To Be Free...
“Time for Dinner!” the familiar voice of Nurse Redheart called out behind a steel door, waking me from my bed. Sitting bolt upright, I saw the desolate white padded wall I had become used to seeing when I had awoke. A frown spread across my face as I realized exactly what that had meant had happened. I heard the door open up behind me and close, the locking mechanism clinking into place.
I only stared at the wall in my sitting position as I felt the bed depress behind me, the clink of a cup on a metal tray almost ringing in my ears. “How long was I out?” I asked the nurse, my only companion in my years of isolation.
I heard a sigh from the mare behind me, and I could almost sense her shaking her head, knowing that she wouldn’t like that I had started our conversation like I did. “Why don’t you ever ask what I brought you to eat?”
“Unless I’ve been out for more than a day, then it’s Thursday,” I said, staring blankly at the wall, refusing to turn towards the nurse. “Every Thursday the hospital serves either oatburgers and hayfries or scrambled eggs and cheese with mashed potatoes. There’s a two week rotation where the main courses are swapped, and unless I missed one of the Thursdays then we had the oatburgers. That means that on that tray you just set down is a serving of scrambled eggs and cheese, a small scoop of mashed potatoes, and a glass of water or apple juice.”
I turned around to see that my predictions were spot on. The only difference was a singular apple sitting next to the glass filled with water. “The apple is new though,” I commented with a blank expression on my face. “How long was I out?” I asked again, no more intense than the first time, my expression slowly contorting into a small frown.
Nurse Redheart sat for a moment, mouth agape, shocked that I had completely described the contents of the tray. She shook her head a bit, closing her jaw before evading my question once again. “You know I’m not supposed to–”
“How. Long?” I interrupted her, my teeth grinding together, not wanting to pussyfoot around the subject any more.
Another sigh escaped Nurse Redheart’s lips. “A few hours, Screw. You only had a minor reaction and we had to put you to sleep. You caught a glimpse of another pony during your hour of free time this week and claimed she was your daughter and we were about to kill her.”
“She looked like Blossom, didn’t she?” I asked, turning around once again and facing the wall, seeing only the two books I had been given by the nurse over the years. One was a book on advanced mathematics, and the other was a filly’s story book that had gotten me out of one of my particularly bad episodes.
“I wasn’t around when you…” Nurse Redheart paused, as if thinking for the right word to say.
“Went bat-shit insane?” I finished the sentence for her, looking slightly back at the empathetic face of the white earth pony.
“Regressed,” she finished her sentence, placing a hoof on my shoulder and giving me a small smile before continuing. “You know you have to let her go, Screw.”
I looked once again at the book in the corner with the cartoonish filly painted on its front. The golden-red coat covering her seemed to blow in some imaginary wind as she stood proudly on a cliff overlooking the sea. She looked almost exactly as Blossom did, aside from the rugged pack that the book-cover filly wore. I remembered reading the series with her when she could barely read.
I opened my mouth to respond, but a lump in my throat kept me from speaking. I hadn’t been able to see my own daughter in over two years, and every day I just missed her more. I closed my mouth before shrugging Nurse Redheart’s hoof off my shoulder, looking away from her with my eyes shut tight, fighting back some tears.
“I’m so sorry Screw…” she softly apologized, placing her hoof back to it’s previous spot.
“For what?” I bit into her words with my hollow, pent-up anger. “You got me trapped in this hell, not letting me out, not letting me see any of the outside world.” I threw the nurse’s hoof off my shoulder violently before spinning around to face her, my anger starting to take me as I began shouting. “I don’t get to see my Daughter. My Husband. Anypony. I’m fucking isolated in here.”
“Screw,” Redheart began, the nervousness barely concealed in her face as she got off the bed and backed toward the door, “I want to get you out just as much, but your condition–”
“So I have to stay in this locked, padded cell forever?! I can’t ever leave?!” I cut her off, leaping from the bed and screaming at her, tears blurring my vision.
