Gerard's POV

"I'm not crazy...I'm not crazy...I'm not crazy..."
I've given up shouting so my words are a whisper, my hazel eyes filled with tears and staring at my mother in a silent plea. She's crying and clinging onto my brother's shoulder to keep herself upright.
"I'm so sorry, Gerard," she says as I'm steered gently into the back of a white ambulance. I don't have the brain function to move my own body so they end up lifting my by the waist to get me in. All the time I'm staring at my mum's face in puzzlement.
Why is sending me away? What did I do wrong?

I had asked her the other day what I did wrong. She was curled up on the sofa with a bottle of Jack Daniels and red-rimmed eyes. I gave her a cuddle and told her it was all going to be okay and she just said she was sorry - I guess I know what she was sorry about now.
But how can I ever begin to blame her?
Mikey just looks sad. His dark eyes are watching my and his mouth is set in that serious expression of his. From the way he's always looked after me, people assume I'm the younger brother.

"Mikey," I say quietly. It's a barely-there word, a breathless word that even I don't fully catch. But he sees my lips move and for a moment I think he's going to cry. I didn't mean for it to upset him and it wasn't a plea for his help, I just need somebody to explain what's going on.
The doors shut in my face and I'm pushed down onto a gurney to be strapped in and covered with a white blanket before the ambulance starts up and we roll forwards.


Mikey's POV

I watch my brother's uncomprehending face as he lets the men in white clothing tug him slowly towards the white ambulance. My mum clings to my shoulder and I keep my arms wrapped around her. Once or twice she's tried to escape and run after Gerard but of corse I can't let her. It's best for him, after all.

I see him mouth my name; he doesn't understand. I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from crying until I taste blood. They shut the ambulance doors and after a pause they drive away. I let my arms fall and mum runs down the road a little way after them, then stops. I see the neighbours watching from behind their lace curtains and can take a guess at their thoughts:
"Good riddance, thank Heaven the loony's finally going where he belongs."
They were unkind about Gerard most of the time and once he started to have full blown psychiatric breakdowns they got scared.
Gerard never did a thing to hurt any of them but they always thought that he might.

Suddenly unable to take it any more, I turn on my heel and walk slowly inside. I manage to hold the tears in until I get to the door and then they start leaking down my cheeks. Ray, who is waiting in the doorway, lets me walk in and guides me into the living room. As soon as we sit down on the sofa and he puts his arm around me I lose it, I give myself over to huge sobs and bury myself into his chest.
"I can't believe I just let them take him away, Ray," I sniffle. "He looked so helpless and confused."
Ray plants a kiss on the top of my head and hands me a tissue.
"Here you are, babe. We can go and see him in a few days, once he's settled in."
I nod and take a breath to regain my composure - I' not known for loosing it.
He smiles at me and gives me another kiss, this time on my cheek.
"It will all work out, you'll see. He's in the best place right now."


Gerard's POV

When the ambulance stops and the doors are opened a bright beam of light falls on my face and I squint momentarily. When I can finally see again I'm in a courtyard and from my limited position (I'm still strapped to the gurney) I can see high walls frosted with barbed wire fencing.
I take a few deep breaths of fresh outside air before the whole gurney judders and I pass through a set of double doors into the hospital.

We stop at a nurse's station and paperwork is exchanged. I try to lift my head to see what's going on but they push it back down onto the pillow with a barked, "stop causing trouble."
A man appears upside-down in my vision and stares at me for a while. After a few seconds he grins. "Hello, Gerard, I'm your doctor." It's not a nice grin and I whimper.
He doesn't seem to care at all and he instructs a couple of nurses to wheel my bed through the hospital.

Lights flash past overhead, I catch snatches of conversation through some of the doors as we pass them. Finally we reach a room and the nurses unstrap me from the gurney. "Thanks, Tilda," the male nurse says, "I'll take it from here."
The female nurse leaves and the male nurse gives me a kind smile. "Hello, Gerard, I'm Bob Bryar, I'm one of the nurses here. Shall I help you up?"
I nod and he puts a hand on my elbow to guide me upright and walks me through the door of my room.
It's white and the only furniture is a bed and two high backed wooden chairs. Bob switches on the light and releases his grip on my elbow. I cross to the window - barred of course - and peer out. Somehow we made it to the third floor (I must have missed the elevator) and the view is of a fairly large piece of grass in the middle of a courtyard. I can see people walking around on it.

