Cry Until You Bleed

7- Celebrations

“You’re doing very well here, Ana,” One of the nurses at the front desk tells me as she cuts the plastic band off of my wrist since after yesterday’s (Friday) therapy session with Dr. Lombardi, she signed off for me to get my ID instead of having this stupid plastic band on my wrist anymore, which is apparently, a means for celebration because all of the patients are waiting for me in the common area to celebrate- and we even got a cake. “Congratulations.”

I offer her a small smile as she clips my new ID onto my blue scrubs, between the flaps of my tan fleece, that has a picture of me and then a bunch of my information like my patient number and stuff like that. “Thanks,” I say quietly. “I’m really thrilled.”

She laughs a little and tosses the band into a shredder. “Just remember to keep this with you at all times.”

I nod, “I will.”

“Alright, you’re free to go then,” She chirps with a wide grin.

“Thanks,” I say before I turn around and head into the common area where I can already hear a lot of chatter. Today is my first Saturday here but I can already tell that it’s a happy day for people here because it’s pretty relaxed with brunch instead of breakfast and an extra hour of sleep in the morning and there’s no therapy sessions during the weekends unless you want to talk to somebody because they have a doctor on hand 24/7.

“There she is,” Renée grins when she sees me walk into the room. Everybody’s eyes are suddenly on me and I can’t help but blush and look down at my shoes because like I’ve said before, I’m not a big fan of being the center of attention. Like, at all. However, I know that they’re just being friendly and supportive of my transition into really being one of them, so I just offer them a shy smile and go with it.

Everybody starts applauding and Johnny approaches me, patting me firmly on the back. “Welcome to the tribe, kiddo.”

“Kiddo?” I repeat with a small laugh. “How old are you?”

“Older than you probably,” He shrugs jokingly.

“Forget about him,” Mia tells me. “He’s a weirdo. The important thing here is that you have a slice of cake, because Mrs. Brodsky makes literally the best cake you will ever have in your life.”

Renée, Mia, and Johnny all follow me to the table in the center of the room where the cake is now being cut by Mrs. Brodsky, who is one of the head chef people in our cafeteria. One of the helpers beside her starts putting slices of cake on individual plates and handing them out to everybody around the table.

“This is all for me?” I wonder incredulously, wondering if they bought all of these plates and plastic forks and the cake just because I arrived here. It all just seems kind of… dramatic, I guess.

“Of course. They think that welcoming celebrations are upbeat and good for everybody, which I can’t argue with. Especially with this fabulous cake,” Renée explains, taking her piece of vanilla cake and then thanking Mrs. Brodsky and then she walks a few steps to the left to stay out of the way of other people in line.

I grab a chocolate slice and do the same, waiting for Mia and Johnny before we leave the large cake table to find another smaller one to sit at and eat our cake. A few people wave at me and I wave back, trying to be polite even though I’m usually numbed with awkwardness, I just try to put a smile on my face and pretend like all of this doesn’t bother me. It’s nice of them to be so welcoming so I should appreciate that.

“So, now that you can go outside and everything, I say that we should show you around later,” Renée suggests as we start digging into the cake, which really is delicious. I notice, though, that Mia isn’t really eating that much of hers.