I HATE YOU!"He then left the room and closed the door so that the nurse couldn't enter. If Laura saw the restraints and the containment equipment, she would regress again."No!" he said to the nurse."What?""Not yet, please. Let me talk to her first, and if it doesn't work, then you can use that."The nurse looked at him with confusion. He had been instructed to administer medication if she became unbalanced and restrain her until she calmed down, and now a male companion was interfering - please, she will regress if you do that."Look, I'll give you five minutes," the nurse put the syringe and restraints on a cart next to the door and went inside to assist his colleague."See? He didn't bring anything," the nurse spoke to Lara, who still looked suspiciously at the nurse, her eyes bloodshot, and anger evident on her face."Lara, didn't I tell you I'm here?" Lipe drew her attention. "If we stop shouting, they will leave and let us be, right?""Yes, of course. We just ask that you don
PRISON WITHOUT WALLS"Nightmare. She was struggling with someone or something in her dream, and it seemed like Lipe was watching a horror movie as he saw her being devastated by something or someone in her dream. That horror movie where an evil man traps the person in the world of dreams.""Help me, Lipe!" she screamed, stretching on the bed, tears soaking her pillowcase. Lipe blamed himself for having fallen asleep because judging by the tears, she had been trapped in her nightmares for quite some time. Without hesitation, he dove into the bed next to her and held her in his arms."I'm here, Lara, it's okay, I'm here now," he spoke softly.But her scream, which woke him up, also caught the attention of the nursing staff. A nurse, the same one from a few hours ago who had given her the calming medication, swiftly entered the room with a syringe and restraints to tie her to the bed. However, he noticed that the girl was crying but in Lipe's arms, burying her face beneath his as if flee
THERAPY"Good morning, Lara, my favorite patient!" The doctor greeted her with a wide smile and extended his hand."You must say that to all your patients," Lara replied with a half-smile and shook his hand."I don't! You're my favorite girl, but I hope you keep that a secret, alright?" the doctor laughed, winked at her, and pulled up a chair closer to her. "Lara, I don't know if you heard what Lipe and I were discussing, but...""I want to continue with the medication. The sedative!" she interrupted him. Lipe thought that she must have overheard a significant part of their conversation."But, Lara, the doctor explained that with the sedative, you can't wake up when the nightmares come!" Lipe spoke, concerned for her. He hated seeing her tormented even in her sleep. It was already challenging for her to fight while awake, and when medicated, she would sleep and suffer as well."I don't always have nightmares, and I'm already used to it," she said, looking at the doctor."You are the p
MESS UP BEFORE YOU TIDY UP.Frank visited Lara in the morning without knowing that she was having therapy and would still spend another hour or hour and a half with Patrícia. He looked for Lipe in the hospital but couldn't find him. He leaned against the wall in the waiting room, even though there were dozens of empty chairs, and started scrolling through his phone.Someone bumped into him, causing him to move to the side, but the person bumped into him again, making him instinctively move further away. When the person bumped into him for the third time, he looked to the side, trying to understand why, out of all the available seats, they had to be right next to him."You're hard to find," Cecília, the physiotherapist, smiled at him."Hi, how are you?" He smiled back at her and raised an eyebrow, asking, "Were you looking for me?""You just told me your friend's name was Lara, and believe me, there are many Laras admitted in this hospital!" She rolled her eyes playfully, and Frank did
I'M TIRED!Cilmo and Clara entered the room, and Dália filled them in on the situation."Guys, if someone is sick and hasn't told anyone, is it wrong to tell someone else?" Cilmo asked, taking a seat at the table where Dália had brought them and started making the much-needed coffee."Don't tell me you're sick too?" Clara asked."No, I'm great, just a bit sore from all the sex, but perfect! Fael is tireless," Dália said, earning eye rolls from Clara and Dália, as she managed to bring her boyfriend or fling into every conversation."Are you a doctor or a priest? Did the person ask you to keep it a secret at least?" Dália inquired."No, the person didn't ask me to keep it a secret, but they don't want to talk about it and refuse treatment," Cilmo replied, finally releasing what had been driving her crazy since she found out."Who is it? Márcia? She was doing better, she escaped from the hospital, probably because she thought she would stay there for many days like Lara. Weren't you the
WALKING THROUGH THE PASTMy brother, two years older than me Scott, was my partner, my best friend for as long as I can remember — Lara continued telling the psychologist —, and I couldn't function without him, and he couldn't function without me. Amidst so many children, so many fights in our house, Scot and I were each other's lifeline. We took showers together, played together, went to the bathroom, slept, everything, we did everything together! After me, there was the youngest one, and she was born with a physical disability. So, apart from being the youngest, she was the sickly one and received a little more care from my parents, especially my mother, as my father was always drunk and claimed she wasn't his daughter most of the time. He would shout at the top of his lungs when he was heavily intoxicated — which was usually the case — that he hadn't functioned as a man for years when my mother got pregnant. And he only didn't beat up my little sister because he pitied her for her
BEING BORN HURTS, BEING REBORN HURTS EVEN MORE!Lara took a deep breath, her voice filled with exhaustion. She continued her narrative:"But I don't know, I do know... it was a shame! The shame that my father felt, which made him disappear for a few days after being dragged onto the street and beaten by a woman much smaller than him, with his wife's help. He was drunk, he said afterward, and that's why he got beaten. But he used to beat us even when he was drunk. But what happened next was that Dinah entered our house again, breathless and strange, and fell to her knees in the living room. She vomited on our floor and cried. Then she apologized to us, crying with her bruised face from my father's punch. She begged us for forgiveness, from us and my mother, and she redeemed the love we had for her, the love that had been tarnished. But it was so easy to win us over. Any smile could buy us because they were so rare.Dinah told us that we could be whatever we wanted, that we were special
VARIETIESThe next day wasn't as easy as he had hoped it would be. Patrícia arrived in the morning for the therapy session, but Lara didn't even smile at her. She seemed to be in a different mode, the "therapy" mode, and shortly after the psychologist and Lipe sat down, she began:"It didn't go as we imagined it would. My father came back home three days later. We didn't know where he was until that moment, and my mother and all of us automatically went into fear and apprehension mode, even though Dinha had told us not to fear him and kept repeating that my mother did very well in defending herself against him. But theory is one thing, right? In practice, it's very different. The social worker wasn't there. It was just us again with him, and he was very, very drunk! After years of torment, fear came rushing back, and we went into defense mode. Years of following the same script. As soon as he entered the room, he went straight to my mother's side, and my sister Lucy, the oldest among