We don't get too many regulars at the Sleep Center. Some sleep problems are acute, so people get the problem fixed and don't come back. Other people have chronic problems but after they come here a couple times they realize nothing at the Sleep Center can help them find the merciful joy of oblivion until they confess they slept with their brother's wife, ran over a construction worker in Mexico, or admit that's probably too much pork for one person to consistently ingest.
Like all medical settings though, we do have a few chronic patients who come even though we can't help them. They don't care insurance isn't paying or that Mark and some of the other attendants are making fun of them barely-behind their backs. They just don't want to be alone. One guy told me he was doing research for an article he's writing for the New Yorker, but then he messed his pants in his sleep, so I'm pretty sure he was a crippled alcoholic who needed a friend.
I first started reading people's files at the Sleep Center because of one of these chronic patients. Once, I was mopping the floor and a chronic patient leaned forward on his chair and said, "I bet I could kill you and no one would even care. I've killed people, you know." I didn't know what to say and he just kept staring at me. I thought I better check his file so when I was cleaning I just pulled open the cabinet and looked him up. Turns out he never really killed anyone. He was just a lucid dreamer, so he was having trouble keeping reality straight sometimes. The next time I saw him I touched him on the shoulder and told him not to worry, that he never really killed anyone. He told me to leave him alone and that, instead of bothering him, I should go do horrible, horrible things to my sister. That guy was eventually banned from the Sleep Center because he told Marcie, another attendant at the Sleep Center, that he was going to wear her one day.
From then on I really started to enjoy reading people's files. Sometimes people were messed up so you felt good your life wasn't as bad as theirs, and other times people seemed so hurt, and when you talked to them they were so kind, that you never thought you could feel so strongly for a stranger. I never read Rachel's file, though. Even when she told me I could. She told me I couldn't read any more files, that it wasn't right, and that I could only read one more, and that it would be hers. I said I didn't want to, though.
So I read another person's file instead, and sweet grackle!, that guy was just completely insane.
