Heart-Shaped Cakes

Short story, shedding light on mental health

This was written in 2014. I found it hiding somewhere in my email. 

 

Heart-shaped Cakes

 

 

            Fatso was dreading it being six o’clock. Every year the nurses would say that the fourteenth of February was a special day and because of this we would be allowed to eat two mini heart-shaped cakes for dessert. This reminded me of when I was a child and my mother would allow me to drink Coca-Cola because it was the weekend. Fatso always tried to hide the cakes in the napkins she would be hiding on her lap, even though she knew that the nurses had put all of their focus on her during dessert time, turning her into the Mona-Lisa at the Louvre in Paris. Fatso had been bulimic since she was fifteen years old, she had recently turned twenty-three. Months after months, I noticed her wearing thicker jumpers and use her hand against the wall to maintain some sort of balance. She said that she constantly chewed extreme mint flavored gum as her throat would burn from the stomach acid that she would force into her mouth. People called her Fatso because it was the easiest way to throw her into misery. It was the easiest way for the other patients to distract themselves, putting their focus onto the pain of others. If others were getting worse, it must have meant that they were getting better, meaning that they were closer to leaving their temporary home. The ward where time stood still and where they abused the term ‘therapy.’ It wasn’t therapy. 

            Fatso was now pacing in circles around the halls, the common room, in front of the television that only showed six channels and past the nurses station. 

            “Alison, please stop, you’re making the others nervous” said one of the women wearing a long white coat. They always called her by her birth name. I rarely called her Fatso to her face as I didn’t have such a big urge to get out of this home.

            “No. You know that I don’t like today. Let me walk for a few minutes,” she said as she rapidly walked past the smoking area. Everyone smoked in this ward, it was the only way that people were allowed to be self-destructive. All knives and sharp objects were taken out of our bags when entering the hospital, the nurses were too lazy to clean up blood off of the walls.

            “You have two minutes, otherwise you have to go back to your room until dinner” said the blurry shape in the white coat, as she walked back towards the hallway, rolling her eyes, knowing that Fatso was fearing the cakes she would later have to eat. 

            “B***h” Alison whispered, terrified to miss visiting hours and desperate to burn some calories.  

            

            “Can you not go sit somewhere else, Autumn?” The woman in the white coat was now standing next to me, next to my favorite wooden chair, it was the only chair in this building that would remind me of my childhood, of the houses we used to have in France and Belgium. Those houses had long disappeared into other people’s memories by now. 

            I had been watching Zola play dress up all morning and afternoon, turning her mirror into her best friend. She would put on a dress, jump ecstatically as she clapped her hands in front of her reflection and then undress again, slowly pulling the dress over her head and dropping it on the floor, next to the others. She looked like she was getting ready for prom. I had never been to prom but this was making me feel like I was about to experience it for the first time. Zola would often quietly cry on the couch of the common room, with her forehead resting on her arms, making them her shell. Once she would have the energy to carry her head again, I would always see the burns her tears had just scarred on her cheeks. She turned into what I pictured a cherry would look like if it were allowed to be human for a day. 

            The color reminded me of the weekends my mother and I would have in Belgium when I was younger. I would spend hours picking up strawberries and then we would make jam together, in our little kitchen hidden in the middle of a silent village. 

            “What about this dress, Autumn? Do you prefer this one?” Zola asked me as she stretched out her dress on both sides, like petals feeling rain and coming to life. 

            “It’s lovely. Pretty color. The red hearts on it suit you perfectly, cherry-colored hearts” I responded, while thinking of the jam my mother and I would make, pretending the anxious household wouldn’t exist. Zola felt like a recently adopted little sister, one that I cared about but hadn’t yet taken part of my heart. 

            “It’s blue velvet!” She said, as she turned her smile into those advertising companies would often place on toothpaste bottles. 

