Diamond Girl

Chapter 9



The whole rehab thing wasn’t a total disaster; some good comes out of everything, right? Sure it does.

I read that in a fortune cookie once, so it must be true.

I actually got a lot out of my stay at Menninger’s. I met my first sort of boyfriend, lost my virginity, took my first psychotropic drugs and had my first suicide attempt there.

So, yeah, lots of firsts, and after I came home, Daddy was back in the apartment. He seemed to have shrunk a little and his eyes looked almost as dead as mine. On the upside, my mother seemed a foot taller and she was a woman who looked like she had won the war. I guess you have to take the good with the bad, and every cloud has a silver lining.

I heard those things at treatment, so they must be true.

The whole drug and alcohol treatment admission might have turned into a kind of embarrassing debacle for mother but, luckily for her, I wasn’t aware that twenty-four hours after she had dropped me off, the confused staff was talking about having her turn right around and pick me up. I didn’t know a thing about it, so after crying and screaming for six hours after being admitted, I settled down for my first night’s sleep after a big fat shot of Halidol. I refused the gray sausages and green eggs they offered me for breakfast the next morning, and screamed at the nurse who lectured me on taking care of my diabetes and, despite my resistance, I was dragged into group.

I didn’t show that I was totally interested in the stories of the other five kids - three girls and two boys - who talked about using, but I was. They made it sound like an interesting way to live, and since my knock-out shot from the night before had worn off, I was taking in what they had to say, and wondering too if I picked up my chair, and smashed the fat bitch counselor over the head, if I could have another one. One of the two boys was pretty cute in a kind of scraggly, stoner way. He had done the inspiring, 'Hi, my name is Jeff, and I’m an addict' speech, which was good since I had been dying to find out his name. I hadn’t got on board with the whole 'I’m Carey and I’m a drunk' thing that morning, but fortunately the counselor had introduced me to the class. “This is Carey and it’s her first time, so we’ll let her observe today.” They responded, “Hi, Carey.” It was really adorable. The whole f*cking set-up in treatment is so supportive. That must be why we all keep going back over and over again. Where would we all be without the Dr. Drew’s of the world?

Jeff was seventeen and I found out later that it was his third time through Menninger’s. One of their success stories, I guess. When he offered me a cigarette, I didn’t want him to think I was a loser, so I took it, and I remember feeling kind of proud because I didn’t choke on the first drag. It was something to do with my shaking hands anyway.

It’s funny that they let us smoke in group. Even nowadays, treatment is one of the few indoor places where lighting up is still okay. The theory behind that is we addicts, being all traumatized about our various issues - heroin, child abuse, bulimia, cocaine, incest, meth, anorexia and what have you - should be able to at least smoke our way through the trauma of confession. And then, over time, while working on our progressions to our new 'healthy lifestyles', we will eventually lose the stink weed habit too, maybe replace it with Scientology, or at least pink berry fro yo. It sounds pretty good in theory but I’ve noticed over time in various rehab facilities, or healing centers - whatever they are called - that most of us keep doing the drugs in between rehab and that no one ever gives up their cancer sticks.

When Jeff’s turn to talk came, he told a pretty cool story about blowing up his Principal’s car at the school for emotionally fragile kids in Calabasas where he had been sent after his second go round at Menninger’s. I got a little shiver listening to his bad boy, bad attitude, bad parents stories, and sat up a little straighter in my chair.

For the first time since hitting that hell hole, I was sorry I had ignored the nurse who had offered to let me shower that morning and I kind of shifted around so that he hopefully wouldn’t notice my insulin pack and ask me what was wrong with me. I toyed with the idea of saying that it was a new kind of time-release heroin thing my family’s company had invented. That is the kind of 'like me, please like me, anybody, somebody' bullshit that I have always suffered from.

At least that is what one of my therapists told me, so it must be true.

Back then, I didn’t know I had a people-pleasing neurosis based on 'deep insecurities and rampant self-hatred' which ran at odds with my 'narcissistic personality disorder and fantasy-based thinking'. I just wanted people to talk to me, to not ignore me, which is apparently the same thing.

