I’ve been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and if I had ever been completely honest with anyone, I would probably be diagnosed with a hell of a lot more. Self censoring for the mentally ill is a form of self preservation. Like the stories I’m about to tell. I have to follow certain rules or I’ll be shut out or worse, found out.

I’m mentally ill and I can say that without a hint of shame or regret. I’m also literally color blind. That doesn’t make me any less of a person, so why should mental illness? My mom gave me a nickname when I was a baby. It was used so much that I’ve never gone by anything else. My name is Doc. I’ll start with the night of the murders.

All my life, my mother had moved me around. I never knew my father. She was ill too, but when you really think about it, who isn’t? We were in a small town in the Midwest when everything started. I was twelve and I had just started the seventh grade.

“Why be normal, huh?” Tommy Gonzalez was the class clown and the only person who talked to me on the first day. He was referring to the slogan on my t-shirt.

“Yeah.”

“Sucks being the new kid here. I moved here three years ago and that first few months was shit. I’m Tommy.”

“Doc.” I was walking home and he had caught up to me on his bike. He had spread out his legs and was just bouncing forward from foot to foot while he straddled his bike.

“Doc? Like the creepy kid in The Shining?”

“I have no idea what that is.” Yes I did. Every kid always said that. Every kid also thought I was creepy. It was a nice way to keep everyone at a distance. My mom was never fond of me having friends.

I kinda had one in first grade, but my mom put a stop to that when she confronted my six year old classmate while she was picking me up from school. She walked up to him in front of God and everybody and said, “Stay the fuck away from my son.” Good times. Thankfully, she moved us three weeks later and I didn’t have to worry about everyone making fun of me anymore.

Being the creepy kid was tolerable. Being shunned even after an effort is something else.

“The Shining? It’s like this superfamous movie.”

“Is it any good?”

“No, but there’s boobs in it. Kinda…”

“That’s cool.” I kept walking thinking he was going to ride away, but he didn’t.

“You want to come over to my house? I just got the N64.”

“Um…I have to check with my mom first.”

“That’s cool. You like creepy shit?”

“Uh…sure.”

“Check this out.” Tommy stopped and I turned to him. He turned the tops of his eyelids inside out and then pulled up his shirt and made his stomach move like a caterpillar. I started laughing. I liked Tommy. He was nice to me. He wrote down his address and his phone number on a piece of paper and then rode away.

I begged my mother to let me go over to Tommy’s house.

“Why can’t I ever have any friends?”

“Because friends convince you to do bad things.”

“I’m tired of being the weird kid mom.”

“You’re not a weird kid.”

“Mom, I’m literally wearing a shirt that singles me out as a weird kid.”

“You’re the one who picked that out.”

“It’s because it's easier not to try. For some reason this kid doesn’t care. He started talking to me. He’s really nice mom. Here’s his address so you’ll know right where I am.” She took the piece of paper, eyed it, and then shoved it in her pocket.

“This is exactly why I was afraid of letting you go back to school.”

“Please.”

“Why do you need friends? I don’t have any and I’m better for it.”

“Come on mom! I swear I’ll behave. If they want me to do something stupid, I promise that I won’t.”

“Well, give it another month and if he’s still nice to you, I doubt he will be, we’ll talk about it.”

“Promise?”

“I promise. We’ll talk about it. Now go do your homework.”

It was the first time she ever gave any hint that she might relent. My mom didn’t have any friends either. She didn’t talk to any family, nor would she let me talk to them. I wasn’t even sure at that point in my life exactly how many family members I had. She was always suspicious of everyone. Every shade in every house we had ever had was always drawn. We were just passing through everyone else's reality.

A month went by, and I still couldn’t go over, but I hung out with Tommy and his friends every day at school. Chris, Phillip, and Cody. It didn’t take very long for me to become one of the group. For the first time in my life I actually had friends. I decided that I would never purposely be the weird kid again. That I would be happy for no other reason than my mom let me out. I wouldn’t push people away anymore. I liked being around other people.

