Florida Man by Samuel Brower

Author:Samuel Brower [Brower, Samuel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9798412400471
Amazon: B0B3W7HD1V
Goodreads: 61277962
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: 2022-06-11T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Thirteen

Weekends in a mental health facility are extra boring. The doctors on staff only work Monday to Friday, so there are no therapy sessions, and because I have a private room, there is normally very little human interaction for me. I usually spend the time pacing my room, reading, or staring out the window at the sky.

This particular weekend was different. Doctor Lee had felt it was time for me to begin eating in the cafeteria with other patients. Saturday and Sunday, breakfast, lunch and dinner, totaling six, glorious increments of time with actual people. Of course, the people are the hospital’s other psychos, a few orderlies, and several overworked, underpaid cafeteria workers, but…beggars can’t be choosers.

On Saturday morning I wake with the sun, dress in my best jam jams and head down to the cafeteria. When I arrive, I’m transported right back to my days in high school. By then, dad had already sent Benny to a military school to prepare him for his illustrious career in the Marines. I was left to endure the hell of high school alone.

I remember entering the lunchroom on the first day of my freshman year, and the anxiety of finding a place to sit amongst all the strangers. We had moved again over the summer, and I didn’t even have acquaintances in the new place...

At least the food was a little better in the hospital. I go to the line, grab a safe plastic tray and safe plastic utensils, then start picking out foodstuffs. The ladies working behind the buffet-style counter serve all three meals each day, but I still think of them as “lunch ladies,” because they remind me so much of the cafeteria workers in my high school. Today’s breakfast consists of scrambled eggs, sausage links, a fruit cup, and two percent milk.

My tray fully laden, I turn and look out over the dining hall. Formica-topped, picnic style tables with bench seats are set out in a grid, and I realize this won’t be as bad as high school, because there are plenty of open seats, and there are no cliques to worry about, as everyone is dressed in the same hospital garb that does nothing to express individual personalities. I no longer have to worry about jocks, goths, freaks, punks, nerds, skaters, or burnouts.

Then I wonder for a moment if there could be cliques based on types of mental illness. Do the bipolars roll with the bipolars and the schizos with the schizos in this place? Was there a personality disorder crew? A major depressives table where all the sad sacks dined?

I grip my tray tightly and stride out into the dining area, looking back and forth, searching for a table that seems a good fit.

“Where my Schizotypal Personality Disorders at?” I call out.

Nobody looks up. Nobody seems to notice me at all, save for an orderly standing dutifully against the far wall…and a woman seated at a mostly empty table in the far corner. She stares at me, her eyes wide with either fright or too much medication.

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