No one waits for me on the other side. From the tiny sliver I can see, the hallway appears to be empty…aside from the frowning faces looking down at me from the portraits lining the walls. Why pick such unhappy faces? It’s like some kind of torture, some kind of constant reminder that there is no escape…not even from inside.
I nudge the door open a sliver more, my eyes dropping from the peculiar portraits to the edge of the tattered carpet—and I spot what’s been left behind.
It’s my shoes.
The black leather pumps are unmistakably mine; recognizable from the scuffed-up toe, the little marks at the inside where I rub my feet together subconsciously, and the dried blood still caked to the bottom of the right heel.
Beside me, the hinges creak as I dare to push the door open just a fraction more. I glance up and down the hallway, but seeing no sign of the boy who left this gift or the orderly that would surely find a way to punish me for it, I snatch up the shoes and step swiftly back inside.
It isn’t until the latch clicks into place behind me, my back pressed to the door and my chest heaving with the surprising adrenaline of such a small action, that I realize my mistake.
My terrible, horrible mistake.
It starts with a faint clicking sound. It’s like a whisper, like the distant shift of fallen leaves. I feel a surprisingly overwhelming surge of emotion at the sight and touch of the patent pumps in my hands. I’ve not even been here two days, but already I feel a strong connection to anything holding me to the world outside these walls.
I think it’s because of this that I’m not more careful. I’m so engorged by the normalcy of the items in my hand that I don’t look closer.
Until it’s too late.
I see a shadow move. A tiny flash, a black blur, from inside one of the shoes.
My eyes peer into the blackness, and for just a moment the blackness peers back. And then it swarms out.
I stand frozen as it pours like ink up my fingers, my wrists, up my arms. But it isn’t ink. It isn’t blackness. It lives.
It’s spiders.
Hundreds and hundreds of spiders.
For the first time since arriving, I wish I was truly insane. I wish this was a vision, a picture made up inside my mind.
But it is so unfortunately, undeniably, real.
I would scream, but somehow my brain registers the sound of footsteps outside in the corridor. They’re slower, heavier. Craven is back.
I fight the urge to throw the shoes against the wall, ignoring every instinct in my body to frantically attack my own arms and torso as the creatures spread across my skin like a feverish tingle.
Some part of me knows I’m going to need these shoes. I’ve used them once before, I might need to use them again.
That and, as much as I’m struggling to banish the image of these spiders pouring into every orifice of my body, I still need them. I need this connection to the outside world. I need this reminder that there was something before this place.
So, as much as it pains me, I set the shoes down carefully and begin methodically, as quietly as humanly possible given the circumstances, squishing the spiders spreading across my body. I can barely keep from vomiting. I feel bile rise in my throat, feel panic and fear simmer just below the surface. I have to close my eyes for a while, feeling across my body for every touch, every tingle.
Even when I’m sure I’m the perfect picture of crushed spider parts and arachnid blood, my skin crawls like it’s still swarming with the insects. I’m not sure it’ll ever not feel like it’s swarming with the creatures again.
I stuff the fear and panic deep down into a place even I can’t reach inside me, and I steal the pillowcase off Adelaide’s pillow and use it to mop up the blood and spider parts from my body, the floor, and the shoes.
I find a few more and have to fight the further urge to frenziedly stomp them into oblivion, instead painstakingly crushing each straggler I find with the tip of my index finger. The whole process doesn’t take more than two sunlit-bricks worth of time, but it feels like an eternity.
If I didn’t come into this place insane, this place sure has a way of trying to turn me that way.
No, not this place.
It’s inmates. It’s guards. It’s doctors.
There’s something sour here in the asylum. I suspected it before, but standing here over the bodies of the creatures meant to frighten me out of my own mind, I know it now.
If anyone looks closely at me they’ll see the evidence of it ground into my skin, crushed into my hair, pressed between the beds of my fingernails. If they check beneath Adelaide’s mattress, the only hiding place left in this whole hellish cell, they’ll find the shoes and the murderous pillowcase.
But what they won’t find is a broken girl.
It’s going to take a whole lot more than spiders to break me. I’ve already been broken a thousand times over, and each time I’ve come back stronger.
In trying to scare me, these boys have inadvertently given me the greatest gift of all. They’ve given up their secret.
They plan to bend me with fear. But that’s where the problem lies.
My whole life I’ve been tempered with fear. I’ve been molded by it. Shaped through it. No matter how long they’ve spent tormenting the souls within these walls, I’ve been tormented longer.
I’ve trained my whole life for this without knowing it.
Or maybe I did know it. Maybe I’ve always known it.
10
Kingsley
“You did what?”
I don’t know what reaction I expected from Price, but it wasn’t this.
From the room’s position on the top floor, the last tinges of orange light still catch on the edges of the windowpanes. All the rest of the asylum is cast in blue unforgiving shadow.
Price’s fingers wrap around the outside of his glass so tight that I can see the tips of his fingers turning white through the filmed surface. He stares at me unblinkingly, his mind working through what I just told them. As if he can’t believe what I just told him.
