Breaking Point

Mama liked to tell me stories, but that was a very long time ago. She used to read softly through the night, her voice barely rising above a whisper. She gave life to characters in books, and I had vivid dreams about those stories. But that was a long time ago. She doesn’t read to me anymore.

Now I whisper to her.

***

“Now, Miss Beth, stop bangin’ your head like that, honey.”

The heavyset nurse placed her hand between the woman’s head and the wall. Beth didn’t seem to notice. She continued to swing her head in the direction of the wall until Nurse Abby held her still. The older woman’s gentle hands turned Beth’s face up toward hers, eyes searching the lifeless girl. No reaction.

Abby’s eyes roamed over the rough skin covering half of Beth’s face. Damage from a fire took Beth’s beauty and youth, but deeper tragedy stole her mind and her voice.

“It’s time for group, dear,” she told her, a formality. Beth would go wherever she was led, regardless of destination. Nurse Abby took the girl by the arm with one hand, patted the girl’s messy hair with the other.

At the touch, Beth flinched, and Abby comforted her with a kind, “There, there. Come with me, now.”

A cacophony of voices disrupted the otherwise silent hall. The rest of the group was gathering in the meeting room. Abby led Beth toward the sounds, opened the door and walked them both inside. Years ago she would have laughed at the sight of the motley crew, but she’d been working on this ward too long.

Group therapy for Beth was more or less a joke. Each patient spoke with Dr. Gale leading discussion, interrupting arguments, and generally prodding admissions from the ill. The physician was one of the only staff members who started at the center prior to Abby and she admired him for his strength. Dealing with these kids day in and day out was exhausting.

Beth hardly listened as the meeting went about its usual cycles. She had no reaction when her own name was spoken, and began to rock slowly forward and back when attention moved on to the next patient in the room’s circle of the mentally wounded.

Soon she was back in her room, escorted by Abby once more, sitting comfortably in a recliner. The nurse wrapped warm blankets around the young woman, murmuring to her all the while. Abby had great faith in Dr. Gale, but she had her own ideas on Beth’s therapy.

“You’ve got to talk about it, child,” she said in her motherly tone. “I know it’s hard, and there’s pain, but it’s good to talk.”

Once more, she pulled the girl’s face in her direction, peering closely into the vacant eyes. Though she still saw no response, Abby was not without hope. She would reach the child someday. If it took all her strength, she’d bring peace to this tormented soul.

“Why are you locked away?” she asked with genuine curiosity. “You were so young when you lost him, barely more’n a baby yourself.” Abby made it a point to know all her patients, but she pored through Beth’s file with particular attention. She knew the girl held a secret. With a sigh, Abby stood and prepared to leave the room.

“Another time, maybe. You’re not ready yet, darlin’, but when you are, I’ll be here to listen.”

Abby clicked off the light, stepped out into the hall and pulled the door shut. A slant of light from the hallway peeked into the room and landed on Beth’s slippered feet.

From time to time, words from the outside world tumbled into her chaotic mind. Tonight, “you lost him,” fell into her consciousness, slipping through the air like Autumn’s first falling leaf. It wavered and flipped through the jumbled mess of her thoughts, but it started to stick. Something about it felt familiar.

Lost. She tasted the word with her mind, focusing more than she had in months. Lost? Him? White hot pain shot through Beth’s mind, a penalty for attempting to clear the deserved murkiness. She sank deeper, immediately shrinking against the familiar sting. While she tried to hide from the pain, whispers started in her mind - sharp, searing and nagging whispers that drove her deeper into herself.


While she couldn’t understand the words, she was familiar with their effect and Beth shied away from them. Her shaking hands reached up and covered her ears. Her fingertips dragged across the rough and scarred skin of her cheeks as they found their way. As skin met skin, flashes of images scorched through her mind. Though her eyes were squeezed tight, she couldn’t shut them out.

Flames of red and orange licking at flesh; screams echoing in the long, hard night; A baby’s helpless cry; desperate struggles of a too young parent.

These images and sounds assaulted Beth until she couldn’t take it anymore. She had experienced these episodes before, but this night’s onslaught cut deeper than ever before. Sound finally ripped through her throat as Beth sobbed with all her capacity.

Then, a light sound flitted through the dark room. It cut into the massive fog of Beth’s pain and remembrance. Her head jerked as she recognized it - child’s laughter. In a rush, her past returned to her. Drugs, alcohol, sex. Reckless days and unfettered whims flooded her memory as it all came back. A baby. She had a baby, a boy named Curtis. He was not much more than a nuisance, a speed bump in the wild ride of her life. At first, anyway.

His adorable blue eyes pleaded with her, though, and wore through the tough exterior of a hardened party girl. Beth came to love him, to care for him. An unbreakable bond formed between mother and child.

Still, she tried to save him. Her throat croaked as she attempted an apology to the cruel and mocking laughter, “…tried.”

The laughter grew into a menacing and horrifying cackle. Its sound filled her head with the stings of a million wasps pricking her brain. With this new attack, more images came to her. The fateful night she fell back into her old ways. With a new batch cooked up and injected, she collapsed into that old familiar high, ignoring the cries of her son.

It wasn’t until the flames overtook the entire room that Beth became aware of what was happening. Stumbling through her stupor and the effects of the drugs, she could barely save herself, let alone a helpless baby.

The whispers turned to screams, with the stinging barbs inching their way further into her mind, hooks ripping through the last shreds of sanity Beth claimed. Vengeful cries spoke intangible words as their spell took hold.

Beth opened her mouth wide and let it all out, screaming with all her will. She screeched and couldn’t stop until she lost consciousness.

Later, Abby held the tortured girl close to her own body, rocking Beth, who sobbed even as she slept. Abby wished for the girl to speak, but not like this. She pleaded with God to let the girl be healed. She leaned in close and whispered a prayer so Beth could hear that someone was on her side. Abby finally got a response from the girl as she spoke her last words before closing herself off to the world forever.

“I can still see him burning.”