by Mark Butler
“Where are we going?” Amelia was exhilarated and confused.
“We’ll be there soon, I promise.” The girls finally reached the top and Amelia was stunned. She could see the entire orphanage and its surrounding countryside. There was the housing buildings with the obvious section of laundry room jutting out, there were also two small, squat building that were churning out great billows of black smoke, and there was the tower that they were in. The most modern styled building was the receiving building that housed the counselors and faced the main road, some five hundred yards from where Amelia now stood. Amelia had never realized the entire layout of the orphanage and she wondered how Allie had ever discovered this vantage point.
“Why did you bring me here?” Amelia asked, turning towards Allie. The girl was gone. Amelia looked down at where Allie’s small hand had been holding her own and she only then realized that she was holding her own hand. She looked down at the courtyard and thought she could see Allie’s small figure running through the rain, towards the dorm buildings. Amelia sighed and made to leave when she noticed a field beyond the laundry room, one she hadn’t noticed before. There were small protrusions in the earth at linear intervals and Amelia wondered what the field was used for. Perhaps the staff was growing crops out in the field. Or perhaps it was a cemetery. Amelia couldn’t be sure at that late hour what she was seeing, so she resolved to go back to bed and uncover the truth at her leisure.
Chapter 2
Per the State’s requirements, orphans had to be given a basic education. Every Fall, a stiff government employee showed up at Lisson Orphanage and administered a standardized test. The kids were not expected to do well, only to demonstrate that they could perform basic reading and arithmetic. Though Ellis loathed the perceived intrusion on his territory, he was powerless to deny the government representative. The assessment was undoubtedly of much more than just the children's education, it was of their condition, though that part was unofficial.
Once the ten through twelve year olds were seated in the lobby, the government employee passed out the tests and read the instructions. The kids were clearly nervous of taking the examination and more than one pencil fell on the floor as their hands shook. Many of them could not perform basic academic functions and once Ellis discovered the under-achievers, he would surely chastise them in his way.
Amelia finished her test first. The government man eyed her critically, for no child had ever finished their exam as quickly as she had. He had been doing his job for years and he had seen it all. Some kids simply filled in the blanks on their answer sheet, just to get the entire humiliating experience over as quickly as possible. Others tried to draw pictures and impress him with their artistry. Some kids simply left the answer sheet blank and cried. He had time while the other kids still tested, so he extracted his bright red marker and began grading Amelia’s paper. It took him three minutes and he double checked the answer sheet, just to be certain.
“Amelia Gannerson, please come here.” Amelia rose from her seat warily and every eyeball in the room was on her, including Ellis’.
“Amelia, if a number were to be divided by one half, then one quarter, then finally one fifth and my remainder is two, what would that number be?” the government man asked. Ellis tried to figure it out in his head and he felt a small ache develop behind his eyes.
“Eighty, sir.” Amelia said immediately, her eyes bright at the challenge.
“Amelia, what would you say I am if I told you that I’m something that is at the beginning of eternity, the end of time and space, and I’m in everything and everywhere?”
“God.” Ellis said from across the room, causing everyone to glance his way.
“No.” the government man responded, his voice dismissive. Ellis’ face turned red and he glared at the kids in fiery embarrassment, “What are you looking at? Get back to work!”
“Sir, you’re the letter ‘E’.” Amelia said proudly.
“Correct. Please Amelia, take your seat.” The government man said once more. He made his way towards Ellis and the two men whispered furiously. The government man seemed to be trying to convince Ellis of something and Ellis kept shaking his head no until the government man threw his hands in the air in exasperation. He stormed back to his desk and started scribbling furiously in his notes. In the rear of the class, Ellis seethed.
Once the final girl turned in her exam, the government man gathered the answer sheets and left, purposely avoiding looking at Amelia. He could not allow another supremely gifted mind to be crushed by the small-mindedness of blind authority. Had this gifted young girl been born into an affluent family, she would have been recognized early and lived a life of philosophy and wonder. She might have become a famous scientist who cured cancer, or a business guru that generated endless revenue for her chosen company. Such minds were a gift from God, the government man believed, bequeathed upon the world to reveal a glimpse of Him. Sadly, the girl was an orphan, destined to live a life of servitude to her intellectual inferiors. It was an unbearable travesty that the government man could simply not allow to happen. With great solemnity, he vowed to himself to watch over this girl, and when the time was right, to guide her.
Amelia watched the government man depart and wondered at the disappointed look on his face. As she watched him leave, she noticed that every eye in the class was on her
Even Ellis was staring, confounded.
“Geoff, get them back to work” he snapped at a young male counselor that stood behind him. Geoff started towards the front of the class, reflexively flinching as he walked by Ellis. Amelia wondered if he had been an orphan once, too.
“OK, girls...line up.” Geoff ordered the room in a nasal tone.
