Chapter 4
The rest of the ‘tour’ passes with me thinking of approximately two things that I can’t get out of my head.
The man in the hall with the small smirk as he pressed a finger to his lips.
And, predictably, the dog.
It’s like a game of Pong in my brain as both topics battle for supremacy, though I’m sure Esther won’t want to hear about either as she shows me the hall of therapists’ offices, the rec center, both back courtyards where a sea of blue-clothed people exist in varying degrees of displeasure, and finally the dining hall.
My stomach twists as I remember I haven’t really eaten today, though not for lack of my mother trying to get food at the hospital.
When she’d offered to bring me something, the nurse jumped down her throat and told her it wasn’t protocol, and to my mom’s credit, she tried to argue. She told the nurse I’m quick to get nauseating headaches from hunger, but the nurse only shrugged.
Really, Whippoorwill Baptist will forever be on my shit list, I’ve decided. And the idea of making an account online just to leave them a strongly worded poor review is incredibly appealing.
“Any questions?” Esther asks, stopping outside of a room in the women’s residential wing. She already told me in stern terms that women are not allowed in the men’s wing and vice-versa, as if I’m an unruly, sex crazed teenager looking to bang every eligible inpatient in my seventy-two hour stay.
Not that I’d let that comparison slip out loud, of course.
“Uh, no,” I murmur, stroking my fingers over the sterile blue cotton of the clothes she gave me to change into. They’re unappealing at best. At worst…well, at least I’m in good company, I suppose. After all, not everyone in residence can be a serial killer, statistically speaking.
Probably.
“You have four hours until dinner. In two hours, you’ll need to be at Dr. Hallman’s office.
You remember where that is?” she asks, putting that stern edge into her voice.
I nod in agreement, and graciously accept my sneakers back on top of my new outfit, now bereft of their dirty white laces that I clearly could’ve used to strangle myself.
“I suggest you spend some time in your room, or if you like, you could head to one of the courtyards. Any closed door with a STAFF ONLY sign is off limits, and going in won’t win you any favors.
” I nod again, and this time Esther steps up, her hands coming up to embrace me in what I’m sure she thinks is a warm, convincing way.
Not that I believe it.
“I know the stories that go around about Bluebone Ridge…” She sighs, giving me her best understanding smile.
“I know you really don’t want to be here.
You’re taking this really well.” She offers me another kind look that feels just as put on as the rest of her current speech.
But I give her my own smile, hoping I look appropriately reassured.
Which I am not.
When she leaves, I walk into the room Esther showed me, changing quickly into the stretchy, powder blue outfit.
It’s certainly not that flattering, and with my pale blonde hair, it just serves to make me look more washed out than usual.
Not that I can see much of myself in the small, bolted down bathroom mirror.
Touching it proves that it’s definitely safety glass, and it occurs to me that it has to be. After all, wouldn’t want those of us with suicidal natures offing ourselves, I suppose. But the reality of it only makes me feel worse.
I’m not fucking suicidal.
I don’t want to kill myself.
How do I explain that I just get overwhelmed? That sometimes I can’t help how I feel, and how nothing seems real?
“Fuck,” I murmur, reaching up to run my fingers through my hair.
Leaving the bathroom, I take a moment to look around the small room with its two twin-sized beds.
It’s not freezing, at least. The door is heavy, with a small window at face level that looks way too much like a cell for me.
So I don’t look at it. Instead I go to the window, pressing my nose against the cold, thick glass to look at the wavy mountain outside.
Not that I can see much, given that the treeline starts only a few feet from the window.
Tall and thick, they look like they’ve been left to grow untamed since this place was built.
And honestly, they probably have. Looking up shows me the sight of other, taller mountains in the range, and I lean back just to breathe against the window, fogging it up.
With a small smile on my face, I reach up with my index finger, dragging it up and down until the word hi stares back at me in the fog. When it starts to fade, I breathe on the glass again, a stupid, rueful grin on my face.
Until something outside in the woods catches my gaze through the foggy glass. I jump in surprise, going up on my toes to look through the trees, expecting to see an elk or something similar.
But there’s nothing.