“You have your hour–”
“My hour? I get to go out and be carted around the halls in a damn straightjacket! What kind of freedom is that. I don’t get to do anything! I don’t get to see anypony! You call it freedom, but it’s just an extension of this slavery! I never get to leave this room with any hope that I might not come back. I know I won’t see what I want to! I’ll never get to see Blossom!”
“But Screw, Blossom isn’t even re–”
“YES SHE IS! You don’t know how horrible it is to just sit in here, day in and day out, waiting to be told I can go sit in a special chair for an hour, restrained so that I can’t even move! You don’t know how terrible to spend every waking moment knowing you’re just trapped here until you die!” Tears were now streaming from my face as my teeth were gritted together. Through my rant I had taken a few steps so that I was now practically bearing down upon the nurse. “You don’t fucking know what a hell my life is!”
“Screw…” Nurse Redheart squeaked, trembling in the corner, her eyes pleading for mercy. “Please, I–”
Before I even knew what had happened, I watched as my hoof struck right into the Nurse’s jaw and heard a loud smack. Nurse Redheart cried out in the corner, a small trickle of blood escaping her mouth. Again, my hoof bared down upon her, and again I heard a small crunch. I had probably broken her nose. I took another shot and gave her black eye. Another shot, another stream of blood. Another shot. Another. Another. I had no idea what I was doing to the only pony I had even considered a friend until it was too late. She coughed once before lying limp on her side when my mind finally reeled back and realized just what I had done.
I took a few steps back before uttering, “No…” and looking at my hooves plastered with the nurse’s blood. I hadn’t meant to do it, but my mind was so flooded with anger. I couldn’t stop myself. Immediately, I heard the metal door behind me fly open, and I was tackled to the ground by two large ponies. I didn’t fight back, too shocked at what just transpired as I felt a needle stick into my neck. I finally let loose and cried at my own doing, slowly letting my vision fade as the drugs took a hold of me. “What have I done…”
I opened my eyes again to see that I was once again staring at the ever-familiar ceiling of white. I sighed before turning my head to the side to see my food tray sitting next to me. Pushing myself to a sitting position, I grabbed the spoon and took a bite of eggs, noticing that they had gotten pretty cold in my air-conditioned room. Swallowing the eggs, I took a sip of water and started on the apple. After a few bites in silence, I set the core back on the tray before looking towards the metal door. “Nurse Redheart, I know you’re out there,” I spoke to the door in hopes that I wasn’t actually just talking to a door. “Can you come in? I want to apologize about earlier.”
A few moments of silence ensued before I took a bite of the lukewarm mashed-potatoes off the tray. I felt terrible for what I had done to Nurse Redheart, as she had been the only friend I’ve regularly seen in a few years. Taking a sip of the water, I sighed before taking a long look at the tray.
“You’ve got to control your anger, Screw,” I told the reflection I saw in the tray in front of me. Looking at my reflection, I saw the frayed grey hair and light pastel blue skin of mine. My eyes had bags under them, and I had a few scars on my face from times before. I hated even looking at the murderous face I wore.
Pushing the tray away, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Opening my eyes, I hopped out of my bed and paced the room a few times, going through the mental steps Nurse Redheart had taught me when I needed to calm down.
“First, find a happy place and go there,” I heard her voice echo in my mind. Closing my eyes again, I walked my mental self over to the door of my cell and pushed it open to see my old house with my daughter and her friend playing on the lawn. I smiled as they looked up and waved at me before going back to their game of tag. The two were just as I had left them when the doctors came that fateful weekend afternoon.
“Remember that this is only temporary, and take a few deep breaths,” I heard the nurse’s voice echo in my head. I closed my eyes in my happy place and took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of cherry blossoms and feeling the warm spring wind blow through my fur, letting the smell overtake me. Slowly I exhaled and opened my eyes again to see the dull, clean, white wall of my room in the artificial sunlight that the lamp above me produced.
