I look right into Jamie’s eyes. “I don’t know why I’m here.”
“Hmm.” She drops her line of sight to her knees, and it feels like someone hit the dimmer switch. Everything goes dull. She switches legs, unbraiding them and recrossing them on the opposite side. Maybe she’ll look at me again and bring the light back, but no. Those eyes of hers, their corners lifting high despite the purple bags underneath, they land on everything else in the room but me. The fake plants, the dull linoleum floor. They sit for a spell on the hospital’s interpretation of what decorative knickknacks should be. Like that poster of a kitten dangling from a branch. HANG IN THERE. Because a kitten with shitty manual dexterity will solve all our problems? Done. Can I go home now?
Jamie’s attention eventually strays to my cast. After she reads the doodles and messages, she looks up at me. The light comes flooding back (don’t look, don’t do it, don’t fall) and I shut my eyes.
“The Beast?” she says. I open them and there she is. A face that launched a thousand somethings. Cars. No, tugboats. Ships. One of those.
“Is that your nickname?” she asks. “They call you the Beast?”
“Guess so.”
“Why?”
I lift my forearm and show her. My bare palm facing me and the hairy full-length sweater facing her. Fur everywhere, all the way up, even coating my knuckles.
“Can I touch it?” she asks.
“Uh…okay.”
She gently smooths her fingers across the back of my hand, like she’s touching the head of a newborn. “It’s soft.”
I sneak my hand back. Am I like a dog now? Did she just pet me?
“Shall we come together?” Dr. Burns asks. “Anyone have a topic they’d like to discuss?”
A girl in the corner raises her hand, and if I saw her coming down the street, I’d step aside so I wouldn’t accidentally breathe on her and mess her up. Everything about her is precision perfect. Like she parts her hair with a laser and resews every button so each row of little holes lines up north to south. While my bag lies dumped on the ground with all the crap spilling out, her bag stands at attention by her foot like a guard dog. “Dr. Burns,” she says, not asks.
“Yes, Gabrielle?”
“I still find it difficult to illustrate to my family that what I’m undergoing is a legitimate concern. They thought I was crazy when I used to cut,” Gabrielle says. “They said black girls don’t do this; it’s a white-girl problem.”
“How did that make you feel?” Dr. Burns asks. I inch my wheels closer to the door. If that’s the default follow-up question to everything, no wonder these girls are robots.
“Like they didn’t care,” Gabrielle says. “Like no one cares.”
I want to laugh. Oh, Gabrielle, take it from me. No one gives a flying shit how you really feel. Not your friends, not anyone.
“Thank you, Gabrielle.” Dr. Burns nods and looks at me. “Dylan? Would you like to add anything?”
“I don’t hack myself up with razor blades,” I say. “So I don’t think I should be here.”
A way-too-skinny girl, Hannah, jumps out of her seat. I’m surprised she has the energy. “If he doesn’t think he should be here, then he should go,” she says. “Because what he said is insulting.”
“I agree,” Jamie says.
Jamie lists to the side like she was punctured with a pin. I suddenly feel bad.
Our Lady Black of the good ship Weltschmerz raises her hand. Dr. Burns points at her. “Yes, Wretched?”
“Wretched?! Your name is Wretched?” I burst out.
“We’re respectful toward others,” Dr. Burns says to me.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have. But that’s perfect.”
“Fuck off, Caveman Jim,” Wretched snaps at me.
“Name-calling,” Dr. Burns says, playing referee.
“I can call myself whatever name I want,” Wretched spits. “I don’t need some misogynist acting like he has a say.” She looks like she’s about to throw a chair at my head. “You know nothing about me.”
“Likewise,” I say.
“Oh, but it’s okay for you to get all up on your high horse because of someone’s name or what they look like?” Wretched sneers.
“At least you chose—” I stop. I pull the brim of my hat down and dunk my hands in my lap. Shut up, shut up, shut up, I chant in my head as I squeeze my hands into fists.
“At least what, Dylan?” Dr. Burns asks.
“Nothing.” I glare at my fingernails. My hands relax and I look up. I grin at the room so they’ll see I meant no harm. I’m a nice guy. Besides, I know when I’m outnumbered. I don’t want them to rise up and drown me in lip gloss. “Nothing. Sorry I said anything.”
Wretched sighs and rolls her eyes toward the ceiling. “I would like to know what you were going to say.”
“Me too,” Gabrielle says.
“Me three,” Jamie says.
She sends me a smile, a small peace offering.
Gripping my jaw, I drag my fingers across my chin. The raspy five o’clock shadow that sprouted after lunch scritches louder than sandpaper. I take a breath. “I was going to say”—I debate how to put it—“at least Wretched chose to look that way and call herself that name. That’s all.”