echo chamber of my skull out into the air. I remember I had many questions that I was saving up for when she came. My questions trip over one another, and I can't keep one sentence separated from the other. The words tangle up. She says,
I'm sorry, I don't understand.
I try to explain myself, but I am sinking, my eyes start to close, I hear myself mumble, getting
farther away.
Marya? You're not making any sense.
She stands to go.
I'll come back later,
she says. Frustrated, sinking, I nod.

I am upright. I am wearing my robes. I stare at the table, where a peanut butter sandwich has appeared, though it confuses me and I don't know what to do with it. My hands lie in my lap. My hands are heavy. Someone is watching, and I lift my head. I have visitors. They furrow their brows and look sad. I tell them not to worry, it will be fine. My mouth will not cooperate. I would be embarrassed but I can't concentrate that long.

I shuffle across the room to the little table where they keep crackers and oranges and tea and powdered hot chocolate and lukewarm water. The water is lukewarm so we can't scald ourselves. The movie plays in a loop. From the faraway place in my head, I watch my insane game of one
A
.
M
.
cribbage with a speechless enormous man who sometimes inexplicably laughs and struggles with a pencil to mark down the score. I do not know how to play cribbage. I have never known how.

My feet in hospital footies are tucked under me. I am a smallish creature, a rabbit or a mouse, swimming in miles of hospital cotton, dazed and riding fluorescent dreams. The colors of the cards blur red-black as I turn my head. I study three dead flowers in a Styrofoam cup: two yellow, one purple. I struggle to remember their names. A man named Beast tried to kill himself last night. I say I am sorry about that. He talks to me slowly and I raise my eyes. He says,
Do you know flowers,
and I say,
Yes.
It takes a moment to force the word but I say,
Yes, I know flowers,
and he says,
Do you know a flower like a firework, an explosion, but purple, or blue,
and I picture the wet bush flush with balls of blue outside the kitchen window, after the rain, when I stared at it for hours, letting the coffee go cold in my cup, clinging to the cup in the face of the astonishing blue while I cried. This was maybe yesterday or maybe last year. It was in the house on the coast or it was in my childhood home or it was somewhere I can't remember now. I pick
through the rubble of my brain. My brain is an archaeological site.
Yes,
I say, carefully deciphering the complexities of my cards,
yes, hydrangea.
We stare at each other, amazed.