Everything made sense in my head. The thoughts and words flowed seamlessly together. I knew exactly how I felt right now. Despite my ongoing efforts to repress those thoughts, Amanda’s innocuous question had brought them forward again.
I’m lonely after being in the hospital for a month with basically no visitors besides the doctors and nurses who have been caring me. I’m embarrassed because even though I’m fourteen, I’ve never been able to move on from needing to wear diapers. And I’m confused, because a month ago I wanted to end my life, and now I want to live, but I have no clue as to what the future could possibly look like for me.
But it all became a jumbled mess the moment I began to speak. I closed my mouth, shut my eyes, and curled up in a ball on my couch. Maybe going to juvie instead of this wouldn’t be so bad after all.
With my eyes closed and my mind all wrapped up in my own thoughts, I didn’t notice that Amanda had taken a seat on the couch until she was sitting next to me with her arm tight around my shoulder.
“You know what, why don’t we do something different. It’s only the first session after all.”
I opened my eyes and nodded, though I didn’t turn to look at her.
“Do you like to play videogames?”
“I don’t know.”
“Annabelle, you need to help me out a little. I’m sure you know if you like video games or not. And if you don’t, that’s OK. We can find something else to do.”
How I am supposed to explain to her that I had never been allowed to play videogames? Well, besides that one time. I felt really embarrassed.
“But I don’t know if I like them.”
“Why not?”
“I… I wasn’t allowed to…”
My voice trailed off into a stutter, and I felt Amanda’s hand rubbing my shoulder.
“Why weren’t you allowed to play videogames?”
The laughter started with a brief giggle, but I couldn’t get it under control. In a few seconds I was laughing so hard that I was crying. This situation wasn’t supposed to be funny, but the absurdity and irony of it was more than I could deal with. I gave a better explanation to Amanda a minute later when I finally managed to compose myself.
“She said video games caused kids to be violent. You know, Columbine and all that stuff.”
“I don’t think there is much truth to that,” Amanda said. “Humans started being violent long before video games were invented. I’ll get the Wii set up and we can play for a bit, OK?”
Curious, I peaked over Amanda’s shoulder as she knelt next to the TV cabinet and got the gaming system plugged in. My excitement to give it a try overpowered my cynicism that this was just a ploy Amanda was using to get on my good side. I mean, I knew that the cynic in me was right, but I wasn’t going to pass up this opportunity.
Amanda handed me the two remotes – Wiimotes, she called them. It was such as stupid pun that it made me giggle again. She started a bowling game on the Wii. Just another thing I’d never done before. After a few gutter balls to start, and one time where I threw the bowling ball backwards and scared all the Miis into jumping, I began to get the hang of it and even managed to pull off a couple of strikes.
But the fun was over as quickly as it began. Amanda turned off the TV and placed the controls back in the cabinet. I knew she would be expecting me to be more talkative this time around, but I still wasn’t ready for that.
“Can I slip out to the restroom?”
Amanda gave me a look. I guess her binder did have all my medical information in it as well.