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On Tuesday morning I went with a nurse to a room where I could give a phone call. I sat on a chair and waited that she left. I was quite certain that she was observing me. Where was the video camera? Or maybe she could look at me through the wall like in the police movies. I typed the number of my parents and waited. It rang three times.
“Hello Mom, it’s Harri.”
“Oh my little baby. I’m so happy to hear you. Is everything okay?” she exclaimed with a worried voice.
“No, I’m not fine. I need you.” Some tears were running out. I sniffed several times and she tried to comfort. She also told me that the doctors were there to help me and that she would take care of me when I would be back home.
“You don’t understand!” I raised my voice. “I need you here. Now. In Mikkeli.”
“Sweetheart, I’d like to come but I’m very busy and Mikkeli is so far away.”
“It’s not a good excuse. Why do you don’t want to come? And Dad?”
“You know that we can’t.”
“But why?” I felt that I was more and more stressed. My hands were moist, my heart was beating faster and I was sweating.
“It’s a long trip and it costs a lot. And we are going to a snow camp for children in Kuusamo. We are leaving in an hour. We’ll be back on Friday.”
“Don’t go! Please! I can pay for the train ticket. You can also come by plane to Kuopio and then by train to Mikkeli if you prefer. It’s important for me.”
“I’ll talk about it with your father.”
The long brown hair nurse with red glasses went back to the room and told me that the time was over.
“I need you here Mom. I miss you.”
“Take care sweetheart.”
“Bye.”
I felt like abandoned by people that I loved. I had the feeling that she would never come. It was like a betrayal. Nobody liked me. Nobody cared of me. In the corridor I was walking like zombie. I didn’t exist. I was dead the previous Monday in a bus accident on the highway number 4.

In the afternoon I was back on the sofa of the Dr Hevonen. “You remember, Harri, you told me that you were unable to save your friend because you were not a doctor.” “I’m not sure. I said that?” I tried to remember but I couldn’t. “Yes, you told it. I had a look at the autopsy report and I can tell you that even if you were the best doctor in the world you would have been incapable to save him. His thorax bones were all broken. His lunges and liver were damaged. He had an internal hemorrhage and his hip bone was broken into small pieces. But tell me something, are you absolutely sure that he was alive and talked to you?” His question surprised me. Until that moment I was certain. But how to be sure? “I guess yes…” I was remembering his eyes and how he asked me to help in the bus before he disappeared by the window and then in the snow. I remembered also the message for his children. “Harri, it was your imagination. He was dead. And he is not haunting you.” I raised my chest and looked at him. “Are you sure? So, why is he coming to my room every night?” “It’s not him that haunts your mind. It’s you that don’t let him go. You are not accepting that he died.” I was under shock. “Harri, you need help. You are unable to make the difference between the reality and your imaginary world.”

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When I was back in my room I looked at the curtain. How many holes did it have? Probably nobody had the answer because nobody took time to study it. Some holes were bigger than others. They were not aligned. Did I already count that one? Oh no, I had to start again. Why was it moving? It was almost an impossible mission. Was it Janne? No, the doctor said that it was my imagination. After an hour I gave up.


That night I didn’t wake up, didn’t scream and didn’t see Janne. But I could feel someone around me. A shadow or another phantom. It was touching my arm. It was cold. Like a thrill. I couldn’t open my eyes because of the medicine. It was blowing or murmuring something but I was unable to understand. I wanted to wake up.