As the girls organized and made their way out, Amelia stood to leave, but Ellis indicated with his eyes and a shake of his head that she should stay behind. Amelia swallowed hard as the room slowly vacated and she was left alone with her nightmare. She stayed in her seat and watched as Ellis took the teacher’s stool from the front of the room and carried it to the front of her desk. He kicked other desks out of the way and Amelia thought the stool might snap under his girth once he settled.
“You think you’re special?” he asked menacingly.
“No sir.” Amelia replied, not looking him in the eye.
“Yea you do. You think you’re smarter than me.” he said, his voice rising.
“No sir.” Amelia said again. She could feel her heart beating wildly in her chest and she knew that no matter what she said, Ellis would punish her.
“If you’re so smart, Amelia, then why are you just a stupid orphan and I’m the king around here?” Ellis asked, rising off the stool.
“I’m not smarter than you, sir.” Amelia pleaded, finally making eye contact. Her plea ultimately fell on deaf ears, and Ellis slapped her hard in the face. She fell sideways out of her chair and slammed her head against the desk next to hers, causing a steady stream of blood to run down her forehead.
“Ain’t so smart now, are ya?” Ellis chuckled, “Now get back to work!” He half-yelled and half-laughed, striding out of the room.
Amelia was left alone for a few blissful moments, though she knew that a counselor would come walking by at any moment, demanding to know why she was banging her head against desks instead of working. She would likely be punished for the mess that her blood made on her clothes, as well.
Chapter 3
Amelia was re-assigned later that day. Ellis had walked right up to her in the laundry room and announced that she would be in the kitchens from then on, due to her profound stupidity. Without even an opportunity to say goodbye, Amelia was taken from the bright, airy laundry room. A lanky counselor whose name Amelia did not know lead her down several different corridors, eventually arriving at a descending staircase. After going down six flights of stairs, Amelia was at the lowest point in the facility. She was led down one more dank hallway, and, finally, she was in the kitchens.
The space was dimly lit,
and Amelia could not judge the rooms’ size. The kitchen was incredibly noisy, as its seclusion prevented sounds from escaping. Water splashed from various pipes and sinks, making the floor a perpetual slip hazard. A great tray-lift hummed as it took food through a hole in the ceiling and returned dirty trays to the waiting hands of malnourished orphans. Amelia watched in fascination as the trays were cleared, soaped, rinsed and passed onto a conveyor belt that ran along the ceiling. At the tray’s second stop, more kids stacked them with fruits, sandwiches and a packet of cookies. Then, the trays were transferred back to the great lift, where they disappeared from sight into the ceiling.
Amelia had not eaten that much food at Lisson orphanage in three days, much less in one meal. She realized that it was too early for the orphans to be eating, anyway. They were serving the counselor’s lunch, then.
“You’ll start at the garbage bags” the lanky counselor said, “Take the bags from the baskets behind the washers, tie them and drag them to this cart” he indicated a cart near a door in the back of the kitchen, “Once the cart is full, take it outside to the gate and unload it, then come back.”
“Yes sir.”
“Don’t dawdle outside. By the time you’ve returned, the bags will be full again.”
“Yes sir.”
The lanky counselor left and Amelia was overjoyed to discover that no counselors stayed in the kitchens. The place was too depressing for those who could choose to not be there.
“Get this bag! Hurry up!” An older boy yelled at her from the cleaning line. Amelia hurried to the bag and barely had time to extract it from the basket before the boy was throwing more food behind him, hitting her in the face.
“Take it easy Aaron, she’s new.” the girl next to him said.
“Whatever” Aaron replied without looking at her.
After Amelia had a full cart, she dragged it with great effort out the back door, emerging under the dark gray sky. As Amelia looked around and realized where she had to go, her heart sank in her chest. She was at the bottom of a rocky, unpaved slope, and the gate loomed at the top. Amelia hauled the cart with all her might up the slope, occasionally scraping her knees on the rocks. Her breath came in fast, desperate gulps as she struggled up the incline. Every step was agony, and hard-scrabble roots protruded from between the rocks, threatening to cause her to tumble. When she reached the gate, she struggled to breathe even as she unloaded the bags. Once finished, Amelia couldn’t resist gazing at her surroundings. She was outside! Her new job was difficult, dangerous and lonely, but at least she could be outdoors occasionally.
As Amelia returned to the kitchen, she smiled broadly when she didn’t have counselors glaring at her constantly. All things considered, the kitchens weren’t so bad.
As the day wore on, Amelia began to learn the tricks of her trade. Going from the dark kitchen to the outdoors was causing her eyes to constantly adjust, igniting a headache. When one of the orphans saw her rubbing her head, he wordlessly offered her a thin, dark strip of cloth to wrap over her eyes. She could wear it outside and still see clearly enough to do her job. Another orphan pointed out that if she took the bags when they weren’t quite full, she would have lighter loads and less messes from the overloaded bags. Amelia thanked her young advisers profusely, though she was rewarded with muted stares instead of the camaraderie she hoped for. With boredom threatening, Amelia attempted to engage Aaron, who seemed to be in charge,
“How long have you worked down here, Aaron?” Amelia said sweetly. Aaron turned and looked Amelia full in the face, causing her voice to catch in her throat. His head was shaped horrifically, with a great canyon carved out of the left side of his cranium. His left eye was unfocused and had a milky, white hue.