“Remember that you will go home eventually,” Nurse Redheart’s final words whispered in my ear.
“Eventually, I will go home,” I repeated to the wall to reassure myself.
“You know, If you would quit attacking me, they’d let you out sooner,” a friendly voiced joked behind me. I turned around to see Nurse Redheart, alive and perfectly healthy, softly smiling with her Nurse’s hat setting on the ground next to the door. She knew I didn’t like talking to her in uniform because it felt too formal and official.
“Nurse Redheart!” I gave a surprised and gleeful shout before running over to her and giving her a hug. “I‘m so sorry I lashed out at you. You’re ok? I thought I had actually done something horrible to you...”
Redheart hugged me back with a paton the back. “I knew you didn’t mean it, Screw, and I’m fine. You’re too nice a pony to do something like that intentionally. I just need to convince my bosses that you’re healthy enough to be safely released.”
She pushed me away before looking directly into my eyes with a solemn facial expression. “Your outburst both today and yesterday have forced me to not recommend you for release for another few weeks.” Putting her hooves down and taking a cautious step back, she finally finished up, saying “I hope you understand my reasons.”
I knew it was for my own good, but I still gave a sigh of defeat, hoping that those outbursts wouldn’t be enough. “Yes, nurse,” I quietly responded looking down at the ground, a mixture of sadness and self-loathing filling me.
“Oh Screw…” Nurse Redheart sympathetically said, placing a hoof on my shoulder. “You’ve been getting better, and I was able to get you recommended for a release check next week despite your outbursts.” She patted me on the back with a final thought, “Just please try to keep yourself under control until then. Please.”
“Nurse, you have to let me out,” I retorted with a sheepish frown. “I need to go somewhere without being strapped to a chair.”
“Screw, I wish I could let you do that,” Nurse Redheart sympathetically said, dropping her hoof off my shoulder and walking over toward the door. Our time was nearing an end for the day. “But with the recent events, I’d be surprised if they even let you out tomorrow in the chair.”
“I understand,” I replied, sitting down on my bed as Nurse Redheart knocked on the door to get someone to let her out. “Then can I at least go to the park the next time I’m let out? I want to smell the flowers blooming.”
“Of course, Screw,” Nurse Redheart said, giving me a warm smile as the door slid open. “Get some rest tonight. I’ll talk with you soon.”
“Thanks, Nurse,” I said as she picked up her hat and placed it on her head. “See you in a few days.” As I said my final word, the door closed on me, leaving me alone in the room.
Almost immediately, the speaker built in my room switched on as I heard a muffled voice say over the static, “Lights out in ten minutes.” After a brief pause, the static shut off and I heard a mechanical beep from my left as a doorway opened up to reveal a tiny room containing a sink, toothbrush, toothpaste, and a chute to place my dinner tray.
Silently, I walked over to my half-finished tray and grabbed it with my mouth, carrying it over to the chute and letting it fall forwards into the dark slit. Walking over to the sink, I picked up the brush and turned on the water with a hoof, wetting the brush just a bit. Grabbing the toothpaste with my mouth I squeezed out a smidge onto the wet brush before setting it back down and turning off the water. Picking up the brush, I lazily ran it over my teeth before determining it had been in there long enough.
Spitting the extra toothpaste into the sink, I turned the water on and took a sip of water, rinsing my mouth out as I ran the toothbrush under the stream, washing out any excess toothpaste. I sloshed the water around my mouth one final time before spitting what I could down the drain. Finally, I turned the water off and took a step back as the door slowly closed. Walking over to my bed, I laid down to get in a comfortable position before the speaker crackled to life again.
“Goodnight, Screw.” I heard the automated voice say as the light shut completely off, leaving me in complete darkness. A few seconds later, a small green glow illuminated under the floor panels the bed rested on so that I could see if I needed to get up in the night for whatever reason.
“Goodnight, Blossom,” I mumbled closing my eyes and seeing her smiling face once more in my head.