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The next morning the Dr Virtanen entered in my room. I was like usually sat on my chair looking at the yard. “Have you seen?” I asked. He looked and didn’t notice something special. “The branches of that tree are moving more than the others. The branch on the right and the one on the top left.” “Well Harri. I have some news concerning your teammates. I don’t know if you have any interest in it or if you prefer to look at the trees.” “Who’s dead?” I asked still looking at the branches. No bird was there and there was no wind. Why were these branches moving and not the others? Maybe the tree had something to tell me? “Matti left yesterday. He has been transferred to Kuopio in a recovery clinic.” Nice. He came to me to present me his nurse and talk about the view from my window but he didn’t come to say goodbye. I was very disappointed. But again, it was not surprising. The Dr Virtanen’s face looked closed. Something was wrong. “And the bad news?” I added still looking outside. After a deep breath he announced me that: “Ville is deceased. Yesterday afternoon probably by a heart attack. I’m sorry. As you know, we are here if you want to talk. Now I will let you alone.” I heard his soles creaking on the floor. When the door was closed I got up, took the horrible flower painting and pulverized it against the opposite wall. It exploded in hundreds of little pieces. With my feet I was destroying them even more. With all my strength. Less than thirty seconds later a tall and fatty nurse that looked almost like a man caught me and pressed me against the wall. I promised to be quiet but she didn’t listen. She injected some product in my shoulder and my legs became so soft that they were unable to carry my body.

When I woke up I had no idea of the time and which day of the week we were. I looked at my left arm and noticed amazement that I had plenty of injection spots like if I was a drug addict. I felt sad. How was it possible to be an almost normal person and to end in a psychiatric hospital? Was it really the emotional shock after the accident? I was scared of myself. I took some paper and wrote my feelings. Maybe this would help. I hoped. When I finished I read my letters. I smiled. I was satisfied. I took two envelops, inserted them inside and hid them in the drawer of my night desk. When I looked outside I saw that two other branches were moving. Why two? Suddenly I understood. They were observing me. I opened the window and said loudly in the direction of the tree. “You are free! Go to the stars or wherever you want. You are not my prisoners.” I closed the window and when I turned I saw the nurse with my evening tray, motionless, fixing me behind her red glasses like if I was a monster. “It’s not what you are thinking. I was talking to… to the birds. They flew away,” I said a bit stressed. She put the tray on the table and went away without pronouncing a single word. Was she shocked or mute?

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Part 3: Forgive Me

On Wednesday I had a new visit in the room of the Dr Hevonen. I was lost in my thoughts and sat on the sofa. I knew that there was a bookshelf in front of me but I was unable to see each book individually. Some shadows were moving. Were they real or not? After have heard several times my name I looked at him. “Do you hear me?” “Yes,” I answered mechanically. “Harri, you are sick and you need help. We can help you like I told you several times. You have to accept it.” I was not sick. He was wrong. I just wanted to go home in my family. “Every day you have some hallucinations and you are unable to make the difference between your imaginary world and the reality. You must be able to resist to your violent impulses and at the moment you can’t. Your cognitive troubles are quite important after more than a week of observing you such as problems of concentration, memory problems, social isolation and so on,” he explained with an ironic smile that I didn’t like. “Just let me go home,” I implored but he rejected my request. I had absolutely no idea about what they were doing to me but I had the impression to get worse day after day. Maybe I would never quit that place. “I’m crazy, right?” I asked directly. He looked at me from my feet to my hair like if he was scanning my body to make an evaluation. “You will recover if you accept your treatment. Please, sign that form.” It was a long text, compact with a line at the end waiting for my signature. I was scared to notice that I was unable to read. The letters were so small and my brain couldn’t concentrate. He gave me a pen that I took. “Just sign,” he repeated. Mechanically, without any reason, I signed. “Good,” he said with a wide smile while he took back the document and the pen. “In this treatment we will give you some medicine that will help your neurons to communicate together by acting on the dopamine. You will not be so anxious and violent like these last days. You will be much calmer. There are some side effects but it’s different with each patient. We will see how it will be with you. I don’t want that you feel anxious about it. Maybe you will be fine.” Fantastic… was he telling me that this great treatment would kill me? “Which medicine is it?” I asked. Probably it wouldn’t help me. “Neuroleptic,” he announced and I knew exactly for which illness it was. I was pale. My hands were cold. That word almost told me that I would never be the same again.

Thursday I felt like dead on my bed. I was unable to move or to think. I was watching some cartoons at TV – who turned it on? - but I didn’t understand the stories. The images were moving so fast that it was like looking into a mixer. The voices were also mixed and transformed into a sound. A nerving sound. Suddenly a kind of big colorful snake escaped from the TV and came to me with the mouth big opened. I moved my knees to my chest and told it to go away. I closed my eyes and gave some slaps. When I opened my eyes there was a kitten walking on a roof on the screen. What was happening to me? I was so confused? Where was the reality? I wished that my parents opened the door. I wanted to hug them.

