Ned Vizzini

It's not a big thing, but I guess it's true- big things are often just small things that are noticed.

I shrug. I don't really need to explain this to Aaron. He's been demoted from most important friend to friend, and he's going to have to earn that, even. And you know what else? I don't owe people anything, and I don't have to talk to them any more than I feel I need to.

your relationship with air__hat__ key. You can__ break up with air. You__e kind of stuck together. Only slightly less crucial is water. And then food. You can__ be dropping food to hang with someone else. You need to strike up an agreement with it.

When you mess something up, you learn for the next time.

I ask the nurse wrapping up her dispensing duties if I need any meds, and she says I'm not scheduled for any. I ask her if I can have some. She asks what I need them for. I tell her, to deal with this crazy place. She says if they had pills for that, they wouldn't need places like this in the first place, would they?

I'll fail.""At schoool.""Failing at school is failing at life.

It's not a mental complaint-it's a physical thing, like it's physically hard to open your mouth and make the words come out. ... you stumble on them as they gather behind your lower lip. So you just keep quiet.

Whether it's sleeping or playing video games or riding my bike or studying. Giving my brain up. That's what's important.

This was all an excuse, I think. I was doing fine. I had a 93 average and I was holding my head above water. I had good friends and a loving family. And because I needed to be the center of attention, because I needed something more, I ended up here, wallowing in myself, trying to convince everybody around me that I have some kind of. . . disease. I don__ have any disease. I keep pacing. Depression isn__ a disease. It__ a pretext for being a prima donna. Everybody knows that. My friends know it; my principal knows it. The sweating has started again. I can feel the Cycling roaring up in my brain. I haven__ done anything right. What have I done, made a bunch of little pictures? That doesn__ count as anything. I__ finished. My principal just called me and I hung up on him and didn__ call back. I__ finished. I__ expelled. I__ finished.

I'm waiting for her to say "Craig, what you need to do is X" and for the Shift to occur. I want there to be a Shift so bad. I want to feel my brain slide back into the slot it was meant to be in, rest there the way it did before the fall of last year, back when I was young, and witty, and my teachers said I had incredible promise, and I had incredible promise, and I spoke up in class because I was excited and smart about the world. I want the Shift so bad. I'm waiting for the phrase that will invoke it. It'll be like a miracle within my life. But is Dr. Minerva a miracle worker? No. She's a thin, tan lady from Greece with red lipstick.

I don't-" I shake my head. (...) "What? What were you going to say?" This is another trick of shrinks. They never let you stop in midthought. If you open your mouth, they want to know exactly what you had the intention of saying.

I wasn't going to have enough money to pay for a Good Lifestyle, which meant I'd feel ashamed, which meant I'd get depressed, and that was the big one because I knew what that did to me: it made it so I wouldn't get out of bed, which led to the ultimate thing__omelessness. If you can't get out of bed for long enough, people come and take your bed away.

It__ a huge thing, this Shift, just as big as I imagined. My brain doesn__ want to think anymore; all of a sudden it wants to do.

I have a system with bathrooms. I spend a lot of time in them. They are sanctuaries, public places of peace spaced throughout the world for people like me.

What happened when you woke up?" "I was having a dream. I don__ know what it was, but when I woke up, I had this awful realization that I was awake. It hit me like a brick in the groin." "Like a brick in the groin, I see.""I didn't want to wake up. I was having a much better time asleep. And that's really sad. It was almost like a reverse nightmare, like when you wake up from a nightmare you're so relieved. I woke up into a nightmare." "And what is that nightmare, Craig?""Life." "Life is a nightmare.""Yes.

You want to play video games twenty-four hours a day?""Or watch. I just want to not be me. Whether it's sleeping or playing video games or riding my bike or studying. Giving my brain up. That's what's important.

(...) Since I was a kid.""Which you refer to as 'back when you were happy.'""Right.

I'm fine. Well, I'm not fine - I'm here.""Is there something wrong with that?""Absolutely.