30. Jael
VOID - Melanie Martinez
Two weeks later…
I wake to the sound of a cart rattling on the other side of the padded walls. I’m lying confined in the dark, strapped down to a mattress that’s closer to a stiff board. Leather binds chaff away at my wrists and ankles, a constant reminder that I’ve lost all control.
I’m buried away in some tomb where no one knows of my existence, where no one will ever find me.
…except them.
Confined to the dark, tight space, I’m stripped of most basic senses. I’m forced to use my sense of hearing above all else.
I strain my ears and listen to the pad of their footsteps. The cart rattles to a halt outside the door. Keys jiggle and the lock clicks as the doorknob turns.
A harsh artificial light spills into the room for less than a second before the door’s slamming shut again. Their silhouettes are nightmarish as they close in on the bed, their head mirrors shining in the dark.
Nurse Big Bird is in the front, followed by two of her assistants. I can make out the outline of her feathered blonde hair and pristine sage medical scrubs that she wears. She exudes an air of authority while her two orderlies are obedient in plain white, wheeling in the cart full of cruel gifts for me.
My gaze flickers to the items on the cart. A small paper cup filled with pills sits next to a tray of syringes, their sharp tips glinting under the light of their head mirrors. The sight sends a jolt of terror through me.
I begin to struggle against the restraints, yanking at the straps with all the strength I can muster. My breath quickens, panic overtaking me as I thrash against the bed.
“Don’t do this,” I plead, my voice hoarse from days of screaming. Maybe weeks. "Please, I have to find my sister!"
Nurse Big Bird simply tsks under her breath, shaking her head as if scolding a misbehaving child. She snaps on her latex gloves, her movements slow and practiced, stretching the moment as if she enjoys watching my desperation.
It’s nothing new. It’s been my hell since I was brought here.
From the time I was first placed under her care years ago.
"We’ve been over this, Jael," she says, her tone dripping with condescension. She gestures to one of the orderlies, who picks up the paper cup of pills and shakes it tauntingly. The pills rattle against the paper insides and make my stomach lurch.
"Open your mouth," the orderly instructs, stepping closer to the side of the bed.
I shake my head and press my lips together.
No more pills. No more sedatives. No more currents of electricity sent pulsing through my body until I’m screaming, begging for it to end.
My heart races at the thought of what’s coming if I disobey. The walls seem to close in, the room shrinking as my fear swells. My body knows what comes next. It knows the pattern, the routine. Soon, they’ll hold me down and force the drugs into me. Soon, I’ll be too weak to fight…
I’m not sure how much longer I can hold on. Time has begun to feel like sand sifting to the bottom of an hourglass…
“Bront?!” I scream, the sound raw and frantic. “brONT?!”
If he’s here, if my shadow’s lurking like he’s always been, I need him. I need him more than I ever have before.
The room goes still.
The orderlies glance at Big Bird as if seeking direction. But she remains unfazed. Something sinister flashes across her face, highlighted by the head mirror shining from her brow.
Without warning, she rushes forward and slaps a hand over my mouth. A muffled, panicked sound escapes from my throat as I writhe against her, my body trembling with effort.
Her lips curl into a smirk, her talon nails sinking into my cheek and drawing blood.
“Shut the hell up,” she hisses, venom in each word. “Nobody can hear you. Nobody will be coming. Nobody even gives a damn!”
I whimper beneath her palm, my mind on the only two people who bring me comfort. My sister and Bront?, both of whom are beginning to feel like figments of my imagination the longer I’m tethered to this bed. The more days go by and the more pills are jammed down my throat.
Nurse Big Bird seems to sense what’s on my mind because a flicker of cruel amusement passes across her face.
“Jael, how many times do we have to tell you? There is no Bront?. There is no shadow man. And your sister? She’s dead .”
“NO!” I scream despite myself. I’m silenced, her warm, latex palm still over my mouth, but I scream the desperate word anyway. A jolt of energy rushes me as I renew my protests, thrashing against the leather binds. “NOOOOOOO!”
“Sedate her. Now.”
