Patient Case #41920
Name: Steven Jacobs
Age: 27
Race: Caucasian

“I was standing there, that night, on that corner. I remember it as if my mind was a piece of wood, and fire was used to etch that particular scene into my mind. I’ve tried to talk about it before, to no avail. Always, always, I get the shakes, I get the jitters, and I can’t speak for a clumsy tongue blocks my way. It’s as if something has taken root inside of my mind, and has forsaken me to discuss that night.

“I’ve even tried to write about it before, to put it out on paper, but my fingers will lock up as if they are frozen solid, turned into a prosthetic limb, for looks and not usage. No matter how hard I try to will myself to speak, or to write, it’s always a futile effort.”

I sat there, talking to the doctor who was assigned to me this month. They rotated in and out, as if I was some sort of problem-child patient. They thought I made these stories up, they thought I forced these reactions, they thought I was faking everything. I mean, what type of world is this, when they doubt me? How many scams and lies have they heard, when they can no longer tell a true case from someone trying to one-up the system?

“No, doc, I’m telling you, this is for real!”

Again, he looks at me with that look on his face, the one of pure disbelief. Pity is on his face; perhaps they no longer think I am faking it. Perhaps it has come down to them thinking my mind has lost it’s moorings in reality, and that, oops, I’ve gone crazy.

Can that happen? Can someone go crazy from being institutionalized for so long? I mean, they thought I was sane when I came in here, thought that I was just in some form of mental shock.

Nothing is said this time, just like every time before. They come, they listen to my words, they write forever on their little note pads, and then they leave. No hellos, no “how are you today?”’s, nothing of that sort. They come to listen to my story, as if I was some demented form of entertainment for them. I would even swear that they have brought doctors in from out of state, perhaps even out of country, to listen to what I have to say. Then to leave, and to laugh at it, as if I was some sort of comedic recording for them to play and listen to at their whim.

I mean, not a single word of my story has ever changed, and it has been the same thing over, and over, and over. I don’t even remember how long I have been here exactly! They don’t let me read the daily papers; they don’t let me have access to the television, and God forbid I actually manage to talk to any of the other patients. The nurses check up on me, but they are only slightly less tight-lipped than the doctors are.

The scene that night, it did put me into some sort of shocked state, to where I could not remember who, or where, I was for days on end. They told me it was a few weeks, but I’ve been here since then, so I do not even know that they are telling me the truth.

They tell me that my mind went into shock from something I had seen, and that’s also why my hair went stark white. It’s a reminder every day, afternoon, night, whenever I happen to go to my mirror and look into it. Once, now that I remember it, I had a head of full black hair, luxurious locks, something the ladies always loved. Now my hair, still as sumptuous as it was if I might say so, was completely white. Not gray, not graying, but completely and totally without color. It’s not brittle like aged hair that’s white, either. Whatever happened that night sent me into a coma induced by fear, and my hair was scared white.

Like I’ve told the doctors, I can remember it clearly, all too clearly, but I can’t get it out of my head. It’s burned there, etched there, imprinted, but I can’t find a way to share it. Speaking of it, writing or typing of it, it all renders me useless. It’s as if the fear I felt that night was coming back, as if my mind, though it knows very well what it saw, refuses to even acknowledge it. I know what I saw, but I don’t think the rational part of my brain wants to admit that it was real.

The doctor is gone by this point, the door being locked as soon as it is shut. They talk me for a walk every now and then, but never do I see someone other than a doctor, or other than a nurse. The people in white, and sometimes blue, are all I have known for, well, I don’t even know.

They’ve given me books to read, ranging from children’s novels to western novels, to murder mysteries, but nothing in the realm of make-believe. Everything they’ve given me to read has a firm base in reality, as if they don’t trust my mind with stories of flights of fantasy.

The books are all I have, other than a writing pad and a pencil. Not much more is allowed, and it’s come to the point where I don’t miss anything. Perhaps it has been long enough for me to forget what it is to be bored, since I’ve been bored so long.

After a bit of just sitting in the chair the doctor’s usually use to interview me and rolling around the room, I wind up back in bed. I’ve lost interest in this set of books, and they won’t bring me another set for a few more days yet.

