Electron ate his meals mostly in silence, trying to ignore the
voluntary and involuntary patients who shared the dining hall. One
lunchtime, a stranger sat down at Electron's table and started talking
to him. Electron found it excruciatingly painful talking to other
people, and he kept wishing the stranger would go away.
The stranger talked about how good the drugs were in
hospital.
`Mm,' Electron said. `I used to do a lot of drugs.'
`How much is a lot?'
`I spent $28000 on dope alone in about four months.'
`Wow,' the stranger said, impressed. `Of course, you don't have to pay
for drugs. You can always get them for free. I do.'
`You do?' Electron asked, somewhat perplexed.
`Sure! All the time,' the stranger said grandly. `No problem. Just
watch.'
The stranger calmly put his fork down on the tray, carefully stood up
and then began yelling at the top of his lungs. He waved his arms
around frantically and shouted abuse at the other patients.
Two nurses came running from the observation room. One of them tried
to calm the stranger down while the other quickly measured out various
pills and grabbed a cup of water. The stranger swallowed the pills,
chased them with a swig of water and sat down quietly.
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