One happy month.

That’s all I got.

I did my best to keep my mother from thinking anything had changed about me. At home, I continued to be with her in her own little dimension. I made sure my grades were good, and I read every book she pushed in front of my face.

Tommy’s birthday was on October 2nd. He was having a party and all of us were invited to a sleepover.

I had never been to someone else's house, let alone a sleepover.

The plan was to play Star Fox all night. Tommy had also told us that he had a large collection of Playboys he had swiped from the local liquor store if we wanted to see them. We were all far more interested in the game. I had never played a video game before.

I was faced with a choice. I could be honest with my mother and ask, or lie and figure out how to sneak out. I tried to be honest. If I tried to sneak, she might move us again.

“You said a month.”

“I have changed my mind.”

“That’s not fair mom.”

“Life isn’t fair, Doc.”

“Mom please. I don’t want to grow up to be like you.”

“What did you just say?”

“Nothing.”

“WHAT did you just SAY?!”

“I’m sorry.”

“This is because of those boys’ influence, isn’t it?”

“No.”

“My Doc doesn’t talk like that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It is my job as a mother to keep you away from people like Tommy, ok?”

“What are you talking about? You’ve never even met him!”

“I have eyes, Doc. I check in with your teacher. You think I don’t know what kind of people you’re hanging out with at school? You think I haven’t seen all of you? What kind of a mother would I be if I didn’t?”

“Mom…”

“You shut up and you hear me. Boy, you better hear me good. I’ve allowed you to be around those things at school, because you’re supervised and I’ve needed a break to get my own head on straight. If you think I’m going to let you go over to that thing’s house behind closed doors, you’re crazy. Someday, you’ll be able to see it, but until that day, I tell you the way things are. Understand?”

I didn’t say anything. I stared at her with my lips clamping down on each other. I should have dropped my eyes to the floor and begged her forgiveness, but it was my first taste of defiance. I should’ve known better.

“I shouldn’t have allowed it to come to this. I should have known where it was going on your first day of school. Start packing your room.”

“What?!”

“We’re moving. It’ll take me two days, in which time, I want you in your room.”

“Mom, please! Come on, I’m sorry! Please, I don’t want to move again!” She grabbed me by the back of my neck and forced me into my room.

“Get in there!”

“Mom, please…” I was crying. I screwed up and I knew it.

“You sit in your bed and think about how much you’ve upset me! GO!” I was defeated. I walked over to the cardboard box lying on its side in the corner and sat inside of it. “I don’t want to see this light on, do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“I love you. I’ll be back when we’re ready.” She turned off the light and shut the door. She locked it from the other side. My mother always locked me down for the night so I couldn’t go anywhere. The window shade was drawn, so the only light coming into the room was from underneath my door. You have to remember that I was only twelve at the time, so the thought of losing the only friends I ever had was very upsetting. I shouldn’t have done what I did, but I thought if I was going to move away, I was at least going to get to that party.

I knew sneaking out the window wasn’t going to happen. My mother always fastened a piece of metal mesh over every window in every room I ever had with at least twenty screws. Even if I had something to use as a screwdriver, it would take forever. There was a better option in the closet that I had noticed the first day we moved in and somehow my mother had not. There was a small square panel up in the very corner of the ceiling. An access panel to the attic.

I knew my mother was going to stay true to her word and not come back until the morning. She was very consistent in her methods of punishment. I knew that jumping up to reach the access panel would make too much noise, so I grabbed the five gallon bucket that was always in the corner of my room for what my mom called, “Midnight Emergencies”. Luckily I hadn’t had one in a few nights, so the bucket was still clean from the last time I had dumped it.

It was just tall enough for me to stand on the tips of my toes to reach the panel. I hoisted myself up and into the attic. It was filled with itchy insulation and mouse turds, but since it was still light outside, I could make my way to one of the vents easily enough.

