Page 43

Jessica

My mom is dead. I stare at the photos and don’t understand why I am so calm. My mind is ticking, like a clock progressing forward, the facts each presented and absorbed. Next. I mention it, and he says the medication I’m on will numb those feelings, to not worry about it.

I can’t worry about it. The medication has numbed that part of me.

So, Mom really is dead. Dead. I’ve never known anyone who has died before. I feel the sadness, but it feels like it is calling to me from far down the beach. It’s faint, almost carried off by the wind.

She was my best friend. I’m not sure how many people can say that, that their mom was their best friend.

When I turned eighteen, moving out wasn’t even a thought.

When I started college, I stayed in my room, and probably will until I get married.

We have an easy relationship, Mom and me.

She is just the right amount of discipline and soft.

I’ve never done anything bad because I respect her too much.

I remember when we got the news of her advanced heart disease.

I sobbed for days. I was in a fog, but not like this one.

It was more a constant cloud hanging over every interaction, every task, every conversation—one that consistently reminded me of what might happen.

I didn’t care about anything but that. I didn’t want to do anything but spend time with her.

Try to help her. I’ve spent the last three months terrified I will lose her.

And now it’s happened, and I am just sitting here, turning pages in a folder and trying to remember if I already ate lunch. I think I did. I remember a Gatorade. Was there something else? Real food? I think I’m hungry, but maybe I just want the activity of food.

“It’s important for you to understand what you did, Jessica.”

He’s handsome. I think I’ve mentioned that before, but each day he gets better.

I think I hit on him. That’s also faint, but I definitely said something about his looks.

Reached for him. Offered something. All I can remember is the sting of rejection.

It made me like him even more. We spend so much time alone.

He could have tried anything. Said anything.

I bet patients in here offer him blow jobs for real food, maybe even more than that.

But he’s such a gentleman. He has a wedding ring on his finger.

Lucky woman. I wonder if she really appreciates him.

I didn’t appreciate Luke enough. Wait, not Luke.

Luke is that prick who slept with me and then went MIA.

Who is the other guy? The one from Chipotle?

Henry. Oh my God, Henry. He was so sweet.

Too sweet, Mom said. She said that’s why I was bored with him, and she was right.

But maybe I was wrong. Maybe I should call him when I get out of here.

Let him take me to that pottery class he kept inviting me to.

Maybe that’s what I need. That would make Mom happy—not that she will know.

I can’t believe he is letting me look at this folder.

Is this good for my psyche? It’s all photos of my mom, her face slack, vomit coming out the side of her mouth.

Off medication, I would be sobbing and throwing these pictures, then rushing to grab them because they are horrible but they are her, and should be protected at all costs.

Especially in here, where I have nothing to remind me of her, nothing to remind me of anything.

If I focus on the edges of the photo, if I place my thumb over her face, it’s just a photo of our kitchen.

I like our kitchen. We painted the cabinets together, just like a year ago.

She let me pick the color, and I went with a pale purple that she said was mauve, but I argued it was lavender.

In these pictures, she’s seated at the round table just off the fridge, her body bent forward, head turned to one side, cheek resting against the crossword puzzle.

She loves crossword puzzles; it’s the only reason we subscribe to the Los Angeles Times .

Each morning, she completes the daily, often calling out clues as I rush around the kitchen, grabbing a bagel and heading out to class or work.

“I don’t understand,” I say. “This says she died of poison.”

“I need you to try to remember,” he says again, like he hasn’t said this a dozen times already, like I’m not straining every blood vessel in my head to try to remember.

“You’ve blocked the memory because it is a painful one.

” He turns the page and shows me the toxicology report, one we’ve already gone over three times.

“Pentobarbital is what was given to her. You likely put it in her orange juice. You told us that you ordered it online.” He flips the page and shows me a receipt from MedsUS.com with my name and address.

There was only one item ordered: fifty milligrams of pentobarbital.

“I didn’t do that,” I say emphatically. But did I?

My mind swims over the possibility. It seemed insane when he first broached it.

Now, after days and days of thinking over it .

.. maybe I did. She was in pain. She was hurting.

She was, despite everything that she insisted to the contrary, dying.

Maybe I did it to stop her suffering. Maybe.

“I’d like to read you the statement from the officer who admitted you on Tuesday.

” He sits back in his seat and turns over a new page, pulling a set of reading glasses off the top of his head and positioning them on his nose.

“Female is highly emotional. Continually states that she needs to be fixed and that she wants to kill herself. Has deep lacerations on her wrists indicative of a suicide attempt. When asks if something happened, she states that she killed her mother. Becomes highly agitated and combative when asked for details. Says that it doesn’t matter, that she’s dead.

Female refuses to give her name or any personal details.

We administered a sedative and confined her, took fingerprints and DNA and submitted them to law enforcement. ”

I listen numbly as he talks, and it sounds like another person he’s referring to.

I look down at my left wrist and carefully trace my thumb over the wound.

There are neat sutures along the cut, black stitches standing out from my pale skin.

It feels hot and itchy, and when I press my finger against the incision, the pain is a little dizzying. “Am I going to be arrested?”

A dumb question, but I don’t understand why no one has shown up yet and taken me away.

I confessed to this crime. I wet my lips and realize they are salty.

I touch my cheek and realize it is wet. I am crying, and maybe I have been for a while.

Emotion. It ticks past me and is already out of reach.

I am torn between telling him to take me off these meds and appreciating the cushion they’re padding me in.

“Right now, my focus is on helping you get better. Think of your brain as a Chinese checkerboard. You had a traumatic event”—he taps the folder—“which was tantamount to slamming a fist down on that board and causing all of your marbles to pop out of place. Some just bounced into different spots on the board, but others rolled off. They might be nearby or might have rolled under a couch and require a little more hunting. My job is to help you find the different marbles and make sure they get put back into place. Think of facts and acceptance as different marbles. Today’s marble is the fact that your mother has died and how she died.

That’s the marble we are working on today.

There will be plenty of time later to talk to the officers. ”

He smiles, but there’s nothing here to smile about. This sounds like a lot of work, and any thoughts of going to a pottery class with Henry next week are starting to sound unrealistic.

“How long will I be here?” I shift in my seat, and the diaper squishes against my skin. Not soiled yet, but I consider my bladder and the idea of peeing right here, right now. I’ve never peed in front of him before, and the idea is appealing. He won’t even know it is happening.

“I’m not sure. We have some patients that have been here years. Others only take a few weeks. It just depends on each situation.”

Apparently, I killed my mom and tried to kill myself. Sounds like a bad situation.

Years.

I can’t stay here that long. No. Absolutely not.