Diamonds

Thursday arrived and you had been led to another building. They called it the activity centre. You sat in the drawing group now and sketched with all black. The assignment of today was to draw something that you thought about a lot.

“Y/N, want to share with the group what you’ve drawn? It’s not a must, only if you want,” the teacher, or leader, said.
“Uh…” you mumbled and turned your paper around. It was a bunch of diamonds around bright eyes. “It’s warpaint, I guess.”
“And why has that been on your mind?” she asked.
“Cause, uh. There’s a band I listen to-
“Black Veil Brides, right?” a blonde girl across from you asked. You nodded.

“And you listen to them a lot?” the leader asked with a smile.
“Yeah. Sure,” you said distantly. Of course, the real reason wasn’t that. You hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Jinxx since you got here. You kind of regretted the way you had talked to him. Maybe he was mad. Your mind was getting away from you again and you made a mental note to tell your shrink about this tomorrow instead of letting it consume you now. That was something she had advised during your last meeting.

You chatted a little with the blonde girl throughout the rest of the hour. Her name was Gracie, she was two years younger than you and you were both into the same music. You were quite bummed out that she was in another unit of the hospital than you, or you might have been friends.

“Are you attending any other groups? I go to the yoga class on Tuesdays. You should talk to someone in your unit about going too,” she suggested with a kind smile.
“Yoga?” You made a face. You’d always thought it was a ridiculous activity.
“I really like it actually. The teacher is nice, and it’s good to get some kind of physical activity when you’re here,” she said.
“I guess. I’ll consider it,” you replied and smiled weakly. You were extremely tired right now and wanted to go take a nap. Gracie had been locked up here for two months. According to her, the first month had been miserable, but she had eventually made peace with being here, and since she starting participating in activities and going to therapy, she could actually see some positivity in this. And she wanted that for you too.

“It’s not all terrible. And hopefully they’ll allow you outside soon too,” she said. When class ended, your supervisor John came to get you back to Unit B, where you were staying. Gracie had told you that Unit A, where she was, was mainly psychotic and bipolar people, Unit B was mainly suicidal and self harming people, and in Unit C they had a lot of older people.

Friday arrived and after finishing your lunch, you were now in an office talking to your psychologist, Leona. She asked about your drawing group yesterday and you told her everything. You’d only had one shrink before, when you were in your teens, and he’d been awful. So your general opinion on psychologists hadn’t been too good up until now. Leona was really kind, and she seemed to take you seriously.

“So tell me more about this man. Jinxx,” she said. You shifted in your seat and exhaled.
“He plays guitar, piano and violin in a band I really like. He’s the one who- who… I don’t know what to say. Saved me? Pulled me out of the water? Stopped me from dying?”
“I’m not here to put words in your mouth but I would definitely say he saved you.”
“Well it’s like every bad fanfiction ever written. Except if it was a fanfic I wouldn’t be locked up in a nuthouse talking to a shrink.” Leona gave you a disapproving face. “Sorry. Psychiatric hospital.” She smiled.

“Do you read a lot of fanfiction?”
“No. I used to.”
“And Jinxx, is that his real name?”
“Nah it’s Jeremy.”
“Okay. You saw him again after he saved you?”
“Yeah. He came to see me in the hospital, and I think I pissed him off.”
“How so?”
“I guess I acted kinda… ungrateful? But on the other hand, he meets a lot of fangirls who struggle with mental health, so I feel like he shouldn’t be completely clueless about how they- we- can act sometimes.”
“Right. You were obviously very torn up right after the incident.”
“Yeah, exactly…” you said and scratched your arm, looking uncomfortable.

“You still seem bothered by the thought of him,” Leona suggested.
“I-I… I wish I could explain to him that I’m not mad at him. I get why he did it. I can’t say I’m grateful, but I get it. I guess it’s kinda traumatising to see someone jump off a bridge.”
“It definitely is. I think most people would try to intervene. Your supervisor John informed me that Jinxx - or Jeremy Ferguson as he said - has actually called here.”
“What?” You were absolutely stumped. Surely he wouldn’t want anything to do with you after the way you acted. Or maybe he understood that you were just upset. But still.

“What did he want?” you asked.
“You’ll have to ask John. He wanted me to check with you how you felt about possibly talking to him before he told you.”
“Oh. Okay. Well yeah, I would love a chance to explain myself,” you said. Leona nodded. You finished up your session rather quick after that and set times every week for your meetings. Mondays and Fridays after lunch was now therapy time.

Notes