Claire turned back to the cow, giggling to herself. What would Adrian say if he saw her milking a cow? She’d never been around animals much; she wasn’t sure how much she liked them. With the right pressure and finger position, she had a new rhythm going, and a new stream of milk found its way into the pail.
The man patted her on the back. “You’re a natural. Real good there, ma’am. Maybe Miss Liza will spare you a little so we can have an extra worker.”
“Never! I’ll let her come help get the milk, and she can do a little when she comes with me. Other than that, she’s mine.” Liza let out a loud laugh. “Come on, gal, we’ll do this another time.” She turned to the man. “Roy, help me get some cans into her cart.”
He headed to the rear of the barn. “How many you need?”
Liza motioned for Claire as she called back. “About six should do it.”
“Six, it is.”
Roy returned with six containers, straining at the weight of each can. “There, I think that’ll get it.”
“Much obliged to you.” Giving a light bow, Liza turned around, and both women headed outside.
“Now, to the slaughter house. And let me tell you, if you’ve never seen an animal being killed and gutted, you’re in for a treat.”
From the wide-eyed expression on Liza’s face, Claire didn’t know if she was merely joking or not.
As they walked, Liza chatted. “It’s not a pretty sight in there. You’ll need a strong stomach. Are you squeamish?”
“I’ve never seen an animal being killed before, so I don’t really know for sure how I’ll be.”
“Just let me know if you start to feel sick, or if you just want to wait outside and let me get everything. It don’t make no difference to me.”
“I’ll let you know. Don’t worry.”
The winding path led several yards up a small hill to a large wooden structure with a large iron gate. Seconds after their arrival, shrill squeals cut the air. Inside a large stall, two brutish men held a poor hog in place as a third man sliced into the jugular with a large glinting knife.
Claire winced, watching bright red blood pour from the animal. As its attempts at kicking free weakened, so did the life in its eyes, growing dimmer until nothing remained but the glassy look of death. “Didn’t they bother to kill it first?”
“They usually try to shoot ‘em and then drain the blood. But when you run out of bullets, there’s nothing else to do.”
“You know what, I think I’ll wait out here. I’m more squeamish than I thought.”
Liza opened the gate. “I’ll be right back.”
Spared from witnessing further brutality and gore, Claire spent her time surveying the landscape, taking in every detail, layout of building placement, tree line, and field. Off in the distance, movement behind a grove of trees caught her attention. Her position by the slaughter house gave her a view of the shed, the one where orderlies often secreted Millie away. She shielded her eyes from the glare for a better look.
She only saw the backs of the people as they reached the door. The scene looked the same, with an orderly present, but the woman with him wasn’t Millie. This woman was larger in frame, and a little older. Because all the asylum dresses were the same, except for color or print design, she always had difficulty distinguishing an individual person on first glance. And though the view was a little clearer than ones she’d had previously, the distance still hindered the ability for a clear view of faces. The woman struggled with the orderly, trying to pull away. He grabbed her hair and yanked it hard. The door opened and the two disappeared inside.
The scene Claire had just witnessed filled her with a sense of uneasiness, one so strong that it left her blood running cold with fear. At the sound of the gate rattling and squeaky wheels from the cart, she whirled around. Her supervisor had left the building.
“I think we have everything now.” The older lady straightened up her hair before grabbing the handle of her cart, which had been filled with fresh pork. “How ‘bout we head over to the garden and steal us some fresh tomatoes or Tommy Toes? I’m thirsty.”
“Sounds good to me.” Claire turned an anxious eye back toward the shed.
“What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
“Nothing, I saw a man pushing a woman inside that shed way back there.” She faced Liza. “Didn’t look like she was all that keen on going in, but he made her.”
Liza paled at this observation, and leaned in close. “Let me tell you something else. We don’t talk about that shed over there. You ever heard anything about it?”
Fearful, Claire played dumb. “No, I don’t think so. What about it?”
