Page 155 of Lost in the Dark
I don’t even know who is talking anymore, all their voices drone on and on, speaking sporadic nonsense. Well, unlike these fools, my patience has already worn thinner than a frozen lake about to devour the innocent and kill the masses.
As I leave my seat, I think I hear my name, but I bury it away with the rest of the prisoners here. Wandering down the quiet hall, the scent of disinfection becomes stronger. They wish to rid this place of the evidence that follows us. The smell becomes so strong, it singes my nose hairs and makes me cough…and then laugh. Of course, I would die from the inside out. Wasn’t that always my fate?
These routines tire me. In and out, in and out, it’s all the same. Nothing is as satisfying as a simple nap or fucking something hot.
And Journee has left me.
A nap it is, then.
I wander down the men’s hall and stare into all the empty rooms that hold the energy of the dreary and half-dead. Trinkets from past lives left on side tables and folders of paperwork for the new intakes.
I stop in my tracks, look left and right, and stealthily walk into the open room. The manilla folder on the made bed calls to my curiosity, and this day has already been oh-so-boring.
My head tilts as I read the name: Thibodeaux Broussard.
Fascinating.
“Benjamin! What are you doing here? Get out. This is not your assigned room.”
Red, red hands as they say. I’m caught. Smiling, I lift my gaze to the mental health worker standing at the doorway with his arms crossed.
“I seem to have lost myself for a moment, but I kept my hands to myself, you see.” I extend them out for his perusal.
Mister Harris doesn’t seem convinced, and it entertains me. They all try to find our faults—exploit them all—so they can write in their little logs about us. Well, there’s nothing much he can write aboutthis.
“Is Mrs. Aquino available? My company was requested earlier, and I don’t wish to disappoint.” I walk toward him and he backs up and keeps a good three feet between us.
Itskout loud and he narrows his eyes in response but says not a word.
“You do hurt my feelings, Mister Harris. What have I ever done to you to deserve such treatment?” I smile, because that’s just what I do.
“It’s not me I’m worried about.” So he says as he continues to try his best to not be within touching distance of me.
“What has you worried, hmm? Have I not been the prime example of a good resident since my stay?” I innocently ask.
I know exactly what they all think of me. I know exactly what they all assume. Their desire to believe falsities because of what is written down in files makes my head twitch in annoyance. My smile falters into a sneer right before I bite the air and turn on my heel to head toward Misses Aquino’s office.
“Benji. How are things?” She asks, as if there aren’t eyes in every corner of this facility. I’ll play her little word games.
“It’s been grand, of course. Like a Holiday Inn Express, just with more…tenantsthan I would like.”
She shakes her head and smiles as she looks over my file in her lap. How many times must she have read through it before my arrival in preparation?
The boy who’s been a victim to his mother’s mental games. The hospital stays, the search for different doctors to find what’s wrong with him, when what was wrong was right there all long…creeping in the shadows of his bed as he slumbered peacefully, unknowing that it was his own blood that would plot his downfall.
Munchausen’s by proxy.
Her death was sudden, but no answers were to be found. No, not in this lifetime.
I’ve survived what I could through the foster system until I was released into the wild. But the damage was already done, and I found myself lost in the sea of normality that I was never allowed to experience. Nothing was what it seemed, and reality was more bitter than my emotions toward the woman who gave birth to me.
I brought myself here, if not for the reprieve from society but for the mere ability to stop drowning in my own mind. Their structures and expectations all proved to be detrimental to my mentality—the thin strand that kept me whole was severed, and I tore into the first body next to me. I couldn’t scratch the itch that crawled on my skin, from their voices to their looks—from their judgments, to their condemnation.
“Now, Lithium is no longer allocated in this facility. The doctor switched you to a different medication. Let me know if you feel any different side effects, and we’ll meet again to see if the doctor can prescribe something else.”
All these cocktails make the mind go from one extreme to the next. She doesn’t even look me in the eye as she says this, always just writing away in her little notebook. Sometimes I wonder if these little nuggets they shove into my mouth are even helping, or just making this worse? I tilt my head and stare at the top of hers. Her dark hair shadows her face so I cannot tell what she’s thinking.
“You’ve been here much longer than you initially intended. Have your plans changed?” Her voice breaks me from the mental musings, and my head twitches slightly before I smile in response.