Chapter 7
Free time is both the best and worst thing about this place, I’ve decided.
There are enough wandering orderlies and guards that there’s not a lot of chance of something traumatic happening.
Especially since any object that could be used for self harm or just harm in general is carefully locked up somewhere none of us know about.
Plastic utensils included, since they’re all disposed of under an employee’s careful eye after every meal.
I’ve never felt more like I’m in prison, and every single hour has me promising myself rather vehemently to never end up in this situation again. No matter what. I’m not sure how being here can help anyone, since it certainly isn’t helping me.
Flipping through the book I’m “reading,” I realize I’m hardly paying attention to it. There are no good books on the bookshelves of the solarium on the second floor, with most of them being dry non-fiction stories or autobiographies.
God forbid the mental patients get smut or romantasy, I suppose. Who knows what we might do with such clandestine, taboo topics?
A noise makes me glance up from the small alcove I’m sitting in under a window.
As a long time floor-sitter, I don’t need a chair to make myself comfortable.
In fact, I’m curled up with my legs under me, a pillow on my lap to support my arms as I lean against the cool wall behind me and listen to the wind outside as I read.
It’s nice enough outside that most of the others are using their free time to go outside or at least somewhere more interesting than the empty, and slightly dusty solarium on the second floor.
But I like my alone time, and I like just listening.
I lower my hands and the book to the pillow, stroking my thumb over the cover as I listen again.
I’m not sure what the sound could’ve been, especially since I haven’t heard it again.
A door, maybe, or just one of the many ancient pipes that groan and pop in this place.
It could be anything, and none of the things it could be are any of my business.
Especially when I’m trying to keep myself out of anyone else’s business, in fear of having to stay here longer.
Two more nights. That’s all I need to suffer through. It’s already almost nightfall, and I tell myself that it’s basically one and a half nights before I’m out of here. Thirty-six hours, if the bus is on time Sunday morning.
Counting down the minutes probably doesn’t help very much, truthfully, but I can’t seem to get my mind off of it.
With a sigh, I look down at the book I’m holding, disappointed.
Out of all the options on the shelves, this one, with a few stories of the history of Bluebone Ridge, felt the most promising.
Still, the chronicle of how this place was built and became self-sufficient up in the mountains is drier than I hoped it would be.
Honestly, I’d rather read a shopping list than this. I hoped for something other than factual accounts and explanations on architecture. I wanted stories about how this place came to be. Not?—
The solarium door opens, then closes sharply with a flurry of movement.
Hattie presses herself against it, sagging, and her shoulders shake as she presses her head to the heavy wood.
My heart twists in concern, and I slowly, carefully get to my feet.
She hasn’t seen me, that much is certain.
But I’m not sure if I should involve myself in whatever is happening here.
Please, don’t let me regret this, I plead silently.
Setting down my pillow and book, I clear my throat so she knows I’m here, but Hattie doesn’t turn from the door.
She’s swaying a little, and her curly red hair obscures her features from me.
Like every time I’ve seen her since my arrival, she looks unkempt and a little unwell.
“Hey…” I greet, creeping closer to her. She’s never struck me as someone who’s violent, but I still can’t help wanting to be careful. My stomach twists a little in concern, and I take a step to the side, giving her more of an opportunity to actually see me. “Hattie?”
At her name, she whirls around, eyes wide, and studies my face with a look of panicked confusion. Once she sees it’s me, however, the panic fades, and she slumps back against the door as if she can barely hold up her weight. “Fern,” she sighs out, like it’s a relief.
“Yeah, it’s just me. Are you?—”
“What are you doing here?” she asks, as if I hadn’t been speaking. Her eyes move rapidly over the medium-sized room, going everywhere like there’s some hidden threat to be found.
I try to seem relaxed and at ease, but it’s a losing battle. So I smile kindly at her and say, “I’m just reading. I’m sort of tired, and I was just hoping to find?—”
“No, no.” She shakes her head and runs a hand through her hair, looking frustrated. “No, what are you doing here?”
It takes me a moment to guess her meaning.
But telling an unwell mental patient who definitely needs to be here the details of my issues isn’t what I signed up for today.
Then again, it’s not like she’s going to judge me, and I doubt she’s going to tell anyone.
“I hurt myself.” With a sigh, I show her my bandaged hand.
She reaches out with jerky movements, and latches onto my wrist with a surprisingly strong grip.
“Oh…no…you shouldn’t—” Her eyes find mine, mournful at my admission. “No, that’s not fair. That’s not right.”
