I graduated in biochemistry, and quickly discovered that companies were looking for people with experience. Still, I managed to work for a while as a lab technician at a small company. All day long, I fed water samples into a large machine and recorded the impurity results in a database. Besides being boring, the job didn’t help me make friends with my coworkers. I took stock of my life up to that point and decided that this kind of work wasn’t for me. I didn’t feel like studying more either—it seemed that people did the interesting work in biochemistry with PhDs, and I didn’t want to invest another five years into something I might or might not end up liking. So I took a break and found a job as support staff at a psychiatric hospital. My job title was therapeutic aide—basically an orderly who kept patients occupied, took them for walks, and performed similar tasks. It seemed like an easy job, the pay wasn’t bad, it covered my student loan payments, and in my free time, I planned to think about what changes to make in my life.

On my very first day at work—somewhat nervous about what awaited me in a psychiatric ward—I met Bill. He was about sixty, tall, and heavyset. Like me, he was an orderly. When I told him my name, he said:

“You’ve got an accent. Where are you from?”

“Bulgaria.”

“Oh, you’re communists, right?”

“Well, we used to be. Now we’re capitalists.”

“Good. I don’t like communists.”

After this brief introduction, Bill explained my responsibilities.

“If you see someone acting up, slam him to the floor and call for help. We’ll give him something to calm him down.”

“What do you mean, ‘slam him’?”

“Like this—suplex.”

“Isn’t there a chance I could hurt someone?”

“If you knew how many I’ve thrown down. So far, nothing’s happened to anyone.”

With that clarification, I started my day hoping I wouldn’t have to suplex anyone.

Gradually, I got to know the patients. There were about twenty men. One was a shaggy older guy with graying hair who couldn’t hold a conversation, only uttering disconnected words. He wanted to say something, but couldn’t find the words. His name was Miles, and he followed Tom, one of the orderlies, everywhere. Bill told me Miles thought Tom was Jesus Christ and followed him constantly. Tom did resemble Christ a bit—tall and skinny, with long, wavy hair. He was used to George following him everywhere and allowed him to tag along when he went on errands to other parts of the hospital.

There was Carl, balding, who loved playing dominoes. He had become friends with an orderly named Betty, an elderly, petite woman. Watching them play dominoes was entertaining.

“I just beat you. How will you answer that move?” Carl would say, slamming a tile on the table.

“You got me. Here’s a four. Oh, you don’t have one? That’s it—draw!”

“I’ll draw. Full of surprises. Well? What now?”

“You little devil. I’ve got that tile too. Go on, play. I’ve only got two left…”

Their game was full of teasing. They were almost like an old couple. I left them and turned to a Latino-looking man named Lou. His pants were pulled down, and he was sticking his hand down his backside, pulling out bits of feces and flicking them with his thumb and index finger toward the center of the common room, where the other patients sat in front of the TV. His “bombs” landed on different patients. I reprimanded him, and he began trembling, speaking quickly and nervously, trying to explain himself but unable to finish his sentences. I gathered that he wouldn’t continue the bombardment.

Joe entered the common room—a big man, tall and very fat, like a ball with legs. He wore a red T-shirt and had a flushed face.

“Hi,” he said quickly and shuffled off toward the next room to get a drawing pad. He was always in a hurry, scurrying around. When it was time for medications, Joe was late. Jogging lightly, he headed for the end of the line of patients at the nurses’ station. A strange impulse arose in me—to trip him to see what would happen. I imagined sticking out my foot, him stumbling, rolling forward, and knocking down the other patients like bowling pins. Of course, I didn’t do it.

Over the next few days, I met the rest of the patients. There was Peter, an old man who walked around with an old chemistry textbook, reading it constantly. He said he wanted to prove that chemistry was a false science—that atoms weren’t C and O and H and that there were no lines between them. I tried to explain that those were just schematic representations of atoms and bonds, but he got angry and stopped talking to me for a while.

Another patient was Phil, a young guy in his twenties. He told me his father had sent him to the psych ward because he didn’t like a cassette Phil had recorded. Phil wanted to buy a van and travel around America once he got out.

There was also Jack, an older man who constantly listed military units and weapons:

“Forty-fourth division, twenty Bradleys, fifteen Abrams with two machine guns each, crew of four soldiers, range two hundred fifty miles, speed sixty-five miles an hour.”

At first, I thought he was a former soldier, but the staff told me he’d worked at McDonald’s before getting sick—this was his illness, talking only about military things, some imagined, some heard or read somewhere. Bill often shouted at him:

“Shut up, Jack.”

And Jack would stop—for a bit.