The room was nothing special; pure white walls, complete and unbroken by anything. There wasn’t even a window. My bed was a pure white, with a slim mattress and white sheet. There was no color anywhere in the room, and that counted even for me. My skin was pale, which made me think that I had been here for awhile, but then again, it was spring and I hadn’t gotten a tan yet. The few colors I had were my eyes, a hazel color, and the food that they brought me. Other than that, it was white, day in, and day out, night in, night out. I didn’t even really know if it was day or not, any more. I could only guess, by the clock; there was no indicator if it was A.M. or P.M.

After awhile of laying there, and playing one of the few games I can, counting the holes in the ceiling tile and finding out the “random” pattern that was used for each one, and finding tiles that repeat that “random” pattern, I ended up falling asleep.

You see, every tile may appear to be random, but it is not. Instead, there are eight different “random” patterns that are used, to make it even harder to pinpoint the design used. But, I had counted every hole, and I had guesstimated every distance between those holes, and I have decided that they are not formed by accident, but are instead imprinted onto the ceiling tiles, all just to appear chaotic by nature.

Unchallenged minds wander, and eventually go into a state of rest, as far as I can figure out. I find myself sleeping a good portion of the day away, and some of those times; this dream comes upon me. It’s a very detailed replaying of that night, of what I was witness to, of what my mind refuses to accept.

I was on my way home from the store, having hoofed it from my apartment down a few blocks. It was pointless to have driven, and the night was a calm one. I figured the fresh air would have done me a few wonders. So with money in my pocket, I headed to the store and purchased what I needed.

It wasn’t anything more than a few odds and ends, supplies for daily work life, like snacks and deodorant and whatnot. It was nothing to warrant a full-out grocery shopping trip, but just a few minutes of my time to get the necessities to tide me over until my next paycheck.

I lived in the city, nothing like New York City, or even Detroit, nothing on that large of a scale. But it was definitely bigger than a suburb. It was something in-between, I guess. About two blocks away from home, I heard a sound from down one of the alleys. Now, normally I am not that brave of a man to go venturing into a dark passageway alone, but tonight something had come over me. I walked a few feet in, and was quickly embarrassed.

Having not been able to place the sound, I didn’t realize that some lustful couple had chosen this back way to mate. I was slowly backing out, hoping neither one of them noticed, I didn’t want to upset the moment or get into a fight, or anything like that. A scream enough to curl, uncurl, and re-curl my hair stopped me though.

I looked up, having averted my eyes to the passionate coupling that had been taking place, to find a completely different scene now before me. The lady, who had moments before been pressed up against the wall with her legs around her thrusting lover, was now throwing her head back in what seemed like pain.

I figured it was pain, and not too much pleasure, because of the man who had his mouth affixed to her neck, and the blood that was flowing from between her neck. It was at this moment that I screamed, and what a bellow of fear it was. My eyes were locked to the man’s mouth, and the blood that was escaping his quickly working mouth, and when he pulled back I saw the odd teeth.

I came near to fainting then, and perhaps I did, for the next thing I knew I was on the ground with the lady on top of me, bleeding on me. I hadn’t even seen him throw her, hadn’t even believed that someone could throw another person like that.

I pushed the body off of me, my own clothes now sopping with the blood that was still flowing from the jagged wound in the lady’s neck. I struggled to my feet, but ended up on my knees, vomiting out everything I still had in my stomach. A vicious laugh brought me to my senses, and again I tried for my feet, finding success this time. The man, well, he no longer looked quite like a man. His face though it was much the same as any face I had ever seen, was changed some how. Perhaps it was just the macabre grin on his face, the blood that coated his lower face, the canine teeth that were apparent with the grin, or the predator-like gleam that was in his eyes that said I was next. Maybe, now that I think about it again, it was a combination of all of the above.

The man charged for me, and leaving my bag where it had fallen, I turned and I ran. This wasn’t the sort of running I did back in high school, for the yearly mile we had to do. This wasn’t even like running in a competition like the Olympics.

No, I ran for my life, I ran past the point of where most people would have collapsed. I ran until, literally, I felt like my muscles were going to explode from overexertion. Only to see him, impossibly, in front of me.

And so I turned, and so I ran, this time the other way.

It was like a bad horror movie, where the monster was always coming from where he shouldn’t, couldn’t be. He popped out of alleys, he came from fire escapes above me, and I kept running.