On our way out of the group room, Jeff stopped me at the door. “Hey, wait up. Do you need some smokes to tide you over? Commissary isn’t till Tuesday unless your family is visiting tonight and bringing you some.”

He waited, and I licked my cracked lips, trying to imagine how Milan would play this. That didn’t work. It was impossible to imagine Milan wearing bright yellow sweats and being in a place like that. It lacked context.

“Uh yeah, thanks,” I said stupidly.”

Jeff flicked his long black hair, which I noticed was kind of dirty but looked good on him, out of his eyes and handed me his half-empty pack and a lighter.

“Sure, here, you can keep the lighter too. I’ve got another one. So no happy families for you tonight, uhm, Carey. Right, your name’s Carey?”

I nodded, turned bright red and stared at the floor. He smiled, and I saw with shock that he had a dimple too. It seemed kind of mystical.

“Okay, wow, you’re a quiet girl. That’s a nice change. I’m Jeff. Well you knew that from my whole L.A. Confidential thing, right?”

Oh God, he was so hot and so funny, and I was so not either of those things, but thought I could at least show him my dimple.

If he noticed, he was underwhelmed because he asked me, “So what are you in for? You didn’t say anything in group and you don’t look anorexic.”

I wanted to die. He thought I was fat. All I could do was make a bigger jerk out of myself by starting to cry and running down the hall towards my room, and the worst part was I was wondering if he thought I had a big ass.

He called out to me but he didn’t follow me and, when I got back into my ten by six cell room, I went straight into the adjoining bathroom and pulled out one of the cigarettes. Smoking was something I knew made people thinner. The cigarette made me sick, and I leaned over the toilet and threw up. If every cigarette did that, then smoking really would make people thin, but unfortunately that is a short term starter’s effect.

After vomiting, I finally wanted a shower, and I don’t know, maybe it was seeing my little stumpy naked body in the mirror, with a roll of baby fat hanging over my insulin pack, or maybe it was the insulin pack, or probably it was where I was - it doesn’t really matter now, obviously - but whatever made me do it, I don’t think there was some big impulse, just a little one to go to sleep and hopefully make my mother feel like shit at the same time.

I picked up my toothbrush and sat down on the toilet. I had seen a prison movie with Milan and Christy and I knew what to do. I took out Jeff’s lighter and held it to the end of the toothbrush. It took a while because I kept burning my fingers, but eventually I got it right and, when the end of the toothbrush was a sharp point, I took it into the shower with me.

There are no locks on the doors at rehab, and if there had been, I don’t know if I would have locked it anyway since I wasn’t totally committed to being dead, just to making a statement of some kind. I squeezed my eyes shut and pressed down deep on my left wrist until I opened it up. It hurt like f*cking hell, a lot more than I had been expecting, so I turned the cold water on and held my wrist under it.

It felt better and the sight of my bright red blood running in pink streams down the drain made me happy in a weird way, made me feel real. In therapy speak, cutting yourself open is a proactive way of handling internal pain.

I guess that could be true.

I don’t know but it didn’t turn me into a cutter or anything. It was a one-time deal. I don’t like scars and, since that time, I have had to wear bracelets and oversized watches.

It was easier with my right wrist, and after that I got dizzy and slid down the wall and rolled over onto my side.

My stupid insulin beeper started going off. I guess all my defective blood leaking out made my sugar levels really low. Anyhow, it was my beeper that alerted the nurse in the hallway.

There is a lot of irony in being me and I try to roll with it. So, finding out the next day that they had been planning on releasing me, but were now keeping me for a thirty day psychiatric review, was kind of funny.

As long as they kept the Klonopin rolling, I could even laugh about it.

Later on it became part of my madcap 'heir head' legend, the crazy blond Carey whose mother accidentally locked her up in rehab, and she tried to kill herself and ended locked up for real. I made sure no one laughed harder than me when the story got told and retold at school, and was later leaked into the papers.

The whole sliced wrist thing ended up working out okay because, since I was officially crazy and had the bandaged wrists to prove it, I could share honestly in group and hold my head up with the other crazies.

