Three days later I'm pushed (humiliatingly) out of the hospital, and an awkwardly long and silent car trip later, onto the plane. It's not like I need a wheelchair since only my wrists are really injured- but for some reason the hospital insists that it's their policy.
As I take my seat, I see them again in my minds eye. My parents, grim and unsmiling, as all their hopes for me shatter against the image of the pale, broken girl this morning. James, offering a nerous smile, he was so well protected from all of this at home, I've no idea how he's adjusting. I do know that he'll face rumours and whispers and probing questions at school. I know statistically there should be many self harmers/suicidial teenagers  in our school, and I've always wondered who they were. But there has only ever been the one incident, although it was years ago it still gets dragged out when gossip is short. They found Delly in the showers, someone had spotted blood in one of the adjoining cubicles, she was only in grade 9 at the time. It was all anyone talked about for three months at least, despite the fact that Delly was back at school almost immediately. What will they say about me in my absence? Will my little brother reach near celebrity status the way Delly's sisters did with everyone seeking the latest news and freshest gossip.

For now though, I can't dwell on this. The plane is beginning it's slow taxi down the runway, a flight attendant a few rows forward give the emergency procedure speech for that one-in-a-million person who a) actually cares and b) hasn't seen the demonstration a dozen times already. I reach into my jeans pocket, digging out the creased pamphlet that I've kept close to me ever since I was sentenced to the Sanctuary. Unfolding it gently, to make sure it doesn't rip along the already worn folds. I take in the cover photo of stark white buildings, cobbled paths and overly landscaped greenery complete with tamed (and the caption assures, fully video monitored) clearings for residents to "enjoy quiet solitude or gather for group discussion".
As I feel the lump swelling in my chest, I hastily shove the pamphlet deep into my pocket and curl over into myself; holding myself together as my fragile composure threatens to crack along the many fissures and chinks in my armour. Hands clenched and tucked into myself like a startled tortoise, I gradually return to awareness of a pressure on my arm and that overly polished, completely unaffected, stewardess voice which assures me that flying is less dangerous than driving and I'll be okay. Barely stifling a snort, I find myself amused, because of course- I wish this plane would crash.

My shame

I wake to an empty room with the pain in my chest so palpable I feel as I must be having a heart attack...though I can't determine why I'm hurting like this, why this knotted ball of fear and pain is struggling to burst out of me.
Glancing over to the table beside me I see a white and blue pamphlet turned face down, a note in my mother's handwriting across the back says nothing but transfer and flight booked for Thursday, please don't fight this xo. And just like that, it all comes rushing back.
I jerk across to reach the dreaded thing so suddenly that the IV tube in my hand rips out, setting off a persistent beeping alarm. But I barely register this with a flicker of conscious thought, too intent on the paper I'm grabbing and turning over to reveal what I already knew; The Sanctuary. Time seems to freeze as I stare at the offending print, but just as suddenly it gets kicked into overdrive as mayhem breaks out, a nurse rushing in to reset my IV, my mother appearing at the doorway screaming things I can't understand as I taste bile and sick falls over the pristine sheets. As I slump back onto the pillow, covered in the contents of my stomach and a feeling of shame, slow tears making tracks down my face, I get a glimpse of a pale face peeping around the ward's door. I try to call out, but just like that, James is gone. Leaving me to wonder whether I imagined it or if he really just saw me in this state.

Fate's dice

Hey, I don't know if anyone is still checking/reading this, but if you are I'm sorry it's been taking me so long to update...I just got wrapped up in starting university! RJxox

