Insanity (6 page)

Thinking about what happened with Dr. Watson earlier makes my head hurt. In fact my temples have been throbbing since I left his office. Dropping my fork, and pushing away my tray, I push two fingers into each side of my temples and begin massaging them. The man is complicated yet beautiful. That equals a beautiful, terrifying disaster.

He looked so stunned when I mentioned the word lobotomy. But according to Cynthia he ordered it on Suzette so why did he look so surprised and frightened? Or maybe he didn’t actually order it and Cynthia just assumed he did. I wonder if she knows him like I do or if he’s treating her as well. Because if she doesn’t know him, I could see how she’d come to assume that he might have been the one to order it. My first impression of him was that he had evil tendencies, but I’ve come to learn that he’s just not capable of that kind of cruelty.

Sometimes, when I look into Dr. Watson’s eyes, it’s like behind their hard surface is years and years of hidden agonizing pain. Of course he never really gets personal. He only wants to talk about me and my issues, then again that is his job, but sometimes I think a good treatment session might benefit him in a good way. There are times during our sessions where I feel like a huge weight has been lifted from chest. Like there is a flat metal beam inside of me pressing harder and harder on my lungs, suffocating me. And when I tell him about something troubling me, I feel the metal bar disappear and I can breathe again.

Once I mentioned Damien to him. Even though he was assertive—as always—and responded to my comment, I swear when I mentioned Damien he flinched. I don’t know why, but I decided that maybe it would be best if I didn’t bring Damien up again. At least when I was around Dr. Watson anyway.

Aurora is nosy as hell when it comes to Damien. Yesterday he left a note in my room, telling me to meet him in the utility closet again tonight and my private joy was interrupted when Aurora peaked over my shoulder and asked, “Ohhh, who is that from?”

Panicked, I clutched the note to my chest and snapped, “Nobody.”

As the weeks passed we’ve seemed to open up to each other, but part of me still feels like I can’t trust her and during our conversations, I’ve been more forthcoming with information about myself than she has ever been. That makes me wonder things about her. Like exactly how long she’s been here? What she was put in here for? And why if she’s been here so long, (which I assume has to be long because she knows the ins and outs of this place) has she made no attempt to at least try and figure out a way to get out?

I ask her this question as we’re lying in bed and while I wait for her to fall asleep so I can go meet, Damien. “Aurora, have you ever tried to get out of here?”

She’s quiet for a moment then the sound of the springs in her mattress squeak as she rolls over onto her right side to face me. “Once.” There’s pain in her voice.

I know that maybe I shouldn’t press her on the subject, but I do anyway. “What happened?”

She lets out a long ragged breath and rolls back over. My head turns toward her and I can see her staring at the ceiling through the darkness. “I got caught.”

I choke on a gasp. “You tried to break out. I meant like why haven’t you tried in the treatment sessions to get better. Like isn’t there a way for you to show them that you’re doing better and ready to go home?”

“I told you before.” There’s a mixture of pain and misery in her voice. “You don’t get better. You don’t get out. So you just try to make the best of it.”

The best of it? In my eyes, there is no
the best of it
in this situation. Basically, I feel like I’m
fucked
either way. “I don’t think I can,” I tell her.

“You’ll learn to.” Her voice is soft. “I did.” Her breathing is heavy. “One girl I know actually escaped.”

Her words breathe hope into my lungs. “What, who?” This is the most marvelous news I’ve heard in the last month.

“It doesn’t matter,” she mutters. “You wouldn’t know her.”

I frown into the darkness, focus on the white ceiling, and play with my fingers. “Well, if I don’t know her, how do you? Haven’t we been here for the same amount of time?”

“No,” she scoffs and rolls over to face the wall. “I’ve been here seven years.”

“Seven years!” I almost shout then cover my mouth and lower my voice to a whisper. “Seven years? How old are you?”

“Almost twenty four.”

A deep, painful stab of remorse blossoms in my heart and I almost start crying. Part of me feels bad for bringing the subject up in the first place, but there’s another part of me who’s glad because now I know what I’m up against if I ever want to try and break free of the shackles that bind me to this place. There’s a throbbing ache pounding in my side as I look over at Aurora, her back to me. This poor, poor girl. She’s spent a good portion of her life locked up in the asylum, too afraid to even hope for a future. “Aurora?”

