Girl, Interrupted Read Online Free Page B

someone would ask her about the apartment. Georgina obliged.
    “How big is the apartment, Daisy?”
    “One bedroom, L-shaped living room, eat-in chicken.”
    “You mean eat-in kitchen?”
    “That’s what I said, asshole.”
    “Where’s the apartment, Daisy?”
    “Near the Mass. General.”
    “On the way to the airport, like?”
    “Near the Mass. General.” Daisy didn’t want to admit it was on the way to the airport.
    “What do you like best about it?”
    Daisy shut her eyes and paused, relishing her favorite part. “The sign.”
    “What does the sign say?”
    “ ‘If you lived here, you’d be home now.’ ” She clenched her hands with excitement. “See, every day people will drive past and read that sign and think, ‘Yeah, if I lived here I’d be home now,’ and I will be home. Motherfuckers.”
    Daisy left early that year, to spend Christmas in her apartment.
    “She’ll be back,” said Lisa. But Lisa for once was wrong.
    One afternoon in May we were called to a special Hall Meeting.
    “Girls,” said the head nurse, “I have some sad news.” We all leaned forward. “Daisy committed suicide yesterday.”
    “Was she in her apartment?” asked Georgina.
    “Did she shoot herself?” asked Polly.
    “Who’s Daisy? Do I know Daisy?” asked the Martian’s girlfriend.
    “Did she leave a note?” I asked.
    “The details aren’t important,” said the head nurse.
    “It was her birthday, wasn’t it?” asked Lisa. The head nurse nodded.
    We all observed a moment of silence for Daisy.

My Suicide
    Suicide is a form of murder—premeditated murder. It isn’t something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes getting used to. And you need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind.
    It’s important to cultivate detachment. One way to do this is to practice imagining yourself dead, or in the process of dying. If there’s a window, you must imagine your body falling out the window. If there’s a knife, you must imagine the knife piercing your skin. If there’s a train coming, you must imagine your torso flattened under its wheels. These exercises are necessary to achieving the proper distance.
    The motive is paramount. Without a strong motive, you’re sunk.
    My motives were weak: an American-history paper I didn’t want to write and the question I’d asked months earlier, Why not kill myself? Dead, I wouldn’t have to write the paper. Nor would I have to keep debating the question.
    The debate was wearing me out. Once you’ve posed that question, it won’t go away. I think many people kill themselves simply to stop the debate about whether they will or they won’t.
    Anything I thought or did was immediately drawn into the debate. Made a stupid remark—why not kill myself? Missed the bus—better put an end to it all. Even the good got in there. I liked that movie—maybe I shouldn’t kill myself.
    Actually, it was only part of myself I wanted to kill: the part that wanted to kill herself, that dragged me into the suicide debate and made every window, kitchen implement, and subway station a rehearsal for tragedy.
    I didn’t figure this out, though, until after I’d swallowed the fifty aspirin.
    I had a boyfriend named Johnny who wrote me love poems—good ones. I called him up, said I was going to kill myself, left the phone off the hook, took my fifty aspirin, and realized it was a mistake. Then I went out to get some milk, which my mother had asked me to do before I took the aspirin.
    Johnny called the police. They went to my house and told my mother what I’d done. She turned up in the A&P on Mass. Ave. just as I was about to pass out over the meat counter.
    As I walked the five blocks to the A&P I was gripped by humiliation and regret. I’d made a mistake and I was going to die because of it. Perhaps I even deserved to die because of