“We just don’t talk about it. You didn’t see anything. And my advice to you is never talk to anyone about it. You do, and you’ll land in mighty big trouble.”
The ache in her gut sent Clair into a tailspin of nervousness. “I-I hear you. Won’t say a thing. I promise.”
“See to it that you don’t.” A sharp warning glare from Liza, and the two walked down the path, picking up an adjoining trail to the garden. The supervisor picked some tomatoes and placed them in the cart with milk, while Claire pulled off some tiny tomatoes, Tommy Toes as she liked to call them, and ate a few. She pulled a few extra from the vine and followed Liza back to the main building.
Inside, they followed the hallway back the same way they’d come. Near the end, Liza led the way down a small hallway to the elevator. She and Claire loaded the milk and meat inside.
“There, we got it. We’ll leave these carts here. I’ll get someone else to come back and wash them off.”
In the kitchen, Claire sat once again, chopping vegetables until her work time ended. She gathered up the Tommy Toes and followed an attendant back up to the ward. She took a deep breath, bracing herself for the usual chaos.
Millie sat next to a vacant chair, and Claire made her way to it. Millie didn’t look at anyone, but held her doll in a limp fashion on her lap. The lady rocked aimlessly, her face highlighted with vacant eyes and grim lips. Claire stared down at the Tommy Toes and back at the withered face in front of her.
Taking a deep breath, Claire got up from the chair and stood in front of Millie, holding a tiny tomato to her lips. “Here, I brought something for you.”
Millie stopped rocking for an instant.
“Do you want it? I brought some more, just for you.” This lady brought out compassion, but at the same time, something about her created a sense of fear. This was the predictable unpredictable, not knowing if Millie would accept the gift, ignore it, or slap it away with some unexplained irritation.
The older lady opened her mouth, and Claire fed each piece to this poor woman, starved not only for food, but just as much for the kindness of another, an act of pure giving with nothing expected in return. Before Claire sat down again, Millie grabbed her wrist, holding it tight. Somewhere in the woman’s eyes, Claire detected a knowing glint, a spark of life catching fire in the kindling of life known as the present moment. Claire’s heart nearly caught in her throat with fear. What if this woman bit her?
In flash of lucidness, Millie brought Claire’s hand to her mouth, and delivered a tiny kiss on the forefinger. Claire marveled at the uncharacteristic display of emotion. She marveled even more at the softness of the woman’s lips and the warm heat of her breath as she exhaled. At once, the enigma surrounding Millie dissipated. In that moment, the tender gesture confirmed that she and Millie were companions of a sort, elected by an ill hand of fate to endure an arduous journey they’d never understand.
Millie released Claire’s hand. The vital spark vanished. Her vacant gaze traveled back to the window. On an inner level, Claire sensed gratitude radiating from this woman’s heart. In all her madness and bleak isolation, Millie had understood a benign gesture and appreciated it. Settling in her chair, Claire also stared out the window, waiting for Ruth.
Where had her friend gone? It wasn’t like Ruth to be missing this long. Clai
re instantly perked up at the low rumble of male voices trickling into the room. She craned her neck around. Two orderlies walking in hushed, quick steps with Ruth in tow.
Each footstep echoed with a soft thud. The men held their heads down as they moved. Claire at once new their dirty secret. They maintained a grasp on Ruth’s arms as if she might faint and fall to the floor, and swiftly guided her to an empty rocker in a shadowy corner across the room. Ruth dropped into the chair with a bump, while the orderlies disappeared from the room almost as fast as they’d entered, their gazes tethered to the floor.
Inside their sockets, Ruth’s eyes emitted a glassy, listless stare. Her face held an expression of one who’d experienced a horror that would never be resolved. Her hair stood out in disarray all over her head like someone had grabbed fistfuls of strands and ground them against her scalp without a thought or care.
A succession of chills stung Claire’s spine as her mind shot back in time when she’d seen a new woman with the men, someone who had fought against them and lost the battle. She shuddered at the remembrance of seeing Ruth forced into the shed and the door closed, shutting out the chance for help. And to think she and Liza hadn’t been so far away that they couldn’t have intervened.