            She wore blue velvet; bluer than velvet was the night. She wore blue velvet; bluer than velvet were her eyes. I winked at Zola, blew her a kiss and sang as I walked to the public self-destructive area of our ward, wanting a cigarette. 

 

            I was forced into a psychiatric hospital after my last breakdown. It happened on the fourteenth of February, exactly two years ago, the day before I turned twenty-three years old. In my early twenties, I would say that I breathed to live the life I was given, studied to survive in the world where I was placed and smoked so that death wouldn’t surprise me. Now, I wasn’t so sure why I was living. I couldn’t imagine living in a world where my mom wasn’t living yet the thought of death terrified me. I guess that’s why I was forced in here. They labeled me clinically depressed. That’s how we were all here, in this private mental institution for the deviant, the house where judges hid all humans that would ruin their idea of a perfect world, a perfect country, a perfect society. We were the pile of clothes thrown in the corner of a room, the boxes of old books that were dusting away in the attic. 

            I arrived at the self-destructive room and lit a cigarette, breathing my future illness. Life felt exactly like a cigarette once it had been lit, my mouth being time and all tick-tock sounds, slowly breathing away its life. I could hear some of the other patients clapping their hands and smiling, excited about Valentine’s day. I wanted to become one with the stained walls, staying away from the world where my mother had died.

            

            “Thirty minutes left until visiting hours ladies!” I heard a nurse shout as she hung heart-shaped decorations by a string, twirling it around the corridor light, in front of the front door. It was sweet how the nurses played along on this day. Did they notice that we were fading, fading into nothing? 

 

Fatso ran into the self-destructive room and lit a cigarette of her own. 

“How are you coping, Autumn?” she said as she took her hand and placed it around mine while using the other to play elegant with her cigarette. 

            “I’m coping. Like a marionette. Can’t you see the invisible strings?” I said, moving my sweaty hand away from hers. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, no seven isn’t a pretty number. Start over. One, two, three, four, five, six, eight, nine. F**k. Where was I? One, two, three, burn me, like the fly that’s burning itself against the light bulb in my dorm. 

 

            I looked up and saw Zola pressing her lips against the window. It reminded me of when I was five years old and would teach myself how to kiss by kissing my own hand. I waved but my greeting flew far past the window, past the building, past the barbed wires, past the grey locked gates and into a world of nothing, a world without my mother. Zola must have been kissing one of the people only she could see. She suffered from Schizophrenia. 

            I had been watching Zola make out with the window for about thirteen minutes. I had smoked two cancer sticks now, the way that chain smokers would smoke while pretending to watch television, daydreaming about long-lost lovers. I hoped that Zola believed that the window was kissing her back. It was Valentine’s Day anyway; she deserved to enjoy a good kiss. I couldn’t remember my last love. I wonder what kind of person they were. My memory had been awful for the last two years, since I felt like a car had repeatedly run me over during rush-hour on a highway.

            Zola always put much effort into dressing up for special occasions. Visiting hours were every weekend, she would always spend four hours finding the perfect clothes to wear for her parent’s visit. It was Wednesday today. 

            I opened the door of the self-destructive room and sang, she wore blue velvet; bluer than velvet was the night. She wore blue velvet; bluer than velvet were her eyes. I loved to see her smile, I couldn’t imagine living in a world where voices were constantly screaming at me. Zola quickly fell out of love with the window and started skipping behind me, whistling along to the melody my mouth was creating. She was an adorable twenty-year old, desperate to find happiness or some distractions. Dressing up in dresses and skipping behind me as I sang was one of the ways she would feel joy in this miserable building, many of the comatose patients would ignore her presence. 

            “Five minutes left until visiting hours everyone, are you all ready?” Said a nurse as she walked out of the nurse’s station. Zola was still skipping while wearing a smile she had stolen from a toothpaste bottle, desperately trying to ignore the screaming voices in her head. Fatso was standing still, not wanting to be sent to her room, she showed excitement by ecstatically swinging her arms from side to side. The comatose patients never participated in the game; it was only the people that felt so much misery that they felt they would drown without any positive emotions. She had forgotten about the heart-shaped cakes we would later have to eat as dessert. 