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The night was horrible. I wake up, sweating like never, out of breath. Suddenly I had a shock. Ville was sat on the table. He was looking at me. “Are you happy? You killed me,” he said with his voice when he was angry. “Forgive me, please. It was not my intention. But… you are dead. What are you doing here?” I asked in a low voice. “I’m here for you. I will not let you forget me. I’ll be always there to remind you what you did. Until your death.” I couldn’t believe it. He looked so real. His face was half in the shadow and half lightened by the moon. He was wearing his Fischer sweater and jeans. Like in the minibus. His arms were crossed and he was still fixing me. “I want to sleep. Go away.” I begged still in a low voice. “I told you that I would not go. Are you deaf?” “No, no. You can sleep…” I looked around but there was no sofa. I moved a bit on the side and invited him to sleep in my bed. He got up and walked to me. But when he was at two meters, he disappeared. I put my head on the pillow and tried to calm down. I noticed that the treatment was effective on my impulses but not on my hallucinations. Ville is not real. He doesn’t exist. It’s just your imagination. Now sleep.


Save me. Save me. “Oh no! Not you now!” I hid under my blanket and hope to don’t hear his voice. But he was repeating these two words again and again. “I couldn’t save you, okay? It’s not my fault if you didn’t fasten your seat belt and were ejected out of the bus that crushed on you. Let me alone now,” I told him quite loudly. I felt a thrill in my hair. Was he touching me? I raised my head and looked around but there was nobody. Save me. “Okay,” I said while I sat in my bed. “Is my room the phantom’s night meeting club? I have enough of you. Now go away, you and Ville and don’t come here again. And please, don’t bring other friends.” Suddenly someone approached in the dark and I screamed. The light went on and after few second I saw that it was the long black hair nurse. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to frighten. Whom are you talking?” Oh my God. If she heard at the whole conversation I could say definitively goodbye to my freedom. “Nobody. It was a nightmare.”

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It was Friday early morning. It was that day that the funerals of Ville would happen. I was not proud of me. I killed two people. I would probably go to Hell. And what about Matti? I destroyed his life. I was a monster. Nothing else. I felt also abandoned by my family and people I thought that were my friends. Only Janne Väätäinen and Martin Schmitt came over. Plus Matti. That was all. Maybe the other understood that I was a monster. I also thought of the document that I signed. What was it? I guessed that it was to send me directly to a terrific psychiatric asylum with heavy treatment. I already noticed some changes in my behavior. It was harder to be concentrated and I felt like to be a drug addict. I was quite sure that the Dr Virtanen and Hevonen wanted to transform me into a kind sheep without a working brain. But they would not succeed. There was one solution to escape and I was ready. I was self-confident. It was not an impulsive idea.

I breathed deeply and went to the bathroom. I took the new mirror and closed the door of the toilet. I flushed it and broke the mirror on the floor. I waited a bit. Nobody came. I hid the unnecessary pieces behind the door, took the sharpest piece with me and hid it under my blanket. I breathed deeply again and slowly. I knew that a nurse would come to measure my blood pressure and temperature. When she came, she did her job and didn’t notice something unusual. She announced like every morning that the breakfast was coming. When the door was closed I knew that I had approximately fifteen minutes to act.

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I opened the drawer and put the three letters on my night desk: one for the children of Janne, one for Martin Schmitt and the last one for my relatives. I hope that they would understand. I took the piece of mirror and looked at my face that was reflected. I was determined. It was too late to give up. I pressed it hardly and started to cut my veins under my left wrist. I gripped my teeth together. It was so painful. “I’m sorry for all the bad things I said and I did. Please, forgive me.” I was bleeding a lot. Quickly the blanket became red. The blood was pouring on the floor. My vision was more and more blurry. My body was shaking. It was fighting for life but my brain didn’t react. My breathing was not regular. My feet were cold. My hands and my nose too. It was harder and harder to keep my eyes opened. The light became darkness. “Forgive me…” I whispered.

The end

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