At once she wanted to run away deep into the woods outside the asylum, and when she came to a private place where she was sure no one would hear, scream at the top of her lungs. She wanted to ease the soul of her injured roommate back to wholeness again, but the pale skin and empty eyes showed one who’d been changed forever, one who’d never return to her fiery knowing ways. Hatchie River had broken Ruth.
At dinnertime, Claire sat next to Millie, and the two ate in silence. Ruth didn’t come to dinner. Anne and Greta had escorted her to bed, while Grace watched in mild amusement, lips twisted into her usual infernal smirk. Claire caught Grace turning her eyes from Ruth to her. Grace smiled wider, and a new fire in her eyes blazed hotter. Inside Claire’s chest, her heart ached with the fear of impending doom. She picked at the rest of her meal with shaking hands.
When she crawled in bed at the stroke of nine o’clock, Ruth remained still with her face to the wall. Claire didn’t speak. As she lay in bed, Grace’s demon eyes came back full force with a hellish glow. For the remainder of the night, Claire caught snatches of sleep. The night had never seemed so long, and she prayed hard for morning.
Chapter Seven
Inside the tub, Claire took a deep breath and clenched her teeth. If the canvas covering hadn’t already been secured around her neck, she would have scrambled out and run for safety. But finding an unlocked stairwell had always left her dreams of running away filled with apprehension. Staff were obsessed with locking doors behind them. At the uncovered end of the tub, Grace stood at the taps, preoccupied longer than usual in regulating the water flow and temperature. The water first came out scalding hot. Claire jerked her legs away, screaming in pain as piping hot water singed her skin. More than anything, she had a mortal fear of being roasted to death.
Grace turned off the hot water and twisted another handle, at which point the needle-like sting of cold water rushed against Claire’s ankles, assuring a gruesome death by roasting may occur another day.
“Don’t know what’s going on with these taps. I can’t seem to get the temperature I want.” Grace flashed Claire a quick sinister smile. “But I think we have it right for today at least.” When the tub was full, she anchored the canvas in place, trapping Claire underneath. “Have a nice bath. I’ll come back when I think your time’s up.” With a series of hard pats on Claire’s head, she bounded out of the room.
Claire winced and shook her head, thankful her brain hadn’t been truly scrambled by Grace’s tender affections. Tender affections. Somehow, she thought these words were funny. The water had already chilled her to the point where her mind was starting to slip, and finding a bit of twisted humor in what others would have seen as ugliness scared her a little. What if she truly started seeing events and people around her as genuinely funny? How could she explain this? She fought to keep a straight face. Giving into laughing meant one had reached a point of no return, the point where insanity truly began, leaving the sane world behind forever. This could happen. She’d seen patients who laughed at nothing, crouched in dim corners of a room.
She rested her head back against the tub. For some reason the surface seemed harder today, not that it wasn’t harder any other day. And of course, dear Grace hadn’t bothered to put a towel under her head to ease the discomfort. Anne and Greta always put something soft behind her head. But not Grace, the one with tender affections. Claire let out a startlingly loud laugh. She opened her eyes wide and glanced around the room to see if anyone had heard. Then she giggled. Of course, no one else was here but her. No one else had entered the room since her arrival.
Another round of giggles ensued. She paused a moment, listening to the silence, an eerie quiet she didn’t hear often. For a change of pace, she opened her mouth and let out a small yell. She stopped again and listened. No answer, no rush of feet down the hall, and no other person yelling for her to knock it off. For the next few minutes, Claire belted out a series of wails, with different durations and unique pitches. When this activity bored her, she made silly sounds with her lips and tongue, taking an opportunity to stick her tongue out until she glimpsed the tip. Still, no one had come into the hydrotherapy room.
