Top Highlights

• BEFORE FREEDOM February “You’re not schizophrenic.” Ten years. I’ve waited ten years for someone other than Rosemary Donahue to say those words to me. For someone who was alive and fucking competent to confirm what I’d known for so long. My gaze is unfazed by this statement. I hold eye contact with Jennifer L. Tako of Evergreen Health Institution. ...
• “I’m unsure what kind of doctor thought this diagnosis was okay. It was extremely reckless and warranted a review of his medical license.” Her gaze softens a bit as she looks at me across the coffee table between us. “I’m sorry we can never ask him his reasoning, Silas. You, at the very least, deserve an explanation.”
• There are no lingering questions for that doctor. I know why he lied to my parents, why he forged medical reports to fit his diagnosis. I’m only sorry that he died in a boating accident before I could make him swallow his own kneecaps for what he’d done to her.
• Of course, Jennifer doesn’t know any of this. Doesn’t need to in order to properly evaluate me. No one would ever know why Ronald Brewer made loving parents and a vicious town believe a twelve-year-old boy had schizophrenia. A secret. An oath I’d vowed to take to my grave. To this day, I’ve kept my word to her. This was the only way I could still p...
• “I want to say I’m surprised by your reaction,” Jennifer notes, tilting her head a bit. “But since I met you, Silas Hawthorne, you’ve always been a calm surface of water. No one knows the depths below, do they?” The corner of my lip twitches in response. “How long have you known you weren’t schizophrenic?” I relax my back into the leather chair, lo...