“Yeah?” Her voice is barely above a whisper.

“What did you do to end up here?”

She traces a circle on the tiled wall with her finger. “That’s not something I like to talk about.”

“Okay,” I say slowly. “Well then can you tell me what happened to you when you tried to escape?”

She doesn’t answer. The silence seems to stretch on for seconds, minutes, possibly even an hour, but I stay in my bed, even though my time with Damien is getting close, I have to know this. Finally, Aurora clears her throat, and she’s breathing in and out rapidly like her spilling this piece of information to me might cause her enormous amounts of pain. Then finally she rolls over to face me again, looks at me with hurt dancing around in her big brown eyes, and says, “They took me to the basement.”

My lungs clench, refusing to expand. I’m pretty sure I stopped breathing for an entire minute, then I finally croak, “No.”

“Yes,” she hisses. “You should feel privileged. I’ve never told anybody that before.”

“What did they do to you?”

“No.” I hear the thick layer of emotion in her voice then a sniffle. She’s crying and my heart breaks for her. I think about getting up from my cot, going over to her and holding, comforting her, but then again, I don’t know her well enough to know if she likes that sort of thing. I know I would if I was upset. Then she says, “Just don’t bring that up again, okay? It’s number one on my list of the things I don’t like to talk about. I’m sure, you have one of those lists too.”

“I do.”

“I’m pretty sure everyone here has one of those lists or we wouldn’t be here in the first place.”

“I agree.” I yawn and roll over to face the wall as a startling revelation sets in; that maybe, Aurora is trustworthy, and that maybe despite the crazy act that she puts on for the staff and the patients that she’s actually a lot smarter than she lets on.

Chapter 7

~BEFORE~

It has been weeks since I’ve spoken to Damien. And twenty one days without speaking to him has been torture.

He calls me.

He comes to my window.

He’s stalked me in the mornings while I take my walks. Just yesterday, I had barely gotten out of my driveway and he showed up behind me, purplish crescents under his eyes, a slouch in his normally perfect posture. “Addy, please,” he’d begged. “Just talk to me. Please.”

I continued ignoring him. I wished I could have told him that this was the last thing I wanted. I wished I could have told him to cover me with a blanket of his arms and never let go. To smother me with his body heat and melt the ice in my veins. But I didn’t. Because I knew what I was doing by trying to push him away. I knew this was going to be better for him. He might have thought that he loved me and can’t live without me, but he would change his mind eventually. He would have to.

The only thing is; he’s so insistent.

I walk out my front door, closing it behind me and there he is, strutting toward me. I close my eyes and sigh, then start walking. Damien remains a few paces behind me and shouts, “I promise you, Adelaide, you can’t shut me out forever! I’ll be here every day until you talk to me!”

Until you leave for college, next month, I think.

I can’t help but wonder what we’d be like if things were different. What if I came from a normal, respected family? What if my mother would have stayed and raised me the way a young lady should be raised? What if my father wasn’t abusive and known to everyone as the town drunk? Would our relationship be accepted then? Would we be able to be that happy and loving couple I’d always dreamed we’d be?

The possibility of that scenario plunges into my heart like Juliet stabbing herself with a dagger at the thought of living her life without her Romeo. A throbbing ache surges through me and I decide that that image is too painful to think about it. This isn’t Shakespeare. This is my life. And Damien and I are not a pair of star-crossed lovers.

It’s cloudy today. There is no sun in the sky and the wind is heavy. The normal summer humidity is non-existent. A gust of wind sweeps over my skin and sends a chill down my spine. I shiver and pump warmth back into my arms, cursing myself for not checking the weather before I came outside for my walk.

Damien still lingers behind me. I can hear the scrape in his steps as his shoes scuff against the gravel and the concern in his voice when he says, “Are you cold?”

I don’t answer him. I pick up my feet and walk faster.

