by Tom Kavanagh
Pickle launched herself out of bed and followed me out the door, running alongside me, thinking that I was taking her for a walk. But I didn’t stop. I continued to run until I had left the safety of our front gate. Pickle must have stopped at this point because the familiar sound of her panting slowly faded into the night, like the guiding light of a lighthouse disappearing into a thick fog.
I hadn’t grabbed a torch or my coat or anything of use, but I didn’t care; I was too angry and confused to care. All I wanted to do was put as much distance as I could between those impostors and me. It was no longer safe in that house. I wasn’t sure of many things, but I was sure of that.
I didn’t have a clear idea of where I was heading or what I would do when I got there. It was all just instinct. I was running, and nothing was going to stop me.
In the distance I could hear the voice of Dad screaming my name. But I knew it wasn’t Dad. I knew it wasn’t the dad who would tuck me into bed or take me out on walks or teach me how to drive a lawnmower.
This was a filthy impostor.
My own laboured breathing and dramatic grunts soon replaced the sounds of my dad feverishly yelling my name. I thought I was in the clear, but without my torch, I was unable to see the branches that had fallen onto the road. They’d been ripped from the trees on the upper bank during the last storm, littering the road and the steep drop-off below. Suddenly my foot caught a particularly large branch, sending me staggering towards the edge of the road and down the hill. It must have taken only ten seconds for me to tumble to the bottom, but it felt much longer. Within those terrifying moments, I was convinced I’d continue to fall, trapped in an unending plummet.
But much to my relief, I did eventually stop falling. Soon after hitting the ground, my shoulder quickly began to throb. Scratches littered my hands and forearms, and bruises would surely show themselves soon enough. Luckily I hadn’t broken my leg or ankle, and so scrambled back up the hill and on to the road.
And then all I remember is dribs and drabs. I’d switched off and had let my body take over. I walked with a fast pace until I had lost almost all of my energy, and then continued to stagger down long, dark roads at a slow, methodic pace.
* * * * *
The police found me shortly after I had fallen down the hill. I was walking along one of the main roads that led out of our town. My clothes were soaked from heavy rain and covered in a thick layer of mud. I was shaking uncontrollably, but I couldn’t feel a thing.
I had gone numb.
There were so many sounds in my head that I couldn’t focus on anything around me. The sirens behind me faded as they collided with other sounds swirling around my head.
The voice of a policewoman cut through the sound for a moment, her soft but stern voice slicing through the sound of the siren.
“Young girl, are you okay?”
I turned my head towards her, my eyes flickering as each bead of rain collided with them, blurring my vision, making it seem that there were many more policewomen than there were.
“What’s your name?”
I didn’t answer. It wasn’t because I didn’t know my name. I did. But I didn’t want her to know it. I didn’t want anyone to know it. I was hoping that I could gradually disappear, that as fewer and fewer people knew my name, I would just fade from existence.
“We’re going to have to take her to the station”
I was then wrapped in foil and placed gently in the back of a police car. I was shivering violently, but I didn’t feel cold. The numbness had spread throughout my body, taking every part of me hostage.
And then there was a moment of clarity.
With my body on autopilot, I was able to think clearly for a moment. I realised that I no longer cared what happened. I didn’t care about what happened to me. I didn’t care about what happened to my dad or Mary or even Pickle.
It was all so simple.
I just didn’t care anymore.
I sat motionless as they drove me back to the police station, trying to fully understand what this lack of caring meant. I’d spent so long surrounded by anxious thoughts and terrible paranoia that I’d forgotten what it felt like to feel nothing.
It had stopped raining by the time we arrived at the station, but it had turned bitterly cold, causing the water on the ground to turn into a thin sheet of ice.
I heard the police officers whispering to one another in hushed tones as they guided me to the front entrance. They were acting as if I were an escaped mental patient and I would lash out if they spoke too loudly.
Lights flickered above me as I was escorted into a small square room. A water cooler to my left released an occasional bubble that rushed to the surface and popped, disturbing the crushing silence that lingered in the room. A police officer soon came in, aiding the water cooler in its fight against the silence.
“Hello, Isabelle.”
I recognised her voice. It was the policewomen who had first found me wondering down the road.
“How are you?”
“Fine,” I responded in a meagre voice, still shaking from my walk in the rain.
The policewoman seemed quite taken aback; it was the first word I’d uttered since I’d got to the station. For all she knew, I was mute.
“Well, that’s good.”
She approached the table and sat down, placing a small stack of paper in front of her as she did.
“Your father called a little while ago saying that you’d run away. We told him that we’d found you. He’s on his way.”
I fell silent.
“Before he comes, I’d just like to ask a few questions.”
I remained quiet, unsure of whether I could trust the policewoman or not. There was something sinister in the way she smiled, some indefinable quality that made my very core shiver. It wasn’t just her smile; it was her whole demeanour. Her movements were sharp and precise, as if one overextension or miscalculation would be detrimental to her health. This same attention to detail had obviously bled into every aspect of her life. She didn’t have one hair out of place; it was pulled back tightly into a bun, so tight in fact that it looked as if her forehead had been ironed.
