At Heartland, in all its cucumber-melon scented glory, from my first vacation to the would-be convent, I can only remember a few characters.

Jeremiah, who was my gay friend from the sex offenders unit.  Cam, the suicidal psychic.  Eric, the autistic OCD with some anger problems.  James, the artistic oaf of a runaway.  Alicia, paedophile to the masses.  Jackie and Hilary, whom I joined as the resident cutters.  April, behavioural white trash.  Samantha, the petty larcenist and armed assaulter.  Sister Mary.  

I remember names: Stormie, Brian, Lee, Leroy, Shauna.  And me.  'Patricia' is how my name was written on the whiteboard behind the nurse's station, until Jeremiah splattered the entire end of the hallway with lotion.  During the ensuing commotion I was able to sneak behind the station and change it to 'Trish' with a red permanent marker.  In the affray I also managed to sneak the edge of the tape dispenser, which I hid under the mattress, just in case.  

Just in case I ever fell prey to those games we played with each other when in ‘group’.

I have always been one to cry, but never out of sorrow for another.  When you all have matching tears and sob stories, I could cry as if it was for me and me and me and them and you and her and him and me.  We were all each other, all with common bonds; common chains would be more appropriate.  At night we all cried, inward or outward.  Cam talked in his sleep, and when he dreamt, he said it always came true. He dreamt of me, but wouldn't tell me until the day I died to him, what it was he saw.

Upon arrival at one in the morning, having been transported to this top notch concentration camp, I was placed in the first room on the left when walking in through the big door to the 'outs' as I'd come to call it. I looked at all the figures rising and falling in an offbeat orchestrated hum. I felt so out of place, wearing my clothes from Saturday night.  Skirts with frills don't have a place where the majority of the texture is cold linoleum, and neither did Sunshine bear, but nevertheless she was the only spark of yellow I could see.  The sunlight was just a dusty light when it was filtered through the Plexiglass windows.  I was escorted to the bathroom.  There are two bathrooms at Heartland, both almost identical except the girls’ smells better, except for when it smelled like vinegar; just after lunch.  I guess breakfast doesn't smell so bad on the way up, considering it was simply cardboard in some form or another.

The mirrors in the bathrooms would have been a worthy souvenir; they were bent so much that if you stood at the right angle, you were as skinny as a rail.  Standing naked, bare and scarred in front of the two night nurses, I felt skinny as a rail.  I had the picket lines to match.