White Coats

And the room was entirely white. It was bright. The sunlight from the single window illuminated even the darkest corner. In the middle of the room was a woman sat in the wheelchair. She was facing the window and the sun, but still looked cold. Her hair was brown and matted and she wore a white cardigan. The room was sparse, only a plainly sheeted bed, nightstand, and a large mirror that was partly shattered in the corner.

There were never any visitors to the room. Never any gifts or well wishes. Just solidarity in a way that just felt like hell.  

The woman sighed and raised her head. Her features were startlingly visible now. Her face was weary. Pale, with large violet bags under and over her eyes. 

Her eyes were a milky blue. They were like a hollow cage. A broken egg shell. The pitiful foam left from high tide. And they looked so sad. They looked out of place and alone. Her eyes had seen so much and had been scarred for it. They reflected a sad hope for forgiveness and peace. And for all the light her eyes carried all she could see was darkness. There could be no light anymore. No joy or wonder that comes from a freshly seen world.

But that was okay. She had seen enough of the world. 

She hadn't taken it so well. Truth be told she wanted to leave the world entirely. Not just to stop seeing but stop feeling. For it was feelings that had killed her. Or so she thought. Yet her she was. And here'd she stay. When she first came here, it was pitiful. She kept screaming, screaming for them to take her home. And they kept shouting that she was home. 

And when they left her alone for the first time, she had traced laps around the room. And when she found the mirror, she attempted to look in it, in herself, like she had done so many times before. But it wouldn't happen, anymore. And so she smashed it. Smashed it to a million pieces because she felt so smashed. And she couldn't see what she had done, but she felt the devastation. In fact that's all she felt anymore. 

And so they learned, the white coats. And they made sure that she only stayed inside her mind. 

Because in her mind she could see and feel and forget and dream. 

And such an irony was that something she had tried to take herself out with was the thing keeping her here.