((OOC: An idea I've been tossing around in my head for a while, after having been to the nuthouse a few times myself. My character is based on a few real people I've met through my experiences, though I've changed quite a few things of course. As for her past, I have it all in my head, and it's... well... simple words don't really do it justice. Want to know? Find out. :) reply, dearies. ))




Sally was out.

Out out out.

The first thing she did upon being discharged from the Psychiatric center was buy an entire carton on cigarettes and a lighter from the little mini mart next to the building she had just exited. It set her back $30.45, exactly... which was, incidentally, exactly one half of the money in her wallet.

Walking down the street in her raggedy old sweatpants and t-shirt, a cigarette in one hand and her carton in the other, Sally reflected upon this. That left her $30.45 exactly to bribe her ex girlfriend to let her stay at her apartment for a few weeks until she found her feet. It was possible, she thought, considering it was she who had dumped Angela (said ex girlfriend) and it was known that Angela missed her terribly.

But... perhaps that wasn't such a good idea. After all, it was Angela who had her sent to the nuthouse for the ... the... well, however many times she'd been there since she was 12.

Yes. The female adolescent ward had been her home for so many years... so many memories were in that building. Nights of screams and nights of laughter. Therapy and group sessions where she would listen to the other girls talk about their parents and how they would mistreat them. Yell at them. Hit them. How they all so wished to die, wished they were prettier, wished that mommy had loved her. Sally would listen and stare at her toes, scared to speak up. Scared to share what had happened, fearing that bringing up the past would take the haven away that she had now found.

She lit another cigarette and sat down on a bench to wait for the city buss. It would give her some time to think about her next move... but instead her thoughts wandered back to their previous track.

Sally had been released on her 18th birthday, fully medicated and 'balanced' enough for the government to deem her 'socially acceptable'. Fortunately, she had an aunt then that cared enough to bring her in and give her a place to stay for a year or so... and things were good. Sally felt as though she was meant to be in the small apartment, catching up on the world and her life.

It could only last so long.

A story on the news... that's what had started it. Watching with her aunt, Sally had seen a video of a little girl being chased down by a man and beaten bloody, her screams, first loud, slowly becoming little more than wet gurgles. Sally then experienced the first flashback of her traumatic childhood she had felt since she was years younger.

Not long after, she was hospitalized once more. And so it went, until now. In and out of relationships and sanity.

Hopefully this time she could start again, fresh. Her doctor said to think of it as being reborn, your sins wiped away. Not believing in any 2000 year old self-righteous son-of-a-bitch, she tried to stay positive.

Now. If only to find a place to stay.