Assuming Names: a con artist's masquerade (Criminal Mischief Book 1) Read Online Free PDF

going to be labeled insane over a nail?”
    “Do you think the nail is the issue?”
    “Is it not?”
    “What do you see in this card?”
    After the first card that looked like a butterfly, I steadfastly contended, “I see nothing.”
    He thought I was being obstinate.
    Next he handed me paper and pen, saying, “We are going to do a word association exercise. Write down the first word that comes to mind. If I say salt, what is the first word that enters your mind? Write it down.” Halfway through, he was quite impressed with how fast I was responding, but then when it was over, he saw I had only written down exactly what he had said.
    I defended myself, “The word you said would be the first word that would come to mind.” Now he knew beyond doubt I was being difficult.
    “You’re not going to tell me how you cut your wrist?”
    “It was a nail.”
    I went straight to a night admission at the psychiatric hospital.
     
    ~~~~~~
     
    On the third day under observation, I was sitting on the side of the bed, my hands over my eyes, saying with exasperation bordering on despair, “It was a nail.”
    The psychiatrist said, “One more chance, and then I’m leaving. I’m going to petition the court to continue holding you. You’ll be moved to the state mental hospital. It won’t be pleasant.”
    I was racking my brain trying to figure out how a nail injury could look so significantly different from a chain link fence injury that everyone except me could see it.
    I couldn’t fathom, and no one was whispering even a hint about their suspicions. I was playing twenty-three and worldly, so it was probably assumed that I knew the most efficient way to slit your wrist was down the vein, and it was probably suspected that I wasn’t outright denying or admitting an attempt at suicide because I was ashamed, or was in denial, or in some other psychological quandary, but the reality was I didn’t have a clue. I had only just turned fifteen and none of this had been covered in ninth grade.
    Hollywood had taught me that suicide was done with razor sharp precision across your wrist, and I had a savage cut down my arm. To my mind, no one would deliberately scar themselves like that, so it was clearly an accident.
    It was the cause of the accident that was at issue. Apparently boats did not have stray nails in the railings. I didn’t know, but I still argued with the psychiatrist like I did. “You’re not a carpenter, yet you’re going to tell me that railings are not assembled with nails. How do you know that? Why would you tell me they’re not when I have seen for myself that they are?”
    He wouldn’t explain. He only warned, “Last chance. Tell me how you cut yourself.”
    But I had never been one to change a story. I’d stick with it to the bitter, twisted end, and before it was over, I’d wear everyone else down into believing it through sheer stubborn consistency.
    I threw a hand up in resignation, telling the psychiatrist, “It was still a nail.”
    And he left without saying a word.
     
    ~~~~~~
     
    It went exactly as the psychiatrist threatened. The judge sent me to Wichita Falls State Mental Hospital, and, as was warned, it wasn’t pleasant.
    The place was a square grid of thirty-odd brick buildings. Most were residential halls, long sprawling two- and three-story structures arranged around treeless green lawns. It almost could have passed for a college campus, except most of the windows were barred and it lacked any sense of external life. Expressionless faces were watching from the windows, but no one was on the grass. The vibe was so subdued it felt threatening.
    It was built in the 1920s and retained little glimpses of another era when electroshock therapy and lobotomies were acceptable. During admission, I saw leather restraints, harnesses, and straight jackets; then later, I took a shower in a wide open, tiled hall with two cast iron tubs that had once been used for cold shock therapy. The place had not