The next few days were rather uneventful. My food was delivered at breakfast, lunch, and dinner, the tray always filled with the same three meals with slight variations here and there. I did my mental exercises every morning and afternoon, making sure to not skip out on any steps. I even got to read a few of my favorite books, ones I used to read to my daughter every night.
The reassurance that this week may have been my last kept my hopes high. Nurse Redheart had been saying slowly that I had been getting better, but this would be the fourth time I would be reviewed. Every other time, my mental state was always deemed unsafe. I had always recently had an outburst or what they called a “relapse.” This time was obviously no different, but I felt confident that they’d change their minds this time.
I felt these outbursts were the mildest I had had in a while. Nurse Redheart would surely vouch for me. At least I had hoped that would be the case. After two days of normality had passed without even a single relapse it was time for me to see Nurse Redheart again.
I sat in my bedside, waiting for her visit. She seemed later than normal, but I sat patiently, waiting for the door to open up and the light pink mane to come inside. I waited for a few minutes. The minutes turned into what seemed like hours, and soon enough, the speaker came on announcing that it was dinner time. The tray of food was slid under the door and then the slot was shut tight.
Nurse Redheart had never missed her appointment with me. For the two years I had been here, she had never just not shown up. Even when she was sick she’d still talk to me through the intercom. I didn’t know what to feel. It had been so close to my release, and the nurse had disappeared on me. I felt almost betrayed by her lack of presence.
“How could she abandon me?” I asked the white wall next to me. “Every three days she came in.” no matter what time of year, she was in here with me, so why would she just leave?” I ignored the tray of food by the door and instead sat in silence. I wanted to lash out and destroy the tray and everything on it, but something was holding me back. Nurse Redheart wouldn’t have appreciated me doing that. I would have just been stuck in this place for another month or even more. It wasn’t worth it.
“And I thought today would be a special day…” I mumbled, closing my eyes and falling back onto my bedspread staring at the light in the ceiling.
Hearing my door slide open, I opened my eyes to look up and see a smiling face approach me.
“It is, Screw!” Nurse Redheart said, causing me to sit straight up in my bed.
“Nurse Redheart?!” I exclaimed as she walked over and exchanged a quick hug with me. “Why did you get here so late?” I gave her an inquisitive look, barely withholding a smile.
“Well..” she began, looking over her shoulder at two other ponies who had entered the room. One was a tan unicorn with a ruffled red mane with glasses who was holding up a clipboard, and the other seemed to be another nurse that I had seen on occasion in my trips through the halls. She had a pink coat and a green mane and wore the same hat as Nurse Redheart was wearing.
“Are you letting me go to the park without my chair?” I excitedly asked, hopping out of bed. This seemed to startle the two other ponies near the door as they seemed to take a few hasty steps toward the still-open doorway.
The one holding the clipboard seemed to regain his composure a little bit before responding to my question. “Not exactly,” he said fixing his glasses.
I muttered a brief, “oh,” before slowly climbing back in my bed, which seemed to make the other two more comfortable.
“We’re here to tell you the results of your review, Miss Screw,” the pink nurse responded.
“My… Review?” I asked, flabbergasted in my bed. “I thought I wasn’t going to have that until next week?” Suddenly a nervousness came over me as I tried to remember every little thing I did wrong in the past week. Surely I wasn’t going to pass a review with those outbursts last week hanging over my head.
“We’ve been conducting a surprise review, looking over your actions and behaviors over the past week, Screw,” the doctor said, flipping through his clipboard.
I took a small gulp as he paused to look through his papers, apparently looking for something specific. “What do you think of me, Doctor.”
“According to your charts, you’ve had reports of recent outbursts, and you have yet to completely recover in most of our professional’s opinions,” the tan unicorn read off the sheet.
I looked down in dismay, knowing that this meant I would still be staying here. “I understand Doctor,” I said, closing my eyes and holding back tears.
