Entry Ten
1393 Words
***
**Entry Ten: The Quiet Doesn’t Stay Quiet**
“We are so worried about you.”
The words feel heavy, rehearsed, almost ceremonial. My parents speak them together — not in harmony, exactly, but in shared exhaustion. They sit across from me like cautious strangers, one on either side of a small table that smells of coffee and disinfectant.
I nod because nodding feels safer than disagreeing.
The rehab visiting room hums with recycled air. Beige walls pretend to be comforting. Every surface is glossy enough to reflect light but not a clear image — design that forgives nothing. Dad stirs his untouched coffee like it might offer directions. Mom just keeps glancing past me toward the nurses’ station, like she’s waiting for someone to confirm I’m improving.
I touch the edge of my hospital bracelet, feel the numbers there like proof that I still exist somewhere outside routine vitals. The chair is too soft. The room’s too bright. Every breath feels monitored.
Then I see it — a frog, small and patient, waiting by the leg of Mom’s chair. It hops once and sits perfectly still, green skin gleaming like candle wax. My pulse skips, but I don’t flinch. Small hallucinations still happen sometimes, they said — residual firing, leftover static.
It’s fine. Just my brain remembering.
Except this one breathes.
I stare. And before I can stop myself, I ask, softly:
“Do they cook it first?”
Mom blinks. “Cook what, sweetheart?”
“The frog,” I say. “People eat frogs, right? Don’t they cook them?”
For a second, I think she’ll laugh — maybe a nervous giggle, something to break the tension — but the sound that escapes her is sharp and brittle.
“Honey,” she says gently, eyes shining with exhaustion, “you’re not making much sense again.”
The frog hops once, turns its tiny head toward me, and then vanishes under the table like it’s ashamed. I stare at the empty space it leaves behind. Mom doesn’t notice. Dad’s jaw tightens just slightly.
I swallow hard.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper.
“You don’t have to apologize,” Mom says. “You just need rest.”
That’s their new religion: rest, patience, clean air, no pink pills.
***
The conversation drags into safer territory — weather, therapy schedule, whether I’m eating, sleeping. Ordinary words strung over a minefield.
Mom’s voice cracks mid-sentence. “Your doctor said the hallucinations should fade,” she says quickly, “but sometimes trauma… lingers. That’s normal.”
“Normal,” I echo. “Right.”
Dad looks up finally, eyes sharp. “He said they’re just images. Your brain holding on.”
“I know.”
He nods but doesn’t believe me.
Outside the tall window, sunlight burns without warmth. Cars pass like efficient ghosts. The world looks functional. I keep wondering how people tolerate that much reality without crumbling.
Mom tries for tenderness. “You look healthier,” she says. “Paler maybe, but your eyes—”
“Different?” I interrupt. “Everyone says that. Like they know what my eyes were supposed to do before.”
The sentence dies between us. Silence spreads like fog. The nurse near the door clicks her pen once, as if to confirm we’re still here.
***
We eat lunch together: oatmeal cookies, apple slices, lukewarm tea. It tastes halfway between childhood and medication.
Dad clears his throat. “The doctors said it’s progress. The fever’s gone. You’ve made it through detox. That’s not small.”
I nod, but his phrasing bothers me. *Made it through* sounds temporary — like a hallway between two versions of myself.
Mom glances at me carefully, voice trembling. “Remember your life before Benadryl?”
A painful laugh escapes her, half humor, half grief. “Feels like another lifetime, doesn’t it?”
I look down at the tea, at the way the surface ripples from my own heartbeat.
“I remember pieces,” I say. “Music. Skittish quiet. Nights that stayed boring instead of apocalyptic.” I pause. “But mostly I remember how being sober used to mean being safe. Now it just means I can’t hide.”
Mom straightens, defensive. “You are safe here.”
“Sure,” I say politely.
Dad’s watching me closely, scanning for the daughter he recognizes. “You’ll get back there,” he says softly. “It just… takes longer for some.”
“Some of us,” I correct. “Not *some.* Just me.”
***
The frog reappears, sitting under my chair like punctuation. I refuse to look directly at it.
Mom notices the small twitch in my eyes and misreads it. “You okay?”
“Fine,” I lie. “Just an itch.”
“Sweetheart,” she says gently, “you can tell us the truth.”
“The truth?” I laugh softly. “Mom, the truth’s worse than lying. It moves every time I try to point at it.”
Another sigh. The air thickens.
Mom’s hand inches across the table until her fingers find mine. “You were always so curious,” she whispers. “You wanted to know everything. Even as a kid. You’d take toys apart to see how they breathed.”
I smile faintly. “And then I’d lose the screws.”
Her laugh cracks into a sob. “Yeah. You’d forget how to put them back together.”
Her hand tightens. “That’s all this is. We’ll find the screws again — all of them. You just have to stop hurting yourself first.”
I want to believe her. I really do. But some part of me knows the pieces don’t fit anymore. They’ve changed shape — sharper, less forgiving.
***
After lunch, we walk together down the corridor. Doctors with clipboards, nurses carrying metal trays — all faces blur into expressionless intention.
Mom grips my arm. “You’ll be home soon,” she whispers. “A week, maybe. A fresh start.”
Dad adds quietly, “No bottles this time. No hiding. Promise.”
I nod like a professional liar.
The frog follows behind, small and determined. My steps feel heavier.
“See?” I whisper to it. “Behavioral extinction.”
Mom frowns. “What?”
“Nothing.”
***
At the doors, the visit ends.
Mom says it gently, “You’re going to be okay.” Her voice cracks on the *okay.*
Dad kisses my hair with clumsy sincerity. “Be smarter than this place.”
They walk away, hand in hand. I stay inside, behind the glass, half transparent.
The frog sits near the baseboard, watching.
“You too, huh?” I whisper. “Can’t let go?”
It blinks once and fades into the wall.
***
Back in my room, silence takes up real space — thick, heavy, deliberate.
I lie on the bed listening to the hum of the building. The shadows from the window bars stretch over the blanket like gentle restraints.
I should feel grateful, hopeful, fixed in some measurable way. Instead, I feel like a person imitating recovery because people are watching.
My head aches — not pain, pressure. The journal waits on the nightstand, obedient. I open it.
*Halfway home,* I write. *Parents visited. Smiled appropriately. Frog still around. Strong candidate for metaphor.*
The pen hesitates as if listening.
*They keep saying ‘recovery.’ It sounds like digging something up. But what if the digging just makes more room to fall?*
No reply. The page stays still. That’s good. Expected.
I close the notebook carefully. Exhale.
Through the blinds, evening light sketches across my skin. The walls keep their dignified silence. The frogs, real or not, respect boundaries — for now.
***
Before lights-out, the nurse stops in. “Doing okay today, Irina?”
“Yes,” I answer.
She smiles like she’s heard that same lie a hundred times.
After she’s gone, I stare at the ceiling. The hum returns, quiet, familiar — a lullaby for relapse.
In my head, Mom’s voice repeats: “Remember your life before Benadryl?”
I whisper back into the dark, “I remember the silence before it spoke back.”
Outside, a night bird calls — one note, long and flat.
The quiet promises nothing.
I fall asleep pretending that’s progress.
***
- Writer