Nurse Big Bird steps back and the orderlies hurry forward. The one on the right forces a metal gag between my lips to keep my mouth wide open. The other on the left snatches the paper cup of pills off the cart and pours them down my waiting throat. I sputter, coughing as the thick pills slip painfully down my esophagus in burning fashion.
But they’ve already moved onto the syringes.
They each take one in their hands and tap against the plastic barrel to check for bubbles.
“Please,” I cry, tears wetting my eyes. The sound’s gibberish with the metal gag in my mouth, but it bubbles out of me anyway.
The anguish, the desperation, the sense of helplessness that feels never ending.
Nurse Big Bird simply smiles and steps back, watching as if entertained. The needles pinch as they pierce my veins and the sedatives flow through me.
It’ll be a matter of minutes before I lose consciousness.
“Next time,” she warns, “we’ll be bringing in the ECT device. Maybe a few more shocks will scramble that brain the right way.”
She turns toward the door, her clean, perfect white shoes thudding against the floor as she leads the orderlies out. The cart rattles as they push it away, the sound fading as the door swings shut behind them.
Silence settles over the padded room once more. Cushioned walls that will filter out any noise I make, regardless of how loud.
I’m alone.
No one’s coming. No one knows, and if they did, they don’t care.
My body shakes with violent sobs. Tears pour down my cheeks as I stare blankly at the darkness and think about the times I used to see him lurking. He would always be there, waiting for me, watching me.
A comforting presence I didn’t even understand how to appreciate.
The effects of the drugs are already creeping up, reaching for me like a tide about to pull me under. My limbs grow heavier, weigh down to the bed by more than the leather straps. The room starts to feel like it’s spinning, blurring at the edges.
I turn my head anyway, searching the darkest corner of the room.
I stare into the void, praying that he’ll emerge. He’ll let me know I’m not alone and that he’s real. He’ll save me somehow and we’ll escape like before and find my sister. We’re in this together.
But the dark shapes in the room never shift. The corners remain empty.
There’s no one here.
A sick, nauseating sensation curls in my stomach, making me feel as if I am free-falling. I’m plunging into a black void that leads nowhere, doomed to repeat this hellish nightmare over and over again.
The possibility I had refused to consider before suddenly becomes too loud, too real.
What if Nurse Hinkley was right? What if Dr. Wolford has been right all along?
My sister’s dead… and Bront?’s never been real…
I don’t know what day it is.
Time bends inside this room, becoming a concept that feels unreal. I’m in and out of sleep, barely ever lucid enough for real thought.
The few moments in between where I am, the nurses return and stick more needles in my veins. They force more pills down my throat. Always with the vague promise they’ll return with worse if I don’t play nice.
The cart rattles outside the door and makes my stomach clench in fear. My head’s pounding, full of jumbled thoughts I can’t really piece together. This time, as the door falls open and the light spills in, it’s not Nurse Big Bird.
It’s him.
Dr. Wolford strolls inside in his patchwork blazer and round glasses. Behind him, two orderlies push the cart with the electroconvulsive therapy machine. It looks like a relic out of a time gone by, back when crazy houses really could punish their patients.
Not that that’s ever stopped Wolford and his team.
"Jael," Dr. Wolford says, stepping closer to the bed. "Are we ready to be good today?"
I don’t answer him. I’m not sure I have the energy to. I’ve been depleted, had it drained and zapped and sedated out of me.
Everything’s begun to have a drugged-up tint that doesn’t seem to wear off, like I’m being permanently altered in a way that’s messed with my perception.
I blink dazedly up at him as he exhales a sigh and then gestures to the orderlies. They slip into their usual routine hooking me up to the machine. They place the electrodes on my temple and then stand back to flick on the switch.
An immediate stench of burned metal fills the room, the machine buzzing to life.
“You know what this is for, Jael,” says Dr. Wolford. “We’ve told you what would happen if you didn’t cooperate.”
I clench my eyes shut and stifle the sob that seeks release. My mind drifts elsewhere like it’s done so many other times I’ve been in a session with Dr. Wolford. I’m still in the dark, still hidden away, but the room’s changed.
