Test Run-Something New

fiction-letter to an inpatient

Number Seven

Pilvia Slath SloGGinG Away

Dear Cassandra,

It’s February 18, 2025. It’s a Tuesday.

If I remember correctly, this time nine years ago, you were also taking a stay at Las Encinadas. I wasn’t able to visit you that time because of the regulations imposed by the locked ward. You met Venus With A Penis that visit. She gave you half of a Vogue magazine with a lot of pages torn out. You saw John Galliano’s bridal design for Maison Margiela in that issue. The bride wore red with a top made of broken mirror pieces and a full skull face headdress also made of broken mirror. You gave me the page with the photo on it when you came home. Then you left for good.

It’s nice to be able to reach you somewhere again. I hope you don’t mind my writing. I’m sitting here waiting for my pretend speed to kick in. You know I’ve still never taken Adderall or Ritalin? Lovely over-the-counter Bronkaid for me. We only learned about that drug because your mom said she had asthma, remember? She used to send us to CVS to get her boxes of it. She said because it was for breathing it was almost like a vitamin, like oxygen in a pill. And then she’d vacuum the bottoms of your couches at three in the morning. We stayed up working on dance routines, stealing her chocolate calcium chews when we got hungry, measuring our waists and chests obsessively. I know you still think prescription speed is the difference between you sane and you crazy. I know you don’t set much store by my down and dirties. I still say it’s no good to be hooked on a drug they can take away from you, no matter how much benefit it confers. But that may be why you’re on the radar, back in the hospital, and I’m not.

Do you guys get therapy dogs? I remember one time you were in the hospital someone brought in a Golden Retriever for you guys to cuddle. You told me about it while I was trying to train my pitbull puppy. “He’s got a face for radio,” you said. “So do I,” I said. “Whatever cute little tricks you teach him won’t keep people from looking at your face, you know,” you said. “You have nowhere to hide.” It started off nasty, but halfway through you remembered you are supposed to be nice to me and kind of hauled your tone blinking into the light, naked, unprepared to deliver kindness but going through the motions. My puppy rolled onto his back and panted at you. “You give good enough face for all of us,” I replied. There was no point in saying the rest: that I don’t care about hiding the hard-to-look-at---my face, my pills, your madness, your meanness, where to find our moms, why not to look for our dads.

I have pitbulls and pills and those encircle me well enough. I do feel guilty, of course. The puppy is a man now and still only half trained. He’s great at those cute tricks. He’s dreadful at obedience. I gave him a DNA test, and one of his chromosomes was bred to hunt poachers. He’s supposed to go after people, it turns out. Instead of trying to stop him anymore, I just take him to walk at odd hours, when there’s little chance of running into anyone. He’s so healthy and happy and active. Every second I’m not trying to recondition him I feel so guilty I hate myself and want to die. But then I put on Nirvana and take some more pills. I have tried. Trying again at this exact second, the second after three am your mom would break out dustpans and Clorox and declare “Resurrection, girls!” is not the turning point. More time doesn’t move the chains. It’s hard to train them not to do what they were bred to do. It may be impossible.

I wonder what your shrinks think about dog training. I wonder if you have any good shrinks in there. I guess I’m asking. I guess you can feel free to tell me. I guess I hope to hear from you. I guess I hope to hear good things.

I still have the red wedding dress page from the Vogue magazine, too. I taped it to the back of the journal I was using at the time. Then I removed the cover and stuffed it into a Target frame. Whenever people ask, I tell them it’s a picture of you. Whenever. If.

Your cousin,

Pilvia