Sometimes I took some of the more stable patients for walks around the hospital grounds. It was a large area. Initially, the hospital was a building constructed in the nineteenth century on a hill above the city. From the train station, they used to bring alcoholics, “immoral” women, and the mentally ill to the hospital. They worked in the yard of “the Castle,” as we called the old building, growing their own food. Scattered around were small buildings used as workshops. I walked with my small group of three or four patients and told them stories—some things I’d heard, others I made up:

“This is the Castle. It held two hundred people. They worked the fields and the workshops. That building was the nurses’ dormitory. Next to it was the director’s mansion. Down there—the white building—doctors lived there. That little pavilion was a mattress workshop. Over there was a shoe factory. Here was the blacksmith shop.”

“What’s that cemetery, Roby?” Joe asked, out of breath.

“They buried deceased patients there.”

“Damn. Even dead, they didn’t get out of here. Why doesn’t the Castle operate?”

“They closed it thirty years ago. They built the new hospital where we are now. It has nine hundred beds.”

“But now there are only three wards.”

“Yes. With the new medications, more people could leave and return to society. And one day you’ll get out too.”

“I’ve been here ten years already. I did something bad back then and said it was because of my illness. That’s why I’m here. Otherwise, they’d have let me go long ago.”

“What did you do?”

“I don’t want to talk about it. Something bad. Some patients are here for that reason—to avoid trial, they said the devils possessed them, and instead of prison, they were sent here. ‘Not responsible due to mental disorder.’ If I’d known then, I’d have gone to prison. I’d be free by now.”

“It’s a shame the workshops don’t work,” Phil said. “It would be cool to learn blacksmithing.”

“I was thinking the same,” Carl added.

“You can’t even remember what day it is, and you want to be a blacksmith,” Joe teased.

“I’ll learn. For blacksmithing, I’ll remember what to do. I remember dominoes. I even win.”

“You win because Betty lets you.”

“Tell him, Roby. Tell him it's not true,” Carl said.

“Don’t listen to him. You’d make a great blacksmith.”

“See, Joe? Roby says I would’ve.”

“He’s lying to you. You’d burn yourself. What would you even forge?”

“Whatever I want. I’d forge a horseshoe—for luck. I’d hang it over my bed. I used to work as a farmhand. I loved horses.”

“They wouldn’t even let you bring a horseshoe into the hospital. You could throw it at someone,” Joe continued.

“Tell him, Roby,” Carl begged through tears. “I’d be allowed to bring it inside, right?”

“It wouldn’t be a problem, Carl,” I lied.

“That’s the pool over there,” I changed the subject. “It’s open. Next time we could go swimming. Would you like that?”

“Oooh,” George said. “I’d love to get in.”

“Just don’t bring Lou. His ass is dirty. He’s always pulling crap out of it.”

“Yeah, without Lou,” the others agreed.

And so we walked around the grounds until the loop brought us back to the new building. On the first floor, there was a vending machine selling drinks and chocolate. Patients bought things with their $10 weekly allowance. When they had no money, I’d buy them something now and then. It wouldn’t ruin me, and they didn’t abuse it. They rarely asked

Once, Miss Rain, the art therapist, and I took some patients to the city gallery. We were a colorful group in donated clothes. People stared and made way for us. The patients stopped at the paintings but seemed more interested in walking on the sidewalk and meeting pedestrians, striking up conversations. The pedestrians quickly moved on once they understood who we were.

We stopped at a small street stand selling toys. There were small plastic horseshoes in yellow and silver.

“Hey Carl, look,” I pointed.

“How much is this?” he asked, pointing to a gold one.

“Five dollars,” the vendor said.

He counted his coins aloud. “I only have $3.25.”

“That’s enough,” she laughed. “Here—may it bring you luck.”

“I’ll put it on my bedside cabinet,” Carl said, admiring it.

“Roby,” he asked, “do you think it’ll bring me luck?”

“I’m sure it will. It found you.”

“Luck found me,” he laughed. “I’ll get better, and they’ll let me go.”

“Of course,” I said, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Where will you go?”

“My brother has a farm in Minnesota. I want to go there. Animals. Fields. Imagine—a huge field, going on and on. No mountains. No walls. Just space. I’ll feel free. I’ll be happy.”

We returned to the hospital. I locked the ward door and heard shouting. In the common room, Bill was leaning over Carl.

“Give it to me.”

“I’ve got nothing, Bill.”

“What’s in your hand?”

“That’s not a weapon,” I said. “It’s a little plastic horseshoe Carl bought.”

Bill snapped it in half.

“Here. Play with it.”

George lunged at him. Bill slammed him to the floor and straddled him.

“We’re taking him to the quiet room.”

Carl didn’t resist. Tears streamed down his face.

I felt sick. I didn’t know how to fight Bill. He was respected for being “firm.” A week later, I resigned.

The story would end here if, months later, I hadn’t seen a street musician with a guitar. It was Phil.

“I started taking my meds,” he said. “They helped.”

“Still want a van?”

“I gave my cassette to a producer.”

“Hey,” he added, “want to come with me?”

“I’d love to,” I said, “but I’m back in school—nursing.”

“You’d be a good nurse,” he said. “Or a storyteller. You helped us back then.”

I walked away as he started his next song.