She pulled out a pen, put it to her tongue, and then placed it tentatively over her pad of paper, hovering a few millimetres from the page.
“Okay, let’s start from the beginning. Why did you run out of your house?”
I could have told her the truth. I could have said that I was scared for my life and that something had come down and taken control of my dad and his new girlfriend. But I didn’t know whether I could trust the policewoman, so I kept my mouth shut.
“Were you scared or angry?”
It became obvious very quickly that she would remain persistent. She had found a young girl walking along the side of the road in the rain, and she wasn’t going to stop until she found the reason why.
“While I was on the phone, your father said that you were having an argument. Did anything happen that I should know about?”
Well, you obviously don’t need to ask me, do you?
My eyes barely flickered, but the policewoman took this as some kind of signal, some internal message that was itching to get out. And that was when her mannerisms shifted. She released her shoulders from their rigid set, as if she’d broken the mould around them. Her face softened, suddenly showing deep-set wrinkles around her eyes and on her forehead. She had transformed from a stern, controlled policeman to a Little Red Riding Hood–style grandmother.
“Isabelle, it’s very important that you’re honest with me. If you’re honest, I can help you. Now, is there anything you would like to tell me?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? I know that it’s sometimes difficult opening up to adults, especially a mean old policeman like me.”
She let out a strained giggle, obviously not used to talking with teenagers. I wouldn’t have been surprised to find a script hidden within the pile of paper in front of her, helping her to seem more h
uman.
“I can’t help you if you don’t talk, Isabelle.”
There was a knock on the door, followed shortly by a pink, shiny face peeking in from the hallway.
“Cath, could I talk to you for just a moment?”
“Yes. I’ll be right back, Isabelle.”
The door slammed shut, followed by a small click.
She’d locked me in.
She probably thought that I might snap at any minute and go on a killing spree. On the plus side, I knew that they couldn’t get me inside a locked room. I was safe . . . for now.
There was another distinctive click, and then the policewoman popped her head in like the policeman had done to her.
“Your father has just arrived. He would very much like to see you. Shall I go and get him?”
It wasn’t as if I had a choice. There was no place to run.
“Fine.”
When the policewoman returned, my dad and Mary weren’t far behind. He stormed in, so angry that I wouldn’t have been surprised to see steam rising from his head. Pickle followed soon after, rushing toward me full of nervous energy. She licked my hand, expecting me to greet her with a stroke behind the ear. But I didn’t move.
“Isabelle, you had me and Mary worried sick! How could you just run off like that? Me and Mary were searching for hours!”
I didn’t reply.
I couldn’t speak.
The policewoman said, “She seems a bit shell-shocked at the moment, so maybe it’s best to talk about all of this when she’s feeling better and is a bit more talkative. But . . .”
And then she said it. She said the sentence that I’d always dreaded I would hear.
“For her own safety, we are going to have to section her.”
Eight
Never Forget
“Those are the main headlines, and now it’s over to the weather where you are.”
“Thank you and good morning. The rain and wind are really starting to pick up now. A weather system has been moving over the region, bringing heavy rain and strong winds, and it doesn’t look like it’ll be easing up anytime soon. Heavy showers will continue for much of the weekend, turning to sleet and snow in elevated areas. There have been many severe weather warnings across the north, so check online to see whether your area will be affected. Moving on to next week’s forecast . . .”
I don’t remember much from those first few hazy days in the centre. Even my initial impression of the place was fuzzy and distant.
On the night I’d run away, I’d been taken straight from the police station to the centre in a police car, followed by Mary and my father, who’d packed a bag of clothes. I’d thought at the time that he’d been able to pack it way too quickly, as if he’d known what was going to happen all along, and this hypothesis was reinforced when I opened my bag the next day to find perfectly folded clothes and toiletries.
From the back of the police car, I wasn’t able to see much. We were in the middle of nowhere, and so the headlights were the only source of light. This only served to inflate my anxiety, as along with seeing the ominous gates of the centre, I also saw the long, creepy shadows extend themselves over the gravel road in front of us. The road stretched on for another twenty yards, leading us to an old Victorian-style building nestled in a circle of trees.
There were two adults standing in the doorway, lit from behind by harsh white light, the same kind of lighting you’d see in a hospital. I felt that I’d physically shrunk just by looking at them, like a kid meeting a terrifying headmaster on his or her very first day of school.
I was led up the stairs by the two policemen and was then passed over to the doctors as if they were postmen handing over a parcel with a dent in it that they hoped wouldn’t be noticed. I sat in the waiting room as my dad filled out the necessary paperwork, again like I was a parcel that needed to be signed for. Once Dad had finished writing, the head nurse looked the form up and down and then did the same to me.
“Hello, Isabelle. My name is Nurse Smith. I’ll give you a few moments to say goodbye to your father.”
Nurse Smith towered over me, and reminded me strongly of a daddy long-legs, although she was dressed in a long skirt, so I had no idea where her legs began or ended. Her hair was tied in a tight bun at the back of her head, much like the policewoman’s hair. Her entire look was unsettling, and only scared me more instead of putting me at ease like a nurse should.