 

            “Do you girls want something to cover your eyes or do you just want to use your hands?” a nurse asked. Her hands were wrapped in many different scarves. We all agreed on using our hands.  Many of us stood in a straight line facing the front door, excitedly waiting for what we would see once we would open it, the same way that children tightly held their Christmas present two minutes before midnight. 

 

            “It’s time” said the nurse, still holding the scarves. We covered our eyes with our hands as we stood in silence. 

            I thought of two years ago. I thought of my mother’s death the morning of Valentines Day. I thought of the smiles I wouldn’t have to fake. I thought of the houses we used to have in France and Belgium. I thought of my mother, my wonderful mother. My fingertips were now pressing into my eyelids, scarring my skin with my fingerprints.  

            

            The doorbell rang yet we all stood frozen with our fingers pressed against our eyelids until it rang for a fourth time. One by one, we would remove our hands from our eyes and go open the door for the visitors. It was nearly my turn. I pressed my fingers as hard I could, making the door spin in circles while I was walking towards it. I suddenly felt like Fatso did every day, I had an urge to puke. I felt nauseas. I felt the skin on my forehead start to swim in molecules of sweat as my head spun in circles, in phantasmagorias of memories. I had to remind myself to walk, focusing on every step. One step. Two steps. Three steps. Four steps. Five Steps. Six steps. I felt like I was back in time, living in a world where my mother was alive. I would often cycle home in the dark with my arms stretched out above me, reaching for as much wind as possible, desperate to feel nothing but meaningless sanity.

            I opened the door. Zola stood in front of me, bowing a little, the way that princesses used to when greeting another individual. She stretched out her dress from both sides, like petals finally feeling rain and coming to life. 

I could see Fatso watching us from the side of the corridor, next to her valentine and next to all other patients and all of their valentines. I noticed that one of the boys had a nurse as a valentine because there weren’t enough of us patients participating in the game. He looked at me, craving the view of Zola and her dress. It didn’t matter that we were living our lives the way that books lived in a box that had been laminated in layers of dust when thrown into the corner of an attic. It didn’t matter whether we had a chemical imbalance in the brain. We would indefinitely be mortal human beings who shared our lives together, a life filled with love and misery. We were the only people who listened to each other, the rest saw us as deviant and unworthy. We had become each other’s shells and formed our own planet where insanity was nothing but reality. We weren’t alone with our misery here.

            “Happy valentine’s day, Autumn” said Zola. 

“Happy valentine’s day, lovely cherry-colored face” I smiled.

 We all shouted Happy Valentine’s Day to each other as I started to silently cry, my tears washing the powder off of my face. My mother died two years ago today.  

            “It’s six o’clock. Dinner time, ladies and gentlemen” said the nurse, as she put the scarves back into a box. We held each other’s hands as we walked towards the dining table and then all sat at our regular seats, appreciating each other’s company. Zola pulled up a chair for her imaginary kissing buddy. Fatso put napkins on her lap and started to shake.

 

 

The End.

 

 

Reviews

[¿]

It's a mixture of gloom and satisfaction. Someone's demise on a special day to someone specials absence on special days are both heart wrenching. I always had the curiosity of learning how actually is to spend days after days in a place full of medicinal smell everyday, but again am so scared of that place!
I loved reading this, short and enjoyable also heart touching.
Be blessed :)

[May. Words.]

Thank you so much. I really appreciate your words.

[Julie McCarthy (juliesp..]

Marvellous write
This is so good
You describe feelings emotions from the past the present all interwoven effortlessly skipping from one memory or present day to the next
I loved your style here
A very good write
I hope you are well these days 🙏

[May. Words.]

Thank you so so much. I'm glad you could enjoy it. Thank you. Wishing you all the best, kind stranger.