Jeff eyed me with new interest. I think he felt like maybe he had contributed to my actions, and every guy loves thinking he has that kind of power over a girl, so he paid me a ton of attention and our a*shole counselor even assigned him as my ward buddy, someone to teach me the ropes.

Nobody thought it was weird when we would meet in the lounge at night to sit side-by-side watching old movies and holding hands. The nurses even thought it was cute how he would walk me back to my room late at night. “Ahh, isn’t he a little gentleman?” After a few nights of this, they were relaxed enough to stop watching us closely and, one night, Jeff just followed me right back into my room.

I loved having him lying beside me on the bed, holding me and telling me I was pretty. When his hand moved down my back and strayed to the top of my panties, and the hated blood pack, I grabbed his wrist and put it on my small breasts instead and started frantically kissing him.

Understandably, he mistook my embarrassment for passion, and in a few seconds flat had shoved my panties to my knees and wriggled around with his face all twisted up, and shoved on a little further until he was inside me. It hurt, not as bad as tooth brushing my wrists had, but it still hurt. I tried to shift away and he pressed down harder and, about two seconds later, panted out my name. His breath in my face was rank and I turned my head, so he kissed my ear, and rolled off me.

I hadn’t liked it very much, but I did know from reading books and seeing movies and listening to Milan that the guy who you gave your virginity to would love you forever, so I shyly tried to nestle against him for cuddling.

He stiffened up, moved away and sat up and started pulling on his sweats. He said my name. “Uhm, Carey?”

“Yeah, Jeff?” I answered in what I hoped was a seductive way.

“Uhm, when we were doing it, I felt something on your back. What the f*ck is that?” I cringed but I was thinking, well, we’re together now, so no more secrets, and I rolled over onto my stomach and showed him. “See it’s just a little tube and a needle going into the pack. I have diabetes and it automatically pumps insulin in. This way I don’t have to do needles.” I told him that it didn’t hurt me because I thought he would be worried about me.

He sort of nodded and shoved his hands through his hair. I thought how hot he looked doing that and reached up to touch him. He stood up like I had pinched him and yanked down his t-shirt. “Oh yeah, well that’s good. I mean if it works and everything. But it’s weird. Huh, is that why you’re here, 'cause having dia-whatever makes you feel weird?”

“No, I don’t feel weird. What do you mean? I’m not even supposed to be here. I don’t do drugs. I’m not some sick freak.”

Even in the dark I could see his lips twist. “No, not at all. You don’t do drugs, right? You don’t belong here. Well that’s cool. I do use drugs but you don’t see me with bandages on my wrists and some f*cking tube in my back.”

I felt tears start and, embarrassed, I pulled up my sheet. “Jeff …”

“No, listen, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that. Listen, Carey, this was cool and everything. I didn’t know it was your first time but thanks for, you know, letting me be the one and everything. But, Carey, we’re like in treatment here, and I … I’m, you know, pretty f*cked up. If I don’t clean up this time, my parents are going to send me to some f*cking crazy school in Russia or somewhere, so …”

I rolled away so I didn’t have to look at him. My stomach hurt and I thought about pink blood and shower drains. I thought about my funeral and mentally added him standing by my coffin, crying alongside my mother.

I didn’t hear him leave, or notice if he said goodbye. After that he sat two chairs away from me in group and never met my eyes, and there were no more late night old movie dates, and on Saturday, during visiting hours, even though we were the only two kids there whose parents hadn’t shown, he didn’t come and hang out with me in the lounge like he had before.

I stood at the window and watched him on the grass outside having one of his bullshit pretend earnest conversations with the orderly, smoking and gesturing dramatically. He looked like a douche; he was a douche. I felt something harden off in my head and I walked over to the duty nurse and, in my best Kelleher voice, I asked her if I could call my mother.

The nurse looked at me suspiciously and I sighed loudly. “Oh, come on, you must have noticed by now that none of my family have made a visiting day, and get a clue, they’re not going to, so I need to call my mother and have her send some things from home.”

