Bug house

I live across the street from a mental hospital. It's not a full-on bars on the window, McMurphy and the Chief playing basketball kind of place. There is a Victorian frontage, but most of it is smooth hermetically sealed modern office block look - which I find more unsettling than some ancient Bedlam.

As I write this I can see about ten people taking a smoking break outside. They seem part of the same therapy group. An even mix of men and women in their forties and fifties, they crowd close to one another, rarely speaking, sucking greedily on their cigarettes. They all look rough, not necessarily poor, but used and beat, dazed. And I wonder, what do they talk about? Why can't they meet each others' gazes outside?

The proximity of the hospital means I often come across people raving to themselves and at me. When I first moved here I thought an inordinately amount of people were using the hands-free mobiles. But no.

Leaving this morning I came up to this woman in the street. She was a large black lady, wearing a pretty summer blue polka dot dress. She was standing in the middle of the sidewalk and I as I tried to get by she placed a hand, lightly, on my chest. 'Why are you here?' she asked, wide-eyed and staring. Before I could answer, she said again, lower, 'Why are you here?' Then she laughed, a long deep laugh and she was off, crossing the road to the hospital.

I watched her go into the building, the glass door swinging behind her, thinking, why indeed, why indeed. After a moment or two, I finally moved, trudging slowly towards the bus and work. And I looked back once, thinking, did that really happen?