Altered States - Chapter 28
I took a long drag off the cigarette before I spoke. Letting it out slowly, I gathered my
thoughts, trying to pick the best choice of words. No matter what I would say, I knew the
doctor would see through me.
“Nick? I did you hear me?” Dr. Blake asked peering at my face over his gold wire rimmed
glasses.
“Yeah, I heard you, I.. I just don’t know how to say what I want to say,” I replied.
“We are working closer to closure, you understand that, don’t you?”
I nodded as I squashed the cigarette out into the ashtray. I neeed more time for analysis.
Brian was better, why wasn’t I? I desperately wanted closure on this too, but something
was holding me back. Something kept gnawing at me.
“Nick, I’m thinking about having you admitted for a few days to work this out,” the doctor
finally stated after I hadn’t spoken for a few minutes.
“God, no, anything but a mental hospital!” I argued.
“You’re not getting through this and to be quite honest with you, I am questioning your
mental stability on this issue.”
I know my mouth dropped open. My body felt like rubber. “Are.. are you saying I’m crazy?”
“No, no, you’re not crazy and we never use that term---”
“I don’t care what term you use, you think I’m a freakin nutcase!”
“Nick, calm down please. This is what I’m proposing to you, just listen and hear me out,”
the doctor stated in a calm voice.
I gripped the armrests, waiting for the sentence he seemed to be wanting to give me. I
slowly nodded. “Okay, tell me.”
“I would like to place you under my care inpatient. That way I can use some various drug
therapies and some hypnotherapies to help crack the obsticle that is keeping you from
blaming yourself about Brian’s illness and the accident.”
“And what if I don’t agree to this?”
“Your parents are backing me on this,” the doctor replied.
“They can’t do a damn thing about this, I’m over twenty-one, I’m an adult,” I spat.
“Nick, either you sign yourself in or I will be forced to take the necessary steps to delcare
your incompetence. Please you really don’t want that do you? Just sign the papers and we
will make sure that it will be released to the press that you are being treated for
something that will be acceptable.”
I was forced into a corner. I couldn’t believe that my family would betray me like this.
God, I had been going to therapy every day because they wanted me to, now they think I’m
crazy? The only thing that made me stop and think this through was Brian. He had been
through so much with his health and I’m being a stubborn ass and not getting all the help I
needed.
I took a deep breath in before I spoke. “Okay, where’s the paper I have to sign?”
The doctor conveniently had a paper attached to a black acrylic clipboard on his desk.
There was a big red X beside the line I was to sign at. “Here.”
Chapter 29