The tiniest flicker of uncertainty shudders out from inside me. I hide it behind a cocked head and stupid grin.
“I thought we had an understanding. After last time….we weren’t going to wait.”
“We also aren’t trying to completely break her on her first day,” Price says, finally looking away to pinch the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “You were supposed to be preparing the room.”
Ives sits still in the corner. He looks on, saying nothing. For some reason, this makes me feel anxious. I don’t like being looked at. I’ve had enough of that—enough of being treated like some specimen for observation.
“But we’re not going to need that right away. Not for days, weeks…” I trail off, bouncing on the balls of my feet as I gauge Price’s reaction, “surely not more than a couple months?”
Price snorts a bit, and at last, he almost cracks a smile. “I’m not as impatient as you, Kings, but even I’m not keen to wait that long.” As he says it, his eyes slide over to Ives and I know what he’s thinking. He licks his lips briefly, his tongue lingering for a moment. “Not when I didn’t get to…indulge…last time. But we do have to do this the right way.”
Ives stretches his fingers out over the ends of the armrests of his chair. “Don’t worry, I’ve got some time.” Both Price and I eye him a little skeptically, so he adds, “Even Ashford can only sneak out so many bodies in the back of a refrigerated truck before someone starts to notice.”
I force my shaking legs to still. “Fair enough. Wouldn’t want anyone getting suspicious.”
The idea of anyone actually caring to get suspicious is enough to make both Ives and Price let out an audible guffaw. Any last ice melts from Price like the last thaw of winter.
“If I thought killing the girl outright might actually change things around here, I’d go do it myself right now,” Price says, then turns to Ives. “But as it is…how long can you wait?”
/>
Ives ponders this for a moment, then gives a curt nod. “A couple weeks, I think. A month at most, if I get a little taste here and there.”
That makes Price’s eyebrows raise, but he doesn’t pry further. Ives is never wrong. More than either of us, he knows his body’s needs.
But it’s never been so short before. There was once a time, when I first came to the asylum, that Ives’ hunts were spaced nearly a year apart. Sometimes more.
Though none of us voices it, the truth of the thing hangs in the air.
At this pace, how long until there’s no end to Ives’ need?
“We’ll have to cool things off after your little episode with the spiders,” Price says, despite Ives’ disapproving grunt. “We don’t know what we’re dealing with yet—with the girl or the new director. I heard he’s keeping her on lockdown.”
“That won’t last long,” I say. “Not even the strong ones last more than a couple days.”
Price nods thoughtfully. “True. Strange what a few days of boredom will do.”
“Good thing we already took the mattress, then,” Ives says, muffling another displeased grunt. “Maybe that’ll speed things up a bit.”
An uneasy silence follows. It isn’t like Ives to be so impatient.
He’s not a psychopath. Not like me. He feeds a need, that’s all.
Unless he isn’t telling us the truth. The thought wheedles into my mind, unwelcome. I don’t want to think of it, but what if he’s losing more grip of his…problems…than we think?
To fill the space, Price pours himself a drink. “Give it a couple days. If she hasn’t caved by the end of the week…then maybe we can try to hurry it along a bit.”
Just the thought of a little fun should make my lips curl up and my mind race in anticipation, but a sudden sharp pain pierces the front of my skull. I lift up a hand to my temple, briefly letting my eyes flutter shut until the pain dulls a moment later. When I open them again, Price is offering a glass to me—and as much as I ache to take it, I make myself wave it away. Once again that flicker of uncertainty blooms inside me, and this time, I don’t think I’m able to completely hide it from him.
“You alright, Kings?” Price asks. He keeps his voice even, but he’s watching me closely over the top of his glass.
I let my hand drop back down to my side, ignoring the second flare of pain rearing behind my eyes. “It’s nothing. I just need some rest.”
Price purses his lips. “It’s that new director. He’s making you see Silver again?”
Just hearing the name makes my ears ring, and a snarl pulls up the corner of my mouth. “I’d like to see him try.”
“And can Bentley say the same thing?” Price asks, once again looking at me over the swirl of the alcohol in his glass.
“Haven’t gotten the chance to find out.”
It’s a rare day that Bentley comes to the surface now. Maybe, like Ives, the darker side of me is slowly taking over. Maybe, one day, Bentley won’t come out at all.
Though even Ives is watching me closely again now, neither of them presses further. We’re not the type. Nothing good comes of too many questions in a place like this.
When the dull ache doesn’t subside, I bow out and leave them on their own.
I barely make it to the stairs before I collapse against the wall. I press my forehead to the dull, stained wallpaper and let out a groan muffled only by biting into the flesh of my own forearm.
The pain finally recedes a moment later, leaving a gnawing guilt in its wake.
I lied to Price. I did see Silver…but it wasn’t at the director’s bidding. The last time Bentley took over it was brief, for no more than a couple minutes—a quarter hour at most.
Changing over from Bentley is like waking from a dream. I often remember just a smidge of his last memory, more like a feeling—an impression of the time he spent in our shared body. The longer he spends in control, the stronger the feeling.
For such a short period of time, Bentley’s memories should have faded right away. It should’ve just been a bleary impression, like waking from dozing off in the study after one too many scotches.