There's a rustle behind me and I turn to see Bob laying out a set of clothes; blue cotton trousers, a pair white underpants and a white t-shirt.
"Let's get you changed then," he says and walks over. Before I know it, his hands have stripped my hoodie and my Green Day t-shirt off over my head and he's checking my hips for signs of scarring. When he appears satisfied there isn't any he tugs the white t-shirt on and slips his thumbs under the waistbands of my trousers and pants.
"They'll only be off for a second," he assures me, then gives a quick tug. True to his word, before I really have a chance to be embarrassed he's already putting clean pants and trousers on me.

"There," he says, folding up my own clothes and casting an eye over me. "How do you feel?"
I stutter for a second. "Scared," I admit and I realise I'm already missing Mikey terribly.
"I know," Bob says with a pitying frown. "Everybody's scared at first, but there's nothing here to be scared of. I'll leave you alone now so you can settle in and don't worry about your things, your brother will pick them up when he comes to visit you."

Bob leaves, shutting the door behind him. I sit down on the bed and poke a finger into it while looking around. There's nothing to do in here and I'm already bored. I start humming a tune and it isn't long before another voice starts to sing along. I groan and look over to see the man in the purple suit sitting on one of the chairs.
I hate the purple man but he never goes away even if I shout at him.
"Well done, Gerard," he says, his cultured voice grating on my eardrums. "You've successfully landed yourself in a padded cell."
It isn't padded but I ignore him and carry on humming and being very bored. Definitely bored, not annoyed.

"A five star establishment," the purple man continues. "Incidentally, that nurse was quite pretty."
I don't bother telling him to shut up because it only fuels his over-inflated ego.
"You do know you're crazy, right? That is precisely why they've locked you up in here. But don't worry, I'll always be here with you."
He grins happily as I curl myself into a little ball on the white bed.

There is a knock on the door and the doctor who was peering over me earlier comes in. He locks the door behind him and pulls down the blinds so I can't see out the glass strip to the corridor beyond.
"Hello, Gerard," he says, turning around. He has a cardboard box in his hands. "I'm Doctor Green."
I nod a wary hello as he sits down on one of the chairs and puts the box on the spare one.
"You have schizophrenia and there are a variety of treatments which I'd like to try." He opens the cardboard box and pulls out a small battery with two probe-like things attached to it. "One of them is electric shock therapy."

My breathing spikes and I scramble for the door...which is locked. Doctor Green is over by the bed methodically slipping two bands around the mattress, they are made of brown leather and have cuffs sewn to them.
"Come and lie down," he instructs, reaching for me. I shake my head violently and yell for help but nobody comes. Skinny as I am, he has no trouble in pushing me down onto the bed and tightening the cuffs around my wrists and ankles.
Now I can't move and I feel a spike of adrenaline as he places the battery next to me on the pillow. He turns the power on and picks up the paddles. "This won't hurt a bit," he says before applying them to my temples.
"No, no, please!" I scream. The pain is extraordinary, like a thousand headaches all at once. He lifts the paddles off and I sob. He makes a humming sound, increases the power, and re-applies the paddles.
Stars burst in front of my eyes, I feel the wide cuffs dig into my skin as I desperately try to writhe away from the pain. Doctor Green laughs and increases the power.

Twenty minutes later I'm exhausted and when he takes the paddles away I slump limply on the mattress. I'm covered in sweat, my t-shirt is sticking to my back and the blood rushing in my ears is so loud it masks my laboured breathing.
Doctor Green's hands stroke the hair away from my face and I whimper under his touch. "Please stop it," I plead.
To my surprise, he does and I open my eyes. He's watching me panting with a calculating expression then his hand slowly snakes down to my waistband.
"No," I breathe and I try to wriggle away from him but his hand slips underneath my waistband and squeezes.

My hips buck automatically and he grins. His hand starts to move up and down and I feel a horrible tug deep in my belly.
"No, please stop it," I mewl, turning my head away from him as tears start to course down my cheeks. "I won't tell, please."
"But it's part of your treatment, Gerard," Green says. "Don't tell me it doesn't feel nice."
My breath hitches and I tip my head back. "It doesn't feel nice," I tell him. "It feels sick."
He tugs again slowly and I cry out as he gets the response he wants and I come, ankles straining uselessly against the restraints.
He packs away his battery into the box but leaves the cuffs where they are.
"I think that went very well," he says, unlocking the door. "I'll see you tomorrow morning, bright and shining."
I hear him leave but I keep my tearstained face turned towards the opposite wall.
"Mikey," I whisper into the silence of my room. Where is Mikey?

Notes