Vision blurring, this feels as if the world is playing a cruel game of sadistic deja vu. A roll of fates dice determines whether the odds will keep this tired and broken heart beating, one more time.
"Rosie...Rosie! Honey? Do you hear me sweetie?"
I guess fate's dice are loaded when it comes to me- well that or this is just something else to add to the long list of things I've failed at.
"Rose, please, you have to say something, can you hear us?"
It must be an illusion as two anxious faces hang over me, I can't believe this is what it took to force my warring parents together. It feels wrong, I open my mouth to protest before I realise what I'm doing. The sound I finally choke out is more groan than word, my mother reaches down to smooth the bed sheet next to me and I realise I'm back on the hospital gurney, tightly bandaged, more time must have passed than I'd realised. I gaze upwards, seeking explanation, surely one of my parents has something to say...my mum sure seemed to before I wound up here...and dad's never been prone to silent anger. In the end the voice to break the silence falls from my left side, just outside my field of vision.
"Look, Rose, you wouldn't open up to me during our session yesterday except to express a lack of regret for your actions..."
Psychologist? Doesn't this guy ever quit? It says something for his perseverance that I recognise his voice in this state I suppose, but I wish he'd just leave, psychologists have always been the bearers of bad news to me.
"...and with the incident this morning I had to make a formal recommendation for your treatment course as you're a minor."
I wasn't seeing the issue here, why was he telling me; like I cared about the trouble I was putting him through paperwork wise. Though my father's eyes were glazed with tears and my mother's eyebrows a downward slant of finality. I had to be missing something.
"Rose...with your parents' consent I've decided that you should be moved to the Sanctuary to receive rehabilitative care until such a time as you are no longer a danger to yourself."
The words settle around me, bloated with finality, tinged with pity. The Sanctuary, I've heard about it, a regular modern day asylum...I've never even heard of anyone going there though...how can they send me there?! Uncontrollable tremors wrack my frame as the sobs begin to build, I thrash and scream at the world until a slight prick on my arm enters my awareness and I drift off, realising they've drugged me.

Hundred watt bulb

 Hey guys, a more normal sized update for you this time, I'm sorry I've been out of it for so long, I had laptop trouble and then I moved! I know I don't have to put labels here but I just wanted to say be safe- because this could be triggering for SI. Anyway, hope you're all well. RJxox

As I force my breathing to slow I gaze up at the small window high over the bed. Its frame is dark, no comforting rim of light leeching from around the square blind, white like everything else in this place. I glance at the clock with its hands resting at 1:17 and I realise, with a sense of finality tinged with the faint desperate taste of expectation that nothing has changed for the better. This night, just like so many others before, I won't sleep. Knowing that all I can do is sit in the confined space and think, makes the five hours until day break stretch out for eternity. But what use, is an eternity filled with nothing? A grunt of noise from the left startles me; don't tell me that psychologist is still here?! I open my mouth, ready to rant and rage until he turns and leaves, tail tucked between his legs. I turn to the side, and I can see his face bathed in the slight glow emanating from the emergency call buttons along the bedside panel...and it's not the psychologist, it's my father. A rush of feeling sweeps through me, most surprising of all is my sudden joy at my dad's presence. This must be the first time I've seen him in months...months and months! I go to cry out but stop myself as I notice his phone resting next to me, screen up reading (1) New message: Julia. What? My brain is still a little hazy from the pain killers, but I know that's not why I'm confused, why would my mum be messaging? I'm sure they haven't been in contact since the shouting match last Christmas...but then, how else would he know I was here. Without considering the implications I hit 'view' and my mother's message fills the screen, 'Don't let J in, he shouldn't see her'. That bitch, James is probably the only person in the world that I'm really sure I love...how could she do this? But then, maybe she's right, what kind of example is this for James? Although it's not like there's anything to see, a bandaged wrist and a father who by all accounts should be absent, surely they can't have told him I'm sick or anything. I can feel my body begin to shake, quaking at the injustice of the somewhat imagined slight, I hate myself for leaving my brother. I don't care about secrecy at this point, I just want my mother to hurt as much as I am so I scribble on the hospital issue paper on the bedside don't worry if your hate seems inadequate, I've got enough Rose-hatred for two.

