Everything I was carrying (mostly pens, paper, office stuff) leapt out of my arms, into the air, and onto the floor. I had just bumped into an angel. She stood just below my height and she was gloriously ravishing in her beauty with an inspiring smile, eyes that talked, and a gorgeously deep red dress. She kindly assisted me in cleaning up, then we exchanged apologies and I left on my way through one of the more stressful days of my life.

I had to go admit a friend of mine to an asylum that day. That’s something you don’t get to say everyday. His family and I had been talking about this for a while; we all knew he was someone that didn’t belong in society. Now I’m not often one to think it’s my place to decide someone else’s ideas or mental state is right or wrong, and I would never in a million years expect myself to decide someone should be put away because of their thoughts. No matter how odd their ideas are, they’re still just as devoid of logical rationale as mine; who am I to decide someone is wrong? But this guy’s different. He’s dangerous. He doesn’t have any legally acknowledged mentality problem, and that’s just what makes this as difficult as it is. He’s just as sane as can be, but his morals are very different from society’s. As I said earlier, this normally wouldn’t bother me, but in this situation I began to fear for my life, and despite our friendship, I have to protect myself.

I threaded my way through the lobby, spewing out an occasional nervous "hello" or "hey, you" to acquaintances, and worked my way through the automatic doors. You know, a few thousand years ago, all we had was dirt, just the land, and sometimes it just irks me how much us people take all this technology and stuff for granted. I’m just in awe of what we’ve been able to do. I mean, 100 years ago, not one building would have an automatic door, yet now they’re relied on as a necessity of life. No one notices them anymore. I know, it’s stupid, but I just think it’s too bad how everything gets enveloped into life and no one cares. Anyway, the doors opened, spilling people out into the parking lot. The sky was gray; it felt like a Halloween morning, even though it was nearly 2:30. I crept through the lot, leering about nervously, because even though I guess I was doing a good thing putting that guy away, but it still felt wrong and I guess that I feared the "personal morality police" would come take me away. I felt like my conscience was hunting me.

As I neared my car, I fumbled around in my pockets for my keys. Noticing that my hands were shaking a little, I tried to calm myself with a slow steady breath. I relaxed and pushed my key into the door. I turned it, but it stuck; it wouldn’t move. Instantly the fear ran back into me as I glanced around, feeling the nervous paleness creep back into my face and hands. Honestly, looking back, I have no idea what I was really afraid of. I mean, no one would have changed the locks on my car or anything, but I guess the fear just fed on itself and multiplied. My confounded gaze spread to the interior of the car, and I noticed a couple magazines on the seat, some sunglasses, stuff like that. This wasn’t my car. Soon the cold paranoia faded away, but it was replaced by a warmer embarrassment, and I began to sweat as my stomach clumped a little. My neck arched as I scouted out the area, eventually finding my own car, and soon I was on my way to pick up my friend.

I met this guy’s family about a month ago, while he was away on some business trip to Kansas or something. His sister called me on the phone and asked if I "noticed anything" about him, and I explained that he was a great guy, real smart and a good friend, except sometimes he seemed a little odd; I think I used the word "aggressive." This seemed to confirm her thoughts, as she began to "spill her guts" about the subject. Apparently it was more serious than I had thought. She told me that he had been in jail a couple times (bar fights, stuff like that) and he’d increasingly been a disruption to the family. About a week ago, it was decided (by them, not me) that he did in fact need to be separated, and I was naturally the one to do it. After a bit of convincing, I accepted the fact that I was going to be forced into this, and I agreed so as to avoid more conflict.

I told him I was going to pick him up in a couple minutes and we’d go do "something." That way I wasn’t lying; I didn’t need that.

The driving went a lot easier than I would have thought, and soon I pulled up in front of his house. It was quite a dreamlike experience. I felt as though I wasn’t controlling anything anymore. I sat in the car for a couple minutes to try and gain composure, and once I was satisfied, I began the procession up to the door. It was a nice little family-based portion of town, where each house was basically the same, but you’d never confuse one with another. They all were very lived in, with children’s toys littered over the lawns, a car parked in the driveway, and an occasional person working their yard. I knocked on the door.

I had to wait a couple minutes, which wasn’t unusual, but it really magnified my nervousness. I can imagine myself looking quite wrecked standing there. Finally he opened the door. He had a look on his face like a dead man; maybe it was just my imagination, but to me he looked like he knew something was up. We went through the normal greetings stuff, walked out to the car, and began to drive.

"What are we doing?" he asked, somewhat cheerfully.

"You’ll have to wait. You’ll see when we get there."

We didn’t talk much during the trip. There was a tension in the air (or maybe just on my breath) that really made it difficult to make small talk, and we really didn’t talk too much normally; we both just watched as the world passed by on each side, and the day seemed to lose a bit of it’s color in a grayish blur when it began to drizzle a little rain. We passed through a relatively busy part of the city, where I guess it was lunch time, and I began to notice people. They all strode along on their busy schedules, totally unaware of and unaffected by the turmoil I was going through at the moment. I envied those hundreds of people, living normal lives, working daily, going home each day to their family, ignoring automatic doors. I envied the boorish simple life.

I looked back at my friend, and the motion caused him to return my gaze. I apparently had quite the dismal look on my face, because as he looked at me I saw his face unintentionally mimic mine, showing a bit of anticipatory fear and worry before he caught himself. He immediately looked away, straight forward, and seemed to be contemplating something. I felt another wave of fear roll through my body as I wondered if somehow he knew what was happening. I now know there was no chance, but at the time is was very nerve-wracking to have the possibility of a potentially dangerous man sitting next to you in a car at high speeds knowing that you are putting him away.

I looked outside again, wanting to free my mind, and amid the blurry gray my eyes caught the sight of that familiar deep red dress that I bumped into earlier. Oh, God, how much I wished I was with her, instead of this guy. I wanted to just give up all of my life so far, just throw it all away, and start over with this woman. I considered it in my turmoil, but soon the credibility of this solution was thoroughly trashed by the fact that I didn’t even know this woman. My mind was searching for an easy out of the situation.

The rest of the trip was uneventful. Soon we arrived at the asylum and there were guard-type people waiting outside for us. They took him away, and he seemed to submit himself pretty easily to them. No violence. I myself couldn’t watch. I found myself shying away from the whole thing, and inside I could feel myself dying in a way. It was a feeling I couldn’t even begin to explain. It was horrible. I still haven’t gotten over it; I’ve never really even been able to think of anything else. Hopefully letting all of this out will help, but I don’t know. I heard that later he broke out of the place, and I think he killed some girl, so I guess that I did do the right thing; he was dangerous. I can never stop thinking, though, that maybe he was just fine, his problems were all in our minds, and that maybe the asylum put a hatred in him. I guess I’ll never know. At least it wasn’t one of us that got hurt.

Onward, to Part 2!