The Voices

Voices

Dr. Jones observed the patient that sat in front of his desk. There were patches of hair ripped out of his head from when he’d have nightmares, and his unshaven face made him appear to be fifty, when in reality he was only half that age. Dr. Jones pointed to the man’s crotch region, “How often do you soil yourself, Adam?” No response. Dr. Jones fidgeted with his notepad, looking at the notes he took of Adam’s demeanor. “Adam,” Dr. Jones said, “if you keep chewing on those finger nails like that you’ll eventually hit bone.” No response. Adams eyes darted around the room, as if trying to take in every detail of the large office. “Your eyes keep glancing toward my book shelf, Adam. If you’d like you can take a look at them. You can even take a book back to your room to read and maybe we can talk about it next time I see you. Does that sound like a good idea?” Adam responded by standing up and shuffled toward the bookshelf, sliding his fingers across each spine. The urine stain became more visible when he was standing up and Dr. Jones took note of all the food stains on his sweatshirt. “Do you see anything you like?” Dr. Jones asked as he walked from behind his desk to join Adam by the bookshelf on the other side of the room. Adam shook his head hard; making it look like his head would fly off his shoulders any minute. After five long minutes of looking at books, both men sat back down in their chairs. “So Adam, how do you feel abou-” Adam cut him off by raising his hand, silencing the doctor, “Just ask me.”
“Ask you what, Adam?”
“The question you’ve been w-w-w-waiting to ask me” Adam said, his voice low and surprisingly soft given his roughed up appearance.
“I’m not sure what you mean. Is there something you’d like to talk about with me? You’re safe here, Adam. Everything you say here is confidential.” Dr. Jones leaned forward and picked up his pen and paper, ready to write down anything that would seem noteworthy.
“The voices,” Adam said, “they keep talking to me. But I’m not crazy. They come to m-m-m-me, but I don’t listen to them.”
Dr. Jones scribbled in his notepad, “What do the voices tell you, Adam?” Dr. Jones watched Adam shake his left leg rapidly. Adam reached for a red sharpie lying on Dr. Jones desk and took the cap off. He walked over to the wall near the front door with no pictures hanging on it and started writing. “Adam, please sit back down. We don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to.” Dr. Jones stayed seated and decided to let him continue his message on his brown wall. After a minute of Adam writing furiously on the wall, he dropped the sharpie, sighed, and sat back down. Dr. Jones read the message aloud from his desk, “I can’t talk to anyone about it, they said. But they never said anything about writing. They talk about killing and stabbing,” There was a short sentence that was unreadable, it was just scribbly lines, but the last few words were understandable, “Dr. Jones isn’t good.” Adam had his hands covering his ears and his eyes were closed tight. “Have you ever done anything these voices told you to do?” No response. Dr. Jones offered Adam the sharpie, “Write it down if it will be easier for you, Adam.” After a moment of hesitation, Adam snatched the sharpie out of Dr. Jones hand and walked to the wall to the right of them with the window on it. Dr. Jones observed Adam’s shaky demeanor as he wrote restlessly on the window. After two minutes, Adam dropped the sharpie on the ground and returned to his seat at his desk. Due to the light shining through the window, the message was unreadable from the desk, so Dr. Jones walked over to read it aloud to himself, “I’m not crazy. They’re not voices in my head, I know that. The medication I get makes me not good, but the-” there was a line on the window which could not be read, but Dr. Jones thought it said something along the lines of, “nurses are telling…” and then it cut out. Dr. Jones picked up the sharpie and walked back to his desk. “Adam?” Dr. Jones said, facing his patient. “Are the nurses telling you to do anything or treating your poorly? You don’t have to speak, just nod for yes or shake for no.” Adam stopped picking at a patch of torn out hair and looked Dr. Jones in the eye, “they told me to do this” Adam said as he dove across the large desk. Dr. Jones didn’t have time to defend himself against the letter opener as it dug its way into his heart. “Adam…” Dr. Jones said, blood spilling out of his mouth. “They told me to do it” Adam said, on top of Dr. Jones as he continued stabbing him over, and over, and over, and over…