This is a work of fiction based on the popular “rubber room with rats” playground poem. It is not making fun of psychiatric facilities or the mentally ill community.
Crazy? I was crazy once.
They locked me in a room. A rubber room. A rubber room with rats. And the rats made me crazy.
The rats scurried around, their squeals piercing through my eardrums and seeping into my brain. No matter where I went, how hard I tried to tune them out, I could not escape. There was only me and the rats.
I was going crazy. Their voices ran around my head, taunting me. They were saying the most vile things, shrieking with laughter. They did not care how their words impacted my psyche. They tormented me ceaselessly, saying the smallest things just to anger me.
The craziness creeped into every crevice of my being. I screamed along with the rats, letting their influence take hold of my mind. I didn’t know who I was anymore. Every word I spoke was against my morals and ethics as a person, and I started to become more rat than human.
It was the only way I could escape. You either went with the rats, abandoning all principles, or were eaten alive, both metaphorically and physically. The rats needed to eat too.
After a while, I became numb to the rats’ shrill squeaks. I could only hear my breathing and the voices in my head. There was the rational side, wondering how I could get out of a hellscape like this. I did not want to live like this anymore. Then, there was the side that was corrupted. The one that said, “there is no escape” and fed me the lies of the rats.
It felt like it had been forever since I had seen the outside world. Heard intelligible thoughts rather than the boisterous voices of the rats. I started to believe the things they uttered. That humans were worthless scum, only existing to be tossed to the rats. I felt powerless, worthless, like I was waiting to become rat food.
It only took one bite for me to snap out of it. A rat the size of my forearm bared its teeth, prepared to chomp away. At first I lay on the ground, ready to be over with the ordeal, but something possessed me to stand up. As soon as I did, everything made sense. The rats were lying to me. They wanted to take over, becoming the dominant voice of the land. But I didn’t have to let them.
I sprinted to the door, spotting a lock on the right hand side. It would be tricky, but I had to try to get out. I glanced around for anything I could pick the lock with, as the rats slowly but steadily drew near. I saw a loose hairpin on the floor and quickly gripped it before the rats could get my hand. It felt like centuries that I fidgeted with the lock, the rats coming closer and closer until suddenly…
The door opened. I was free to leave, bolt as fast as I could to repair the damage the rats had done. I fled to find somewhere to call home and hoped the rats would not follow. After all, that would be crazy, right?
