schizophrenia

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Rule number one of schizophrenia: Never interact with the voices.

Rule number two of schizophrenia: What you see is not always what is real.

Even after having these two rules branded into my head since I was a kid, I was slightly shocked when my reflection addressed me directly.

“Good morning.”

I was brushing my teeth when I heard the voice--not mine. I looked behind me: nothing. I looked in the mirror: just me.

“Nice to meet you,” it--I--said.

Physical me flattened my mouth into a thin line. Reflection me didn’t.

“Now now, Charlie, that’s not the way to act around someone you haven’t yet met.” My reflection crossed its arms. I looked down at my own body. My arms were hanging loosely by my sides, my toothbrush clutched in one hand.

“Only my friends call me Charlie,” I stated firmly. “You are not my friend.”

“Yet.” My reflection smiled sinisterly. I didn’t know I could show that much teeth in a smile. I looked creepy.

“Yeah, right.” I gestured with my toothbrush at the mirror. “You’re just another voice, and that person in the mirror is just another hallucination. I’ve been dealing with these for so long that they really don’t impress me that much anymore.”

“Mhm.” My reflection--the hallucination--was unamused. “Well, if I was ‘another hallucination,’ would I be able to do this?”

My physical body winked at my reflection.

I narrowed my eyes. “That’s not sufficient proof.”

My hand raised of its own accord, waving at my reflection, which was not waving back. My reflection looked pointedly at me. “Is that good enough?”

“Nope.” I wondered how I had moved without consciously initiating the wave. It was creepy.

I punched myself in the jaw.

“Ow!” I yelled, glaring at the mirror. “What did you do that for?”

“Proof.” My reflection raised an eyebrow.

I fingered my jaw. It ached. The pain seemed real. I sighed. “Leave me alone.”

“I’m here to make a deal with you.”

“Nope. I don’t make deals with hallucinations.”

“Haven’t I just proven I’m not a hallucination? Look, I just need possession of your body. For, like, twenty-four hours. That’s it.” My reflection sighed and scratched its neck. “I’ve failed possession like, three times, and if I fail again, I don’t achieve full demon status.”

I looked at my reflection curiously. I knew I was making a mistake by interacting with the hallucination, but it was either this or ignore it bugging me for the rest of the day. “You know what, whatever. Go for it. Twenty-four hours, I’m yours.” What could it hurt? The voices already basically possessed me, in a way, so I was just giving it verbal confirmation of what was true.

*****

“And that’s the last thing I remember,” I told the woman. “I don’t remember killing any of those people. I don’t remember anything at all. I just came to with the knife and all the blood surrounding me.”

The next day I was admitted into a government mental ward specifically for dangerous psychopathic individuals. That same day, the voices stopped.

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(representation of a schizophrenic person has been based off of my limited knowledge from a psych 101 course; depiction may or may not be accurate)