Patient Pre-Check For Participation In Group Activity

Patient Number: 0619

Patient Name: Robin Stephens

Question One: How Are You Feeling Today?

If I say ‘healed’ do I get a gold star? Probably not, considering you stupid fucks won’t even tell me what I’m supposed to be getting treatment for. God, whatever. I feel fine. No, y’know what? I feel shit. Not mentally – well, kinda mentally, but not because I’m mental. No, I feel shit because I’m being kept in this stupid room all fucking day and all night, so actually, if you do let me go to this stupid group thing, I might feel a tiny little smidge better. Just a tad. Just the tiniest, smallest bit.

Question Three: Do You Have Any Thoughts Or Plans To Harm Yourself?

If I didn’t tell you last time, why on Earth would I tell you this time? Also, I’m pretty sure you’d notice. I know you’re spying on me. Not because I’m paranoid – fuck, why did I say ‘spying’ like some stupid little kid? You’re watching me, or whatever. Viewing me. Like some sort of zoo animal. Again, not paranoid, just want to make that very clear, I’m just being realistic.

Question Four: Do You Have Any Thoughts Or Plans To Harm Others?

Hm. I wonder if the spooky psychology doctor people will let me go to their little get-together of kidnapped patients if I tell them that I’m going to murder everyone when I get there. What a mystery. Also, no. I haven’t even seen another normal person in days. Psychologist lady doesn’t count as a normal person, by the way.

Question Five: Do You Remember How To Interact With Others?

Of course I do. What a bullshit question – I happen to have had a memory, y’know, while I’ve been in here, and I worked in a supermarket. Do you know how many people I had to interact with? I can’t exactly remember that bit, but I know the gist of working with the public. Too many fucking people! I think I’ll handle your stupid little group just fine.

Question Six: What Is The Proper Way To Conduct Yourself In A Group Setting?

You want some sort of bullshit answer about ‘ooh, let other people have their turn to speak and be respectful and everyone has their own opinions and we should let them feel valued and contribute’ and all that shit, don’t you? Well, there you go. That sums up what you want to hear, right?

Question Seven: Do You Require Any Additional Help Or Equipment To Participate In This Session?

A kebab would be nice. Doner, no salad, garlic mayo.

Question Eight: Are There Any Topics That Would Bring You Distress If Brought Up During The Session?

The topic of pointless questionnaires would bring me to tears. Tears of boredom, like, but still.

Question Nine: Do You Understand That By Taking Part In The Session, You Agree To Behave In An Orderly And Calm Manner?

Unfortunately, I kinda guessed that would be part of the deal. Also, the way you’ve worded this makes it sound like I can say I ‘understand’ and then just choose to do whatever the fuck I want anyway. You’re just checking that I understand it, not that I’m going to go along with all of your bullshit. Like, I could have said ‘I understand what you’ve said, and I’m going to fully ignore it’. What would you do then? Just keep me in here, I guess.

Question Ten: Do You Feel Normal?

If I knew what the fuck sorta normal you meant, then maybe I could tell you. Give me a fucking hint!

Fuck me. If I haven’t just seen the shitshow of a lifetime, then I don’t wanna know what’s gonna top that.

I’ll start from the beginning. Psychologist lady read over the form – she wasn’t a fan of my comments about her, but I swear to God her eyes lit up when she was reading about me having a memory. I don’t know if I should’ve written that down, but she didn’t actually say anything about it. Maybe she was hoping I’d pour my heart out in the session with a soppy story about my mum or something.

Anyway, apparently I scraped a bottom-of-the-barrel pre-check pass. The moment she opened the door, and I knew I could go out with her, half of me was ready to jump up and make a run for it. But then these two burly dudes came in, and I thought better of it. They put my hands behind my back and put my wrists in some sort of weird kinda-handcuffs-but-not-handcuffs. Almost seemed like a sex thing.

Then, it was outside time! Or sort of outside. I followed the psychologist lady out of the door, feeling like every miracle ever just happened at once, and it was a sort of weird open-plan medical-looking corridor, like the sort of thing you see on those hospital TV shows. There were people everywhere. Some burly guard dudes – and dudettes, probably – but mainly just posh-looking snobs in white coats and some people who might’ve been nurses in scrubs. The floor was so shiny that I could almost see my face in it, and everything stank to the high heavens of bleach.

All of the people seemed to be giving me a wide berth, except those two annoying guards behind me, foiling my pretty rubbish escape plan. We crossed the corridor, went through a door into another, quieter, more normal-looking corridor with doors on either side, spaced quite far apart, and then psychologist lady stopped outside one of them. There was a rectangular window running vertically down it, almost like a school classroom sorta deal, but the moment I got close enough to look in it, all I saw was a chair flying across the little panel and then an eruption of papers, like a tiny stationery volcano.

Psychologist lady made a weird sound, sort of between a ‘tut’ and a squeak, and waved her hand at me. I didn’t know what that meant, but as she opened the door and pretty much sprinted inside, I got yanked backwards by the maybe-sex-related-not-quite-handcuffs, and literally dragged along the shiny floor back to my cell.

The worst part is, I would’ve walked if they’d asked.