No movement in the dark pine needles, or anywhere else on the grounds. There’s no movement, though from somewhere far away I hear the sound of barking that I assume must be Moro. It fades after a few moments, leaving me standing there, staring through the thick glass and looking at nothing again.
“You won’t be able to open it.” The voice makes me jump, and I whirl around to look at the open door behind me.
Standing there is a girl probably around my age, with dark circles prominent under her eyes and a frown on her lips.
She tilts her head to look at me, surveying my face for a few moments as I just stare back at her.
“You get your own room,” she goes on, stepping inside and glancing at both made beds. “That’s pretty nice. Well, I don’t know actually…” She looks thoughtfully out the window behind my head, then back at me. “It gets a little creepy up here in the mountains. I’m Sam.”
“Fern,” I reply automatically, clutching my fingers against my injured hand reflexively.
It hurts enough to be grounding, but not enough to really distract myself from the situation.
I look her over, trying to see past the exhaustion and the dark circles to something other than her dry grin.
But really, that’s the most noticeable thing about her, apart from us matching in our powder blue ‘client’ uniforms.
“Are you here for a while, or…?” she trails off, leaning against the doorframe with her arms folded. My stomach twists around nothing, reminding me not for the first time that I haven’t eaten today, and I threw away my one source of sustenance this morning at the coffee shop.
Was that really only this morning?
It seems so much longer than that, though realistically I know it was only maybe nine hours ago now since I left the coffee shop to go home.
Yet another strike against Whippoorwill Baptist is that I was in a room, starving, trying to doze for a good five hours of my day, at least. Probably closer to six.
They really will be getting a strongly worded review from me, whenever I’m free from Bluebone’s haunted halls. “Hopefully not.” I sigh, reaching up to run my fingers through my blonde hair. “From what I’ve heard, it’s just a seventy-two hour thing.”
“Ah.” Sam nods, seemingly reading between the lines. “Tried to kill yourself? Hurt yourself? Mentioned around someone that you might be a little depressed?” Her eyes lock onto my hand, and I rush to link my fingers behind my back a little self-consciously.
“Something like that.” She’s a little too close for comfort to the truth, though I don’t know why I care. After all, I doubt she’s in a better situation. “What about you?”
“This is my third stay. I’ve been here a month so far, this time.
” Sam seems so cavalier about it that I glance up at her, surprised, only to see her dry, humorless grin widen.
“I meant it, when I did it.” She shows me her wrists, which are scarred with tally marks that stand out, stark against her skin.
I find myself biting my lip, and I gaze up at her, seeing more than the dark circles and the unhappy smile. “Sorry,” I murmur, which seems to surprise her.
“Why?”
But I’m unsure how to respond to her, so I look down, unable to meet her eyes. “Because you deserve better.”
“You don’t know me.” I can hear the confusion in her words, but I only shrug, unable to really explain better. I can’t help the sympathy that twists my heart like a wet rag, or how I suddenly want the best for this girl who I’ve only known for five minutes.
“Hey, umm.” Seeking to change the subject, I latch onto the first thing I can think of. “When I got here, I saw this other woman. She looked sort of…unwell.” My arms cross in front of my chest, and I can’t help repeating the tapping motion of my fingers on my arm as I think about her.
Sam snorts and relaxes, then walks into my room to sit on the bed closest to the door. The one I haven’t touched. She curls her legs up under her, feet bare. I follow suit, figuring I don’t really need my shoes on floors that are surprisingly not as cold as I expected.
It feels better immediately, without my laceless sneakers threatening to slip off at any moment, and I mirror her on the other bed as she says with a little smirk, “We’re all sort of unwell here. I’ll need a little more than that to know who you mean.”
Again I bite my lip, wondering if I should just laugh it off instead. I don’t want her thinking I’m worse off than I am. But then again, what exactly can Sam really do, when she’s in a shittier situation than I am?
“She was tapping.” I emulate the motion on my arm, tapping out in counts of three. “And when I first saw her, she was looking up at the corner of the room, like there was something there. There wasn’t,” I add, just to be clear. “Then she looked at me and said?—”