I waited in the attic for a couple of hours until the sun went down, then I went to work on the vent. We were going to be leaving tomorrow anyway, I doubted that my mother would notice the broken vent on the roof. I was able to quietly pop the little wooden slats off of it and then I started to squeeze through it. I got stuck at my hips and for a while I thought I wasn’t going to be able to free myself, but eventually I scraped my way through.

Getting off of the roof was a quick jump into the backyard and then I was free.

I had made Tommy tell me how to get to his house at school that day. I made my way to the school and then I followed the directions Tommy had given me from there.

An hour after squeezing my way to freedom, I was playing a video game. I was eating hot dogs, drinking soda, and sitting in a bean bag chair. The greatest night of my life. In the morning, I would have to walk back to my house and accept my punishment, but the night was going to be worth it.

It was heaven.

Just before dawn, I was cast out of it.

Tommy, Phillip, Cody, Chris, and myself were all in his family room. We were all sprawled over the couches and chairs in front of the tv. We had said we were going to stay up all night, but of course we had all fallen asleep long before the sun came. Tommy’s parents were upstairs.

I woke up at some point in the middle of the night. The title screen to Star Fox was still playing on Tommy’s giant tv, and the music made me smile. I was about to have a midnight emergency. There was a night light in the downstairs bathroom. I kept smiling while I peed. It was far better than squatting over a bucket in total darkness. I remember thinking that someday when I was old enough to leave my mother, I would have night lights all over my house, so it was never truly that dark at night.

As I opened the door, I heard a thud from upstairs.

I walked back out towards the living room and I heard more thumping coming from the stairs.

I walked over and saw Tommy’s mom crawling and gurgling her way down the stairs. I walked over and flicked the switch on the wall. There was a trail of blood left on the stairs. She was moving so slowly. At the top of the stairs, I saw my mother holding a knife.

Tommy’s mother reached for me and her mouth was moving. The cut on her neck was jagged.

“Don’t touch her Doc.” My mother walked down the stairs through the trail of blood. When she reached Tommy’s mom, she drove the butcher knife through the back of her neck. The poor woman’s hand fell. She was gone.

“We’re in a lot of trouble now. I’ve warned you about things like this.”

I ran to the front room and in the glow from Tommy’s tv, I saw what my mother had left of my friends. Judging by the looks of them, she was able to do quite a lot of cutting without making a sound.

“Doc…Doc…” I turned to her. She was walking toward me with that huge knife in her hand. She was completely naked and slicked with insides. Even then I knew that my mother was different than most people, but I had no idea she was capable of gutting an entire house of people. I wondered if I was next. I started to shake and had a mini midnight emergency down my leg.

“Mom…please don’t hurt me.”

“I got us all packed, but I can’t go anywhere like this. I need you to wait for me and then we’ll go. Understand?”

I nodded my head.

I did as she asked. I think I was in shock. I stood in the front room while she took a shower in the downstairs bathroom. I just stared at my friends while that soft music kept playing over and over from the tv.

When my mother was finally caught, she would say that everyone in that house was not human. She described what the things in the house looked like. Vile, monstrous pretenders that wore cracked human skin. She was declared insane.

She had taken off her clothes right inside the front door, and after she put them back on, she slid her fingers inside her pocket and pulled out the small piece of paper that Tommy had written his address on and let it fall to the floor.

“If you hadn’t given me this, you would have been in a lot of trouble. I would’ve had no idea where you were.”

It’s hard to say what was going through my mind right before my mother put me in the car and fled from the scene. Chris, Philip, and Cody looked just fine, all things considered. My mother had lied about them when she was caught. They were just children and she knew it. My mother was a murderer.

But Tommy’s mom and Tommy himself did not look like they had before I had gone to sleep; before my mother had gone to work on them with a Ginsu.

Pretenders that wore cracked human skin that was not their own. It was the first time I saw the things that are all around us and it was the first time that I began to understand exactly who my mother was.