After awhile, I simply could not run, because I could not longer breathe. It felt like my lungs were collapsing on me, like my legs had disintegrated beneath me, as if I could not move. Of course, he was there waiting for me, and he grabbed me by the throat. By this point, I could not help but laugh; I could not help but cry, so I did both. This was too much like a horror movie, this was too unreal, and I was descending into hysterics. I barely felt it when he bit into my neck, when he started to drink from me. I barely heard it, when I cried out to the night, when I pleaded for whatever God was above to save me from this, to intervene and make this stop. Like a child confronted with the boogey-man beneath the bed, I was sobbing, crying, weeping. Nothing was right, and everything was upside down.

It might have lasted forever; it might have lasted for a second, but the next thing I knew I was being dropped on the ground. I saw the man-creature go flying over where I lay; entangled in a mass of limbs that was tackling it from the spot it had taken me.

Shakily I managed to get to my feet, and the world seemed to spin and turn in hopes to land me back on the ground. I steadied myself against the alley wall, looking to my would-be rescuer. Of course, at that moment, everything and anything would have been an enemy to me. I was in the fight-or-flight stage of mind, but there was no way I was fighting, and my legs would not work to carry me away.

On top of the thing that had attacked me was in some sort of suit, like something you would see in a movie where there had been some toxic spill or something. They wrestled, they fought, claws against a gun and a syringe. After that, I saw nothing more of what happened between them. At this point I fell into hysterics again, alternating between body-wracking sobs and laughs. I could not help but fall to the ground and cower against the wall, shaking as I wrapped my arms about myself. My thoughts were, was it possible to have an acid flashback, if you had never done acid?

The next thing I knew, I was waking up in this room, and I have been here since. Who knows why, since I am perfectly fine, who knows? These doctors, they still think I am crazy, they still believe that my mind shattered that night and was never repaired. I have to get out, I have to leave.

I have to get out, I have to get out, I have to get out of here. I’m hungry, so hungry lately. I can’t stomach the food they are bringing me. I can’t eat the slop they give me, and they won’t bring me what I want. Steak, hamburgers, real food. My stomach churns at the smell of anything that they bring me.

I can’t sleep, I can’t think straight; all of the holes in the ceiling seem to be calling to me like the reversed stars of the night sky.

I don’t even know if it’s night, if it’s day. I yearn for the sun, I yearn for the moon, I yearn for some sort of fresh air, something. This hunger is gnawing at my insides, giving me cramps, making me violently sick. The nurses try to give me pain medications, sedatives, but I only throw them back up.

I am lying on my bed right now, panting for breath. It feels like I simply can’t breathe, like there is no air making it into my body. In a panic I run for the door and start pounding on it, calling for help. My body must be fueled by some basic need, because I am leaving dents in the door with my hands. I am in a craze by this moment, beating at the door, pounding at it, kicking it, hitting my head against it.

And the next thing I know, there is no door there. It’s on the ground in front of me, or more appropriately, on top of the nurse who had been trying to get the door open.

Her pained cries didn’t even register in my mind as I moved my way over the fallen door, over the nurse beneath it, and took off down the hallway. Nurses, familiar faces from the unknown time I’ve spent here, all tried to get in my way, tried to stop me, tried to tackle me. They had syringes and were trying to fill them with sedatives, to knock me out, to stop me. But I pushed my way through them; I shoved them bodily out of my way. I heard the crunching of bones, I heard the pained cries, but none of that deterred me.

I ran, and ran, looking for a way out, but there was nothing. Only an elevator, which would not work, it needed a keycard. So I turned back, and pushed my way through security guards now, punching, kicking, biting. BITING! I tasted blood, and it made the hunger within burn. It was like I had a candle in me before, and it suddenly burst into a fire akin to that of the sun.

My mind went blank, but I had a horrible feeling I knew what was going on. It was only confirmed as I regained my senses moments later, amidst a pile of bodies, many of them with gaping wounds in random places. Clothes had been shredded, torn apart, flesh had been rent the same way. And blood, it was everywhere. Pooling in the hallway, covering the sterile white in small, crimson waves.

It covered me as well, as if I had been through some sort of unholy baptism. But I was no longer hungry, and no longer afraid of that night.

::August 31, 2003 11:59 PM

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