“Run,” comes the Russian voice in my ear. “Run from the monsters. Will they come find you?”
I take off through the long, confusing halls of the mansion. My sister’s beautiful music echoes no matter how far I go. No matter what closet I hide away in.
But I run anyway. I rush to get away before the monster finds me in the dark.
The switch flicks.
Electricity tears through the vague memory, burning through my skull, setting every nerve on fire. My back arches, muscles seizing, my mouth falling open in pure agony.
“We’ll start off simple,” Dr. Wolford says. “Tell me your age.”
I’m too delirious to make sense of his request, turning my head from side to side, babbling pleas. I look blearily up at the orderlies standing by the bed and mumble something about helping me.
Please. Please. PLEASE!
I scream desperately, starting to question whether in my head or out loud. I’m not sure as they peer down at me with casual indifference and await their next set of orders.
Dr. Wolford sighs. “Turn it up.”
A bolt of electricity sears through me so intensely, I’m knocked back into the dark closet. I’m hiding among the coats and hoping I’ve become invisible. I’m breathless from running, but also from the fear that beats inside my heart.
My sister plays and plays, the music beautiful but ugly.
It’s never good enough. They’re never satisfied.
“Tell me your age!” Dr. Wolford demands suddenly, and my eyes pop open with a gasp. “Tell me your age and I tell them to turn it down.”
“I… I…” I babble, tears slipping free. “Please…”
“Turn it up. Again. Until she learns.”
There’re feet approaching the closet door. The thick Russian accent calls out to me. It grows closer as I shrink deeper into the closet, hoping that this time it’ll work. My prayers to become invisible will come true.
My sister didn’t please them. She made mistakes, flubbed a key, and now it’s time to be punished…
The electric jolt rips me back to the bed, where I’m forced to look up into Dr. Wolford’s smug, condescending face as he demands to know if my sister is alive.
“Answer the question, Jael. Is your sister alive?”
I can hear her music playing. The sprawling notes fill every corner of the large home, even as she flubs a key and our mother screams at her. Even as the closet door is drawn open and the monster finally finds me.
“Tell me what you believe,” Dr. Wolford grits out, losing any patience. He looks across the bed at the orderly closest to the machine. “Turn it up. Turn it up ’til she learns.”
I scream and arch as the hot, prickling pain swallows me up.
None of it makes any sense. How can my sister be dead when I can hear her music? How can she be gone when I know deep down she’s alive?
The world as I know it shatters. Everything crumbles and nothing means anything anymore.
It doesn’t matter what’s real and what’s not. If I’m sane or if I’m crazy. It couldn’t matter less as Dr. Wolford barks his next question and the bones in my body vibrate from the intense, electric pain.
“Is he real?” he asks. “Does Bront?—the shadow man—exist?”
All noise falls away. My sister’s music fades and sobs come to a choking halt. I blink between wet, clumped lashes at Dr. Wolford as he glares down at me and waits on an answer.
The dark corners of the room may be empty, but I know deep in my being they weren’t before. I know with certainty he was there, he was among the shadows. Maybe not before in the closet, but at the hospital, on the road, at the cabin, everywhere else I have gone for years.
He was real and he saw me when none of them bothered to.
“Yes…” I croak, voice broken. “Yes… he’s real.”
Dr. Wolford’s expression tightens, his eyes subtly narrowing from behind his wire-framed, round glasses.
A long, intense silence passes where he stares down at me like a failed experiment he couldn’t find more nauseating, and then he barks his next order.
“Get out,” he snaps. “Both of you. Leave the room. Don’t bother with the machine, just go!”
They rush to make his request happen.
The door swings shut and the padded walls promise to keep whatever happens next a secret.
But I already know.
More tears fill my eyes as Dr. Wolford steps to the foot of the bed and his hands work to unbuckle his belt.
“You know what happens, Jael,” he says, smirking. “You know what happens when you don’t accept the treatment. I have to get creative. I have to make you adapt in other ways. You have no one to blame but yourself.”