I begrudgingly hugged Dad—or at least the thing I’d once known as Dad—and shot a menacing glance over at Mary. I wanted to say all kinds of horrible things to her, but what I wanted more was to get into my new room and hide away for a while, knowing that for at least right now, I was safe. I didn’t know what would happen the next day or the day after that, but at that point, I didn’t care. I just wanted to be on my own.
“Are you ready?” Nurse Smith asked, probably not wanting to prolong this frosty goodbye any longer than it needed to be.
“Yes.”
“Then follow me to your room, please.”
As we walked, she told me about the centre and its history, but I could barely hear her over the sound of her shoes hitting the old wood flooring. Once we’d made our way through the common areas, we climbed a flight of stairs and through a pair of double doors to a long hallway.
“This is the main hallway. These are the patient rooms. Each room has a small bathroom. Showers are not permitted after 10:00 p.m. or before 6:00 a.m. Breakfast is served at 7:30, lunch at 12:00, and dinner at 5:30. And this is your room.”
As I walked in, I was struck by the blandness of the place. They’d stripped the room of any character, removing all objects that could be used as a weapon to hurt the nurses or myself.
“Nurses will come in at around seven in the morning to wake you up and give you your medication. If you should need anything, you can pull the string next to your bed, and a nurse will come as soon as they can. Do you have any questions?”
“No.”
And then I was left alone, in a bleak and cold room, with none of the personal mementos that helped me to feel that I was still myself. It wasn’t exactly a warm and inviting introduction to the centre, but then again, it fitted with the overall feel of the place.
For the next few days, all I could do was watch the changing light outside, which was one of the few indications that time was actually moving forward, the other being the hourly visits from the nurse.
She would always ask the same questions in exactly the same order.
“How are you feeling today?” she’d ask with a chirpy tone.
“Fine,” I replied, my voice just as stagnant as the air around me.
“How did you sleep?”
“Fine.”
“Would you like to go for a walk? Stretch your legs?”
“No.”
“I’ll come back and check on you in another hour or so.”
“Okay.”
It was the same every day. But I guess that’s their plan. They want to give us repetition so that we won’t have time to think of anything else.
It gives people a chance to breathe because all of the decisions are made for them.
But I didn’t want to breathe in the stagnant air of the centre, and I didn’t want all my decisions being made for me.
I wanted to escape.
I felt like McMurphy in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, desperate to get out and breathe the fresh air. I was never going to get better by being in here. I’d slowly rot, sinking deeper into my sheets until I became part of the bed, like how a barnacle becomes part of the ship.
They’d been trying to make me take my medication, but it hadn’t worked. Every time they gave it to me, I would put it on my tongue, push it to the side of my mouth and trap it with my teeth, and then pretend to swallow it. I’d then move it below my tongue and open my mouth to show I’d swallow it.
I didn’t want to become sick, because if I became sick, Dad would kill me. I’d no longer serve a purpose, so he’d no
longer need me on the farm.
Another persistent occurrence was mealtime. Because everything was structured down to the minute, everybody knew when breakfast, lunch, and dinner were served. But the nurses still acted as if it was a complete surprise. They would come in and say things like, “It’s breakfast time!” or, “Just to let you know, breakfast will be served in five minutes.” By my third morning, I had already left my room before the nurse had come in.
“It’s breakfast ti—” I could hear the nurse say as I crept down the hallway to the dining room.
The centre had been set up within an old Victorian building, a large manor house that had been sold off to the company that funded these facilities. It had been renovated, but only barely, just to the point where it would pass inspection. They obviously didn’t want to pour any more money than was necessary into the facility. We needed help, but not at the cost of their bottom line.
If you had been put in this canteen and then the canteen of a prison, you’d be hard-pressed to see the difference between the two. We collected our food in single file, watching as the sloppy food crept up the side of the plastic tray dividers. It was likely that the food started out as a solid shape, but it didn’t stay that way. They might have thought we’d use sharp food to hurt ourselves and other patients, so instead of serving it as shapes, they whacked it all in a blender for three hours.
I collected my putrid-smelling slop, doled out by the less than enthusiastic lunch staff, and made my way to an empty seat at the back of the dinner hall, one that gave the best view of the rest of the tables. Watching the other patients had become a sort of strange hobby. There wasn’t anything else to do, so without even really realising it, I’d begun to watch everyone around me, even giving them names. I didn’t even really like doing it. They were all just like me. But there was nothing else to do, so I didn’t have a choice.
A few of the regular patients came and sat down in their usual seats, unable to break from the schedule and routine that they had been forced into. But then I saw someone whom I hadn’t noticed before. She was similar to myself in terms of looks and height, but somehow, she gave off an aura of normality. It didn’t feel as if she should be here, as if she had come on a school trip to stare at the crazies and had got lost. The one thing that really stuck out was a red bow she’d tied around her ponytail. She’d somehow convinced the staff to let her keep it, even though they took everything personal from us the moment we arrived. It was like a little torch above her head, spreading out her individuality from the rest of the patients.