He catches up to me and falls in line with my steps. Looking away, I gaze out into a field of long grass, my eyes on the green and yellow blades as they twirl around and whip back and forth in the wind. Damien lets out a frustrated sigh. “You have to stop this. Just look at me, Addy.”

I don’t.

“When are you going to stop being so damn stubborn?”

My gaze shifts to the ground and I kick a pebble down the road, thinking; when will you get the picture and leave me alone. I know that the thought is a fantasy. It’s been weeks and he hasn’t let up yet. Am I
that
worth it? Is a simple girl with a slumdog family worth all of this effort? His mother doesn’t think so.

I’ve only met Marlena Allen one time and meeting
that
woman once was plenty. Damien doesn’t seem like he could be his mother’s child because he’s so different and she’s so typical. By typical, I mean for a wealthy woman. Since meeting her I’ve learned that wealthy people have a certain agenda on what they want their children to do with their lives, and according to Marlena Allen I don’t fit into Damien’s agenda or more like her and his father’s agenda for him.

At the beginning of the summer Damien had invited me over their house for dinner. Daddy had managed to pass out really early for the night, so I put on the nicest dress I owned and crawled out my window with an anxious, excited feeling swirling through me. I was actually going to meet Damien’s family. And for some reason I thought that they would be just like him.

I was wrong.

Well, not completely wrong. I instantly liked Damien’s father, Lucas. He was kind, had friendly blue eyes just like Damien, and was welcoming. He gripped my hand and shook it, “It’s great to finally meet you, Adelaide. Damien speaks very highly of you,” he’d said greeting me with a smile.

But not Marlena.

She was frigid, a thick layer of ice in her emerald eyes, a flush on her peach cheeks, a straight line on her full lips. “Hello, Adelaide,” she’d said coolly. Timidly I shook her hand while she gave me a stare down that made all the hairs on my arms stand up. Her handshake was firmer than Damien’s father’s and I knew by the tightness in her grip and the icy glare in her eyes that she hated me.

After dinner she confirmed that theory when she plastered a fake smile on her luscious pink lips and crooked her arm through mine. “Let’s go for a walk, dear, shall we?” Her voice oozed sarcasm and plastic kindness and I glanced over my shoulder to Damien for help. I was hoping that he’d notice the panicked look in my eyes and save me from his mother’s snakelike grasp and venomous tone. But he didn’t see me. He was heavily engaged in a conversation with his father and brother. That gave Marlena just enough time to yank me through the back door and away from any hope I had for Damien being able to come to my rescue.

The moment we stepped outside she pulled her arm away, strolled away from the door—and away from hearing range—heading toward the lake behind their home. Her back was to me and as I approached warily, she beckoned me closer with a flit of her wrist. I knew she must have been the one who came from old money just by that gesture. I might be naïve and sheltered, but I remember seeing people like Marlena in the department stores the few times Daddy took me shopping. They held their noses high in the air, looking down on the employees of the store just because they worked as sales associates. Not only did I find that insulting, but disgusting as well.

I guessed I’d never truly understand the differences in the social hierarchy. Some people had to work and some people had everything handed to them because of who their parents were, their grandparents were and so on and so forth. Personally, I would have rather worked to get where I needed to be in life.

I stepped up next to Marlena and followed her gaze to a group of swans, gliding across the calm murky waters of the lake. My eyes centered on a swan right in the middle as the beautiful creature stretched its white wings, and dipped its head beneath the light brown water. I knew Marlena was studying me. I could feel her cold glare as it broke through my skin and turned all the blood in my veins to frost. “I think you know why I asked you to come out here,” she said, a matter of fact tone to her voice.

“Somewhat,” I replied, weakly.

“Now, don’t play oblivious, darling. I know you’re smarter than that.”

Her snide remark blasted through my core and sent shock waves of anger plummeting through my body. I’d never been the angry or disrespectful type, but something about Damien’s mother, and her arrogant, elitist attitude made me react in ways I’d never reacted before. I clenched my fists at my sides, gritted my teeth, and inhaled deeply. Marlena worked her way around me, stopping in front of me to block my view of the lake. I lifted my gaze to meet hers. “What do you want from me?”