“But,” he continued much to my surprise. Instantly I was looking back up at him waiting to see what he was about to add, “as deemed by the professional staff, you are partially released from Celestia’s Hospital for the Psychiatrically Unsound with biweekly visits from Nurse Redheart.”
“You mean I…” I started, pausing as the realization hit me. “I get to go home?”
“Yes, unless Nurse Redheart determines you are relapsing,” the other nurse responded with a small smile.
I looked over to Nurse Redheart with a shocked expression still on my face. “I can go home?” I repeated to Redheart, still disbelieving that this was real.
“You get to go home, Screw,” she reassured me. “Your sister said she’d come pick you up tomorrow.”
“I’ll get to see Blossom again,” I whispered, a smile creeping on my face.
“Yeah, and I’ll get to visit you every few days.”
“I…” I began, choking back an entirely different type of tears this time. I didn’t know what to say, and before I knew what I was doing, I had embraced Nurse Redheart in a tight hug. “Th-thank you.”
She seemed surprised by the sudden embrace, but her warm smile quickly returned. I said it again and again as she just nodded and patted my back. I started to cry a few tears of joy before finally letting go. Looking to the back of the room, I saw the doctor and other nurse standing awkwardly as I kept hugging Redheart. “Thank you for letting me go home,” I directed toward them.
The doctor nodded and the nurse gave a big smile before heading out the door and waiting outside. I finally stopped hugging Nurse Redheart, realizing that it was time for her to go. She grabbed my hoof and told me, “I’ll be there to help escort you home, ok?”
“Thank you, Nurse Redheart,” I thanked the white mare again. “I don’t know where I would have been without you.”
She nodded her head before stepping out the door. “See you tomorrow, Screw.”
I smiled one last time before finally looking at the tray that was still sitting near the door. I noticed an Oatburger and hayfries was today’s meal along with some lemonade, my favorite one that the hospital served. Today was the best day of my life, and tomorrow was only going to get better.
I finished up my meal and did my daily routine for getting ready for bed before finally lying down to the low glow of the floorboards. I was going to see my house after two years away from it. For once in my time here, I fell asleep happy.
Two doctors huddled around the patient who was restrained and drugged on the bed in front of them. They flipped through papers while mumbling questions and answers back and forth.
“Have we heard back from the nurse who was wounded in the struggle?” The first asked, looking up from his clipboard into the second’s glasses-covered eyes.
“We know that she is in a comatose state currently, but we cannot yet determine if she’ll recover," the second solemnly answered.
The first sighed before setting his clipboard on the end of the bed. “Dr. Moondust,” he began “I don’t think it’s safe to keep this patient any longer. Her relapses have been getting worse and worse. She barely responds to her own name anymore, and now she’s assaulted her own nurse.”
“I agree, Dr. Shimmer Shine. It’s time we let Blossom go. We’ve been at this for nearly six years, and she’s still convinced that she has a daughter waiting for her at home.”
“Do you have the injection prepared, Moondust?” Shimmer asked, levitating a cotton ball and dipping it in some alcohol before sterilizing the injection area.
“Right here, Sir,” Moondust replied, opening a case with a clean syringe and a bottle of liquid.
“Fill up the syringe while I write down the reason for euthanasia. Let’s make this a clean injection. Have we notified her next of kin?”
Moondust carefully filled the syringe, making sure that no bubbles remained within its confines before responding, “She doesn’t have any living relatives, sir.”
“Well,” Sun sighed before looking into Moondust’s eyes. “This should be easy then. Go ahead and giver her the shot. Let’s get this over with”
“Yes Sir,” Moondust replied with a stone face, moving the syringe to the spot Sunshine had just sterilized. She pushed the needle precisely into a vein and depressed the plunger, letting the chemicals course through her body. Dr. Shimmer Shine watched closely to his watch as he held his hoof against Blossom’s neck, checking for a pulse, and a few silent seconds passed as Moondust removed the needle and properly disposed of it.
“Time of death: 7:38 PM. Let’s go get somepony to remove this body.”