I pulled the elastic out of my hair, releasing a tight ponytail that was collected at the crown of my head. I pressed my fingers into my scalp, massaging it firmly to alleviate the pressure.

I glanced around the room, focusing on a poster. “If you think you’re in hell, keep going.” Is that supposed to be motivational? I stretched my fingers out, the tendons tightening, and squeezed them into a fist.

Open. Close. Open. Close.

“So, Grace, why are you here?” the man asked.

I answered without hesitation, “Because the psychiatrist at the hospital told me I needed to come.”

The man, whose name I had already forgotten, looked at his notepad and scribbled something down. The marker squeaked as it pressed against the paper. My teeth clenched.

The unspoken truth weighed heavily in the room. He knew I had tried to kill myself. It was written on the page in front of him.

A bird landed on the sill outside the window, staring in at me. I stared back. Its eyes, black, vacant, glistening, made the hair on my arms stand on end.

“Well, let’s try and figure out why he sent you here then, shall we?”

The smell of putrid coffee filled my nostrils.

I motioned to the pot. “I’m sorry, can we pour that out?”

Chapter 4

Dear Sunshine,

I’ve made a mess of everything. I’m sad and alone and tired of trying, and you’re not here. But you never really were, were you?

The doctors say there’s something wrong with the way my brain works. They want to analyze my thoughts, study me like a rat in a cage with a cube of cheese at the end of a maze. I told them that maybe, in a previous life, the doctors drilled a hole in my head for the spirits to escape and it never quite healed. They weren’t convinced.

They say they’re going to make me better. The funny thing is, you were the only one who could have fixed me. But you didn’t, did you?

I have to know, why didn’t you care? Didn’t anyone ever teach you how to love another person? Please, tell me what happened that made you this way. Then maybe I’ll be able to understand. I need to understand in order to get better. I need so desperately to get better.

Love,
G

Chapter 5

After my mother left for what she claimed would be the final time, I returned home one evening to find her hosting a welcome back party for one of her new, young friends. The house was packed with people who were laughing and shouting over one another. Empty beer bottles and dirty plates were stacked on the counter. A girl was sitting on the couch, cutting up lines of white powder on an oval mirror she had taken down from my wall. Another guy was rolling a joint, busting the weed by hand.

“Grace, come here,” my mother beckoned. “I want you to meet someone.”