The Dead House

It’s all about “putting me away again.”


See, they think I’m a personality disorder. I touched on this before. I am “a way of coping” when Carly was coping just fine. DID—dissociative identity disorder. I’m a coping mechanism… an alternative personality. I’m a symptom. They think I’m like a disease—I’m infecting Carly.

No one believes that I’ve always been here. Carly says it’s because no one trusts the word of a teenager. And our parents, the only two people who could have told them the truth, are gone forever. I guess Jaime could tell them too, but who believes a five-year-old?

This is how it works:

I’m here courtesy of Carly. I’m anywhere because of her. Not that I’m complaining, and she’d never admit this, but I’m like the wart on her arse she’ll never show, but she constantly knows is there. Where she goes, I go.

I am a prisoner of my skin. My bones are my cage. But she tells me she needs me, that I make her so happy, that she couldn’t live without me, and I know it’s true. It’s true for both of us.

Carly and I are closer than sisters. Closer than twins. We might as well be the same person, because we share the same body. But we are different. You might say she’s my better half. We share one life, each getting part.

Carly gets the day.

I get the night.

We live in shifts; it’s always been this way. I’ve always been here. Always, always, al

ways.

Wish they’d believe that.

Unfortunately, I was unlucky enough to be born to the night watch, so I’m the one nominated for deletion integration

The

Big

Nothing


Dr. Lansing says it’s a good thing, but I’m not much tempted by oblivion. Not today, anyway.

I don’t blame Carly for being the one in the light. I love her more than anything. She’s my opposite completely, and she’ll say she’s the weaker half of our equation, but the truth is she’s my rock. She is everything I wish I were.

See how honest I’m being, Lansing, dear?

During the crossover, at dawn and dusk, just as the sun is moving behind or above the horizon, I can sometimes feel Carly coming. It’s hard to describe. I get sort of dizzy… like I’m high… and just as I’m about to go, I feel her brush past me. Not quite touch… more like a familiar scent or a gentle breath. It’s the closest we get to touching. I can almost talk to her in those endless minutes when we are neither one nor the other.

Almost.

But, since that’s impossible, we use other methods—the Message Book and little notes scribbled on purple Post-its stuck here and there.

Gotta go—I hear the nurse coming for checks.


Purple Post-it

Found between the pages of Kaitlyn’s journal

Remember to behave tonight. Only one night, OK?

PS: Grabbed you one of those gross marshmallow concoctions you love from the canteen. Under the bed. Also, Jane Eyre from the library.

Go nuts. Be good.

Xoxo

C



4:04 am

Where was I? Oh, yeah. Now that we’re heading back to Elmbridge High School, it’s safe to write in the Message Book again. For a while, back in late June, Dr. Lansing read it without our knowing, and would say things that could only have come from reading our exchanges. But we figured it out soon enough, and that was the last time we wrote in it. Lansing wanted that, of course. She saw it as Carly indulging in her alter ego—an “enabling behavior.” When Carly wasn’t writing to me there, Lansing probably smiled and put a neat little tick next to a task box that read “stop all messages.” But she was wrong if she thought that would stop us.

We wrote to each other in the bathroom mirror, in steam. We wrote Post-it notes, which we hid in unlikely places and swallowed after reading (not the nicest thing to force down your esophagus, but they checked the bins to make sure I wasn’t smoking). She forced us underground, and underground we’ll stay, until the day we pack our bags and head for the city, where the night never sleeps.

For now, my nights are full of nothings, and Carly’s days are full of everythings.





2


155 days until the incident




Session #45 Audio

Dr. Annabeth Lansing (AL) and Carly “Kaitlyn” Johnson (CJ)

Tuesday, 31 August 2004, 8:34 PM


(AL): How are you feeling tonight, Carly?




(CJ): Today was a good day.




(AL): Last day here. No anxieties about the upcoming school year?




(CJ): I like being at Elmbridge…




(AL): But?




(CJ): [Pause] They sent a notice that they’re giving me a new room. Apparently, it’s a little smaller. Different. It’s in the “L,” so I’ll be able to see the boys’ dorms across the courtyard, which is weird.




(AL): And it bugs you? The change?




(CJ): A bit. But it will be good being back.




(AL): Change affects us all in different ways. It’ll get easier as more time passes. Tell me, how much did you manage to eat?




(CJ): I ate in the hospital canteen today. I had salad and some tuna.