LXXII | Some Test
❦
I’m tailed by the nurses
for a month.
They won’t leave
until they do
THE TEST.
I think they’re overreacting.
But of course,
I don’t track these things—
like a normal girl.
The doctor is firm
even when I make a scene.
Boring questions.
Routine.
Her eyes are kind.
Calculating, patient, bored.
The angel from the first day
was obviously
a hallucination.
The asylum is crowded.
David still has his escort
—that’s four nurses.
There’s a new patient:
Siti.
So six nurses.
Asher escapes getting shadowed
and I’ll ask if why
if they’ll just relax
and let him talk to me.
He looks at me often,
so I know he wants to.
(At first I thought
he’s just feeling guilty
like he was
before.
Then
I remember.)
The one who used him
is me.
He’s not upset.
If anything,
he appears liberated.
I watch him
eat nasi lemak now,
Zuraida’s talking to Siti on his other side.
(They should just
sit together
if they want to talk.)
He’s ignoring them.
But sometimes
he’ll make comments.
I forgot
he can understand
Malay.
His eyes meet mine.
A smile.
The pretty nurse
blocks my view of him
casually.
I glare at her
and turn back to my painting.
The face I’m contouring
is Tammie’s.
But if you tilt your head a bit,
it’s Asher
with guilt in his eyes
like before.
I let him hang around because we’re the same.
Now we’re not—
I blur out her/his smile—
I don’t know
what to do.
❦
David’s nurses disappear first.
Then Siti’s.
She spends all day
in the studio.
Zuraida goes with her.
Tammie’s
new friends.
I’m sure of it.
I check
just to make sure.
Siti just looks at herself
from all angles
at herself in the mirror.
Zuraida watches,
hair hanging in front of her face.
A talking statue.
The dissonant music
drowns out what they say.
But the girl swinging from the pole
has her lips pursed,
parting only to pant.
So I relax.
Tammie snarls at me.
Makes a face
I cannot bear to look at.
So I leave.
I tell my white shadows
they can leave too
but they ignore me.
After some time,
I’m allowed to approach Asher.
He’s happier
than I expect.
I’m unhappier
than I expect.
We sit in the greenhouse,
staring separately
at the same rowan trees.
He doesn’t apologise.
I still wait for it.
Like an idiot.
He talks about why
he’s happy.
It’s the first thing he tells me.
You’re alive,
he keeps saying.
Frustration
boils like a kettle
in my chest.
I don’t know what to do about it.
He takes my hand.
The nurses
almost react.
He waits
for them to return to their
posts
before he says,
Let’s continue being friends.
The frustration
overflows.
It hurts now.
Like lava
melting my organs.
I wonder why.
It’s good,
isn’t it?
Since Tammie’s even angrier at me now.
I won’t be alone
everyday.
Maybe I should think about dying again.
A future
for the both of us…
Hope,
life,
whatever.
It’s out of reach now.
Burnt to a crisp
in my chest.
Asher lapses into silence
when I don’t respond
to anything he says.
He squeezes
my hand
gently.
A month(?) later,
I’m awakened early
just to pee into a cup
for them to dip
the plastic stick into.
It’s negative.
After medicine time,
I realise I liked having them there—
as white shadows.
❦