“You’re telling me,” I agree dryly, trying to grin and mostly failing. Not that she really seems to notice. Her thumb strokes over the bandage, and I swear she seems to fidget without really moving. But I’ve noticed Hattie is so restless all the time, not just now.
“Do you need me to get you some help?” I ask at last, letting her draw me over to the window where I was reading before.
My stomach clenches nervously at not knowing what she’s doing, and the sudden fear that she’s going to launch forward and gnaw out my throat.
But I remind myself I’m being stupid, and feeding into stereotypes.
Hattie has never done anything to me, and she seems pretty nice, all things considered.
“No.” Her voice is soft as she turns to lean against the window. She brings her hand up, and by extension mine too, until she can press them both to the glass before turning to stare out the thick, wavy pane with thoughtful contemplation. “You saw them.” Her words aren’t a question.
But somehow, I know exactly what she means.
I look out the window as well, worrying my bottom lip between my teeth.
“I don’t know,” I say finally, my words slow and unsure.
“What is it you think I saw?” There’s nothing out there now.
I haven’t seen anything strange at all today, except this morning with Cairo in the shed.
And not to mention Hattie in the bathroom after group therapy, though I can’t be sure she remembers that.
She doesn’t answer right away. Instead, her fingers trace shapes in the glass, though without it being foggy, nothing is showing up.
She just stands there with both of our hands on the glass, like I haven’t asked her anything.
But I’m good at being patient when I really need to be.
Though I’m sure my mother would disagree with that statement.
So I just watch her, hoping she’ll be ready to explain.
“They’re just so hungry, he says. And I’ve seen them.
” I don’t know what she’s talking about, and it feels like I missed the first half of the conversation.
I think back, scanning my brain for any clue at all about what she’s trying to say, but I find nothing.
Nothing echoes back at me, and without an explanation from her, I don’t think I’ll be able to decipher what the hell she means.
“Who’s hungry? And who says? What are you?—”
From the corner of my eye, movement in the trees outside catches my attention and I turn to look, just as I hear Moro barking from somewhere in the courtyard, though the sound dwindles after only a few seconds.
Not only that, but I now can’t see anything in the trees, no matter how hard I look.
It makes me wonder if I was just imagining things in my sudden paranoia.
“Hattie, what is going on here?” Stepping closer to her, I reach up with my other hand to lightly grip her arm, hoping I don’t scare her away but also striving to get her full attention on me.
It works, in a way.
Hattie looks at me with wide brown eyes, the freckles spattered over her nose looking stark against her paleness.
Her hands come up to mirror mine, gripping my sleeves just under my shoulders before she leans in until our foreheads are almost touching.
“They’re starving ,” she whispers with wide eyes and a tremble in her voice.
“You don’t understand, Fern, how hungry they are.
He showed me what they look like. He told me they deserve to eat. ”
“Who showed you? What did he show you?” More and more, I’m starting to wonder if this is her delusions speaking, rather than something real.
I’m almost embarrassed to be so drawn into it when I know she’s troubled and really needs help.
She’s not talking sense, and she’s not saying anything I can interpret, I’m sure.
Voices outside catch my attention. When I turn at the sound of frantic footsteps, Hattie grips my arms more tightly.
“It’s not what you think.” Her words are rapid, panicked.
“They aren’t like us, and they’re so hungry.
You can’t hate them when they did what they had to in order to survive.
” The words ring familiar, but I’m too distracted by the steps and voices getting nearer.
“Hattie—”
“They’ve never had someone say hi to them before. They liked the message on your window.”
My blood goes cold, and I turn back to her, feeling like the world is spinning under me. “How do you know?—”
But I don’t get to finish the question. The door snaps open, revealing two women, one of whom is the orderly who showed me around yesterday. “She’s in here!” she calls back to the other employees, and Hattie jerks away from me, shoving me hard enough that I stumble.
“I wasn’t lost,” a confused, slightly hysterical Hattie snaps to them. “I don’t need help.”
But Esther’s smile says otherwise. She doesn’t so much coax Hattie out as drag her, with the help of her cohort, though she turns to give me a concerned look over her shoulder before she goes. “Did she hurt you?” Esther asks, looking me over.
I shake my head, not sure what to say. “N-no,” I stammer at last, leaning back against the window again with my arms wrapped around myself like I need the support. “No, she just…” But I trail off under Esther’s watchful eye before taking a breath to steady myself. “She just wanted to talk.”
But even once they’re gone and I can no longer hear Hattie arguing with the orderlies, I don’t move.
I stand there, against the window, feeling suddenly very alone but not at the same time, and wondering how the hell Hattie knows what I wrote on my window that faded within a minute, when she hadn’t been there to see it.