Undulating her thighs in the water, the shocking cold which had stunned her in the beginning had worked its wicked magic, sending her body plummeting to what might as well have been an icy grave. No matter how long one spent in these tubs, one never warmed up or got used to it. Had anyone ever died in these? Were the dead bodies in the field behind the asylum as cold as she felt right now? Her bladder burned, and her bottom throbbed as if might explode. The urge to urinate and defecate had been a continuing battle during hydrotherapy. If she got lucky enough to have Greta or Anne present, bodily functions weren’t an issue.
But Grace and her tender affections managed to bring out all the discomfort she’d suffered in her lifetime, mentally and physically. Claire thrashed her legs again, cursing Adrian for destroying her life and Mitchell for not calling back. All at once hate set in, so strong the anger roiling inside scared her. She hated the world and everyone in it. Nothing or no one could make it better. Hatchie River and the staff had successfully declared war, disemboweling dreams and crushing the existence of all the women inside its walls, leaving mental carnage in its wake.
The last vestige of spirit had been plucked from her friend Ruth, leaving an innocent woman shattered and ruined forever, her eyes dry because all the tears had been cried out. Any shred of self-esteem or hope had been totally amputated, with only a dead stump in the psyche left behind. There was only grim remembrance of the past and no hope for the future.
Claire dug her head against the hard surface of the tub until the pain kick started a headache. She clenched her fists until her hands throbbed. Seething in anger, tears flowed. She wanted all of this craziness gone, to purge herself and be done, start anew. Relaxing her pelvic region, she released a hot stream of urine, enjoying a new emptiness inside. In one last act of defiance, she clenched the muscles in her bottom and heaved, the contractions inside her colon eliciting a final sordid burst of satisfaction. Once the drain opened, all the ugliness of the world would go down nice and easy. It had to. There was nowhere else it could go.
Time passed, and with it Claire’s tolerance as she rested her head to one side, using the taut canvas as a makeshift support. For the first time, ice water didn’t leave her whimpering and wishing for something better, nor did she spend time counting clothes, life events, or people to make a therapy session bearable. For the first time, she truly embraced anger, welcoming the emotion in all its fiery strength and glory. For the first time, she didn’t try to understand why life had brought her to this point, this inexplicable place where she found herself. She rested against the canvas and opened herself to the flow of
anger, marveling at the way each part of her body and each nerve tingled with a new energy, filling her with a resolve she’d never experienced before.
A rustle of feet infiltrated the silence. Learning the feet belonged to Grace fanned the flames of anger. Claire didn’t acknowledge the attendant when she unfastened the cover and pulled it back.
“You look all crabby for someone who’s just had a nice bath.” Grace glanced down at the tub and grimaced as she pulled Claire out of the water and helped her out. “But I guess it’s hard to enjoy a good soak when you shit and pee in it.”
Numb to consequences at this point, Claire blurted out, “Maybe if you did your job right, like Greta says, you wouldn’t have to clean up shit and pee.” Her eyes locked onto Grace’s, while her lips pursed together in a new rage.
Grace stepped back, her face blanching with surprise. “Oh, aren’t you hoity-toity today. You got a lot of nerve saying that to me.”
Claire stood her ground in cold silence, never removing her eyes from Grace.
“No wonder that man of yours dumped your nasty ass here. You’re a sassy bitch . . . and a shitty lover to boot. I’d get rid of you myself if I was him . . .” With a fresh gleam in her eye, Grace reached out and pinched one of Claire’s nipples. “Can’t figure out what he’d want with those old saggy tits when he could get some young cute thing.”
In a reflex action, Claire’s hand shot out, and her palm landed squarely on Grace’s cheek. For the next several minutes, time moved in slow motion. At once Claire noted a strange disconnect, a separation from her body, like her eyes had somehow floated out of her head and now hovered above. Those eyes viewed a naked woman running out of a room and down the hall, trying desperately to make her way to the stairwell door. Behind her ran another woman, yelling and cursing in anger. The door didn’t budge, no matter how hard Claire rattled the knob, praying hard for deliverance, a stroke of luck, perhaps.
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