“Send what? You have the same commissary privileges as everyone else here, Carolyn, and there is nothing in your chart about calling home. I think we need to wait on this until Monday when your doctor is here.”

Of all the many things I hate about treatment, and about hospitals, the thing I hate the most is when nurses say 'we' when they mean you. It’s the most pathetic bunch of crap and I told her so. Of course, this made her ugly face shut down, and I could see my plans going up in smoke, so I changed my approach. I gave her the dimple and tried to look sad, not totally pissed and wanting to club her to death with the receiver as I wished to.

“Look, I’m sorry, I’m just really, you know, disappointed that my mother couldn’t visit me this week, so could I please call her? I promise I’ll only be a minute.”

She shook her head, getting off on her little power play. “No, I’m sorry Carolyn, but speaking to your mother about your feelings is a therapeutic issue and ...”

Keeping my teeth gritted and my Cheshire cat smile in place was not easy, but desperate times and all. “I really appreciate what you are saying, but I am not asking you if I can call my mother to discuss my possible feelings of abandonment … ' Anyone with half a brain can pick up therapy speak within an hour of admittance to these bullshit factories. “... I am asking you if I can call her to FedEx me some sheets. The mystery fabric you have here is making me get hives, and just so you can see that I am being honest with you, you can sit there and listen to every word I say, okay?”

I was guessing that she was one of those sad women who knew her fairy tales and would buy my princess and the pea routine.

It worked like a charm. She even blushed. “Oh, of course, you must be used to, well, yes, I … . Here, give me the number.”

I reeled off the number at the Plaza, telling her, “Have the operator put you through to the Marin suite. My mother is using it while the family is out of town. She always stays at the Plaza on Saturdays.” At her pop-eyed look of admiration, I shrugged. “You know, privacy, that sort of thing. It’s hard at home with all the staff.”

She was totally psyched by then to be in on calling Ellen Kelleher of Vogue and Page Six fame. When she had asked the Plaza’s operator to put her through, she very reluctantly handed me the phone. It was so pathetically obvious that this call would be her conversational topic in the nurse’s lounge for a week.

Milan answered. Speaking quickly I said, “Oh hi, Milan, are you there with Mom today?”

She shrieked into the phone. “Oh my Gawd, Carey, where are you? You just disappeared. No one will tell me anything when I call the apartment. I can tell you can’t talk. Gawd, I am totally dying. Tell me where you are and we’ll come get you.”

I closed my eyes so the snoopy nurse couldn’t see the tears that hearing my friend’s voice started.

Swallowing, I said in a bored voice. “Gawd, Mom, did you forget already. You brought me here. I’m at Menninger’s, remember?”

Milan is actually smart as hell, which seems to surprise people, though I don’t know why, considering what she has accomplished. That day was no exception. She stayed silent, letting me fill her in.

“Anyway, Mom, I am calling because the sheets here are killing my skin and I want the set Aunt Georgia bought me ...”

“You want me to call your aunt, right? Just say yes or no. I’ve got this.”

“Yes, that’s right, the sheets are at her apartment in the Trump Towers, okay?”

“Okay, hang on, Carey, ve vill rescue you fair demoiselle, oui?”

I laughed, relief running through me like cool water.

“Oui, Maman, and Maman …? ”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you … I …”

“Don’t sweat it, Carey. Just chill. See you soon, girl.”

I hung up the phone.

The nurse looked at me admiringly. “You speak French to your mother?”

I rolled my eyes. “Sure, on Saturdays. On Sunday we try for Italian. It’s very broadening, you should try it. I’m going back to my room. Thanks for making the call. Later.”

I knew I wouldn’t have to wait long. Not only was Aunt Georgia my friend but I knew she wouldn’t miss a chance to screw with my mother.

It never occurred to me to try and call Daddy. Even if he didn’t know where I was, the whole Menninger’s scene and my embarrassing messy suicide attempt would have turned him way off. That was one of my mother’s lessons I really had absorbed - don’t bother Daddy - and I tried not to. Later on when I messed up, I found out why bothering Daddy was a bad deal, but none of it was on purpose.

I wish he knew that.