I spot the private bathroom off this room, and almost intuitively I know that the blades I'd hidden in the lining of my wash bag must be there. Besides that, its pure logic...surely someone has picked up my things. It's like I'm drawn to there, to them. Like...you know when you play a video game, important items show up with a glowing outline of blue or orange or green. And even if you don't understand the game, it's instinctive that the glowing items are important. Reach them, and things will change, be better. The blade hidden in my wash bag- god knows how they weren't found- shine like a hundred watt bulb. Luring me as surely as a moth to a flame. Helpless. I ease myself off the bed, succumbing to the inevitable; I tiptoe on socked feet towards the bathroom where my escape lies waiting. The blades unearthed, malevolence glinting off the shiny silver, I grasp one in my now encumbered left hand and send a quick prayer for forgiveness winging it's way to Ally.

That's when I dream in colour

The last conscious thought to drift through my mind before I succumb to the stupor is how it's so easy to let go of myself mentally when I could never- even when she was irrevocably and irrefutably gone- release my grip on Ally.

It seems as if I swim through my subconscious, but perhaps I merely dream. Colours swim, and strange patterns emerge, like the ones I used to imagine existed in my head when I closed my eyes and rubbed the tightly closed lids. Fantastic lights and colours performing a silent show for my benefit. Memories float by me- evident in the glimpse of a face, or a fuzzy scene as if viewed through water. For a brief moment, I wonder if this is what my psyche looks like- but then I condemn it as some madness brought about by all the pain killers smothering my system. Strangely, I feel almost at peace, even as the usually torturous images of Ally flash through my muddled brain. 

I wake scrambling, but immediately freeze when I note my surroundings. Struggling to slow my racing heart while at the same time inhaling as little of the clinical air as humanly possible.


RJxo 
Sorry for the teeny update! I'm highly apologetic, yesterday was a bad day, and today was a busy day. I'll post more soon I promise. xxx

Echo

"I just, I just don't want to pretend okay!?" I have been propelled upright by my words- stronger than I feel- but now I slump back down onto the pillows, as the last of the strength that momentarily flashed through me out of anger drains away.
"Rose...I'm sorry, I truly did not mean to upset you" And for some reason, against my better judgement and potentially influenced by the morphine coursing through my veins, I believe him.
"I'm Dr. Hale...Chris Hale, you were referred to me by the intern who admitted you to the A&E last night."
My breath comes in shallow gasps, fighting to deny the unwavering truth I hear behind his words, this isn't how it's meant to be at all.
"Well? Rose? Is there anything you want to talk about particularly? How are you feeling?"
I hold myself still with the utmost care, breathing lightly and taking up the smallest square of room on the bed, intent on absorbing as little of this hospital as possible.
"I was wondering-"
"I hate this place." I hear myself admit, "when can I leave?" I ask, when all I really want to ask is when can I go home.
"But Rose..." his placating doctor tones roll over me, "you've barely been awake for five minutes".
"Doctor..."
"Hale"
"Yes, Dr. Hale, would it take you longer than five minutes in hell to realise you harboured no desire to be there?" I inject every ounce of scathing I can muster into the sentence, and yet  he chuckles softly in reply. A brief moment of mirth surfacing, he looks as surprised by his amusement as I am irritated. I wasn't aiming to be witty or funny.
"I'm afraid Rose, you have no choice."
You have no choice. Those four inconsequential words are all it takes to send me careering into a memory tailspin. I can almost hear her cracked whisper, see her hand resting lightly next to mine. It's near enough to this day a year ago that I sat in a room almost identical to this one with Ally, there was never any question that I would overcome my fear of hospitals to be with her- but since then my profound loathing for them has only grown. I had of course sat on the opposite side of the low rails on the narrow bed than where I'm curled up now, holding onto her limp and unresponsive hand- light brown against the glaring sanitary white of the hospital sheets. I had been immovable during those visiting hours, precious snatches of time I was allowed to spend with her as I watched her hand lie listlessly in my own I had begun to understand that it was only a matter of time before Ally left me for somewhere she belonged. If only I could release her. I would have stayed forever, but the reminder always came, dropping through the heavy air to rest around me.
"Rose, you have no choice." The psychologist's voice fades out of my awareness, a false echo of what once was.