But this time was different.
This time, I woke with a blaring headache—a searing pain tied to a single name. Silver.
Bentley is trying to tell me something about the doctor, but I don’t know what. If it weren’t for this persistent, relentless ache, I’d just dismiss it as easily as I do all his other pleas. I’ve ignored him dozens, hundreds, of times before. It’s in my nature. It is my nature.
But not this time. This time Bentley will not let it rest, even if it means damaging both of us in the process.
11
Thalia
Aside from the bagged lunch slipped through a crack in the door and a brief trip to the bathroom purchased with a quick flash of upper thigh through the keyhole, I see no sign of human life until long after the sun has finished setting.
For a person who probably spent the better part of her day locked up as well, though probably in the infirmary rather than a bedroom, she seems surprisingly cheery. Though I thought my heart couldn’t sink any lower, it still somehow manages to do just that as I catch sight of another paper bag clutched in her hands.
She must see my face fall because she stops in her tracks, the smile on her own face slipping for a moment. Her fingers curl around the edges of the waxed paper and her eyes flit down to it, and then back up to me.
“Sorry,” she says, sticking it out on stiff arms. “Silver’s orders…” I take it from her, grimacing at the whiff of plain peanut butter and jelly as I unfold the crumpled top “…at least until you decide to do the therapy.”
I glance up at her from between the folds of brown paper. “You mean until I give up?”
I don’t wait for an answer as I peer down the length of my nose at the inner contents. “It’s a small price to pray, for freedom.”
Adelaide lets out a loud snort from where she’s stopped at the side of her bed. “Is that what you call it? Being locked in here all day?”
I watch her out of the corner of my eyes, waiting for the moment she finally sits down on the bed. I did my best to stow my stolen prize between the twisting metal frame, but there’s still a chance she’ll be able to feel a lump beneath the flimsy mattress.
“If it means I don’t have to take orders all day, then yes,” I say. I lean back against the metal frame of the bed, each shifted movement making the slats creak beneath me. My body protests nearly as much, but I’m just relieved when Adelaide finishes shimmying underneath her blankets without so much as a twinge to signal she’s felt the secret hidden underneath.
She turns over on the bed so that her back faces me, and I get the distinct impression that she’s staring out the window at the thinnest sliver of moon visible through the panes. Though I can’t see her face, I swear I can feel the slight smile that seems permanently etched at the corner of her mouth.
“Say what you like,” she says, her voice already growing heavy, “but no one ever hides away forever. Not even the ones that should.”
Here, she half turns over to look at me out of the corner of her eyes. Her lashes, pale as the hair atop her head, catch that silvery light from outside. It gives her an ethereal look, almost like a faerie or some otherworldly creature.
“It’s not so bad, you know. There’s worse places out there.” She rolls back over and takes a deep breath, holding it in for a moment before letting it out in a long breathy sigh. “At least here, no one’s asking you to be something you’re not.”
There is where we disagree, but there’s no point in arguing with her.
Despite Adelaide’s repeated attempts to assure me I’d be better off just giving in to Silver’s demands, I spend the rest of the week in self-imposed imprisonment. Each morning Adelaide accompanies me down to breakfast where she sometimes makes a small scene drinking her own blood, and sometimes she acts like a totally normal person chatting cheerily over a breakfast of d
ate and nut oatmeal.
I’m not sure which side makes me more uneasy.
Each morning after breakfast, Dr. Silver sits me down and asks me if I’m ready to join the rest of the inmates—I mean guests—and each day I end up getting escorted back to my room.
It’s boring, almost mind-numbingly so, but I get a small rush at the look of frustration of Silver’s face each morning. It’s this tiny sliver that I learn to live for.
After the incident with the spider-shoes, I expected a full-on barrage from the boys…but aside from their confrontation that first day, I’m basically ignored. By the end of my first week, five full days trapped one step above solitary, I’m almost a little bitter about it…and more than a little suspicious.
During my brief encounters with the rest of the asylum at breakfast each day, I see the way they avoid the boys. They’re treated with more fear than respect, with gaze shifting away to avoid eye contact and feet shuffling to stay clear of their path.
I do encounter a few minor incidents—a locked bathroom stall that takes a few minutes to jimmy my way out of, a spoiled pack of creamers in my decaf coffee, and a broken stair railing that almost sends me tumbling down several flights of steps–but nothing that can’t be explained away as a side effect of the aging asylum itself.
What can’t be explained away, however, are the echoing voices in my head.
I hear them far-off at first. The voices from my parent’s funeral.
Help us. They said.
Now they say other things. Nastier things. Personal things.
They tell me I belong here. They tell me I’m finally home.
You always knew you’d end up here, they say. And they’re right. I did always know, somehow, that I’d end up here. But that’s Kemper’s doing, not mine. I never heard voices before, unless it was his voice whispering in my ear.
So, I ignore them.
I cover my ears and count the cracks on the ceiling, the lines in the grout. I’m not insane. I don’t hear voices. Even the most sane person would start thinking they are, locked away as I am. If they’ve been through what I’ve been through.
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