“Nine years” he replied in a curt, authoritative tone. The girl next to him saw Amelia’s repulsion and she turned, sporting a face without a nose.
“We’re down here because we’re disfigured or out of favor. The counselors don’t want to look at us, and The Eater is through with us.”
“The Eater?”
“You probably know him as Counselor Ellis. He eats kids’ souls.” the girl said dramatically.
“OK...So what’s your name?” Amelia asked, hoping to change the subject.
“I’m Neena.”
“I’m Amelia.”
“You seem really nice. You have a load to carry, though, and we can talk more after the dinnertime rush.”
“OK.” Amelia responded, forcing herself to look away from Neena’s warped face. Their backs had been turned to Amelia all day and she couldn’t believe that she hadn’t noticed their deformities. In the darkness of the kitchen, she could hardly distinguish any details. As she looked closer at the other kitchen orphans, she noticed that they never looked away from their work, probably ashamed of what they thought that they were; freaks.
That evening, Amelia and the other kitchen orphans went to sleep in the compartment above the kitchen. To Amelia’s delight, the area was large and counselor-free. The smell of the food wafting through the vents below was tolerable and, according to Neena, they never went cold in the winter, either. The kids tucked each other into sleep and Amelia noticed several of them chatting, discussing everything from their working conditions to long-gone parents and pets. It was less than 24-hours after Amelia’s standardized test and she was exhausted, warm, and oddly, happy.
CHAPTER BREAK
The first nine months of working in the kitchens were perhaps the happiest of her life, Amelia thought. She developed several close friends, though no one as close as Neena. She and Aaron were on speaking terms and she had made him laugh hard once, causing his crooked teeth to cut his lip. Counselor Nancy came through sometimes only daily, or even weekly, and she was never severe.
Amelia had not seen Ellis or “The Eater”, as he was called, in three weeks. Before that it had been a month. He had not stayed long then, either, just long enough to glare at the kids and yell about something or another..
Amelia had fit in to the underground society perfectly. She now shared the trash-duty with a group of three kids who would barter their own jobs for a chance to go outside. Amelia had washed dishes, prepared plates and had once given a brief report to Counselor Nancy on the workers’ morale.
Neena’s voice cut into Amelia’s peaceful thoughts,
“What are you looking at?” Amelia broke from the reverie of cleaning a tray to glance at Neena,
“Nothing. Just those stains on the wall.”
“Aaron flinging food everywhere is what’s causing it. Aaron, why don’t you clean the wall sometime?” Neena invited Aaron into the conversation.
“I didn’t cause them stains. That’s from that stew and beef that the counselors don’t finish” he muttered loudly.
This caused an uncomfortable silence in the area. Though life was much more social in the kitchens, eating was only slightly better than the rest of Lisson Orphanage. Amelia was now nearly twelve years old and hopelessly skinny. She had not developed a woman's curves and she cursed her slow genes. She had caught some of the boys admiring her body, though, but none of them were aggressive towards her. She could make Aaron laugh often and effortlessly, and she also supposed that her popularity was why Neena was so attached to her.
Amelia helped finish cleaning up after dinner, then went to take the final cart to the gate. She volunteered for the duty often, as it had been her full-time job for the first month. When she reached the gate, she unloaded the bags rapidly and gazed at the sky. The air was clear in the countryside, though Amelia was not sure which state that Lisson Orphanage resided in. She knew that it was freezing cold in the winter months and unbearably hot in the summer. Spring and fall were pleasant, though.
Amelia went back inside and prepared to listen to one of Neena’s absurd tales about “The Eater” that constituted evening bed-time stories. Amelia rarely ever heard the name “Ellis” anymore and she wondered if all the kids could even remember his real name. Most of them were younger th
an her and not terribly bright. Even Neena was a full year Amelia’s junior, though she had been in the kitchens for much longer.
Once Neena had gathered enough kids willing to listen, she started her story of “The Eater”. She told them all about his latest victim, a dark-skinned girl with no name. Amelia watched Neena’s performance from the rear of the group, awestruck. Neena was an incredible storyteller. Her tone would go from a barely audible whisper of “The Eater’s” thoughts to a sudden screech of pain as he ensnared his victim. She made theatrical gestures with her arms and made eye contact with her audience, manipulating their imaginations fantastically.
Amelia was unaffected and gazed at the kids, who watched Neena with laser-like attention, not willing to miss a moment. After a short while, Amelia went to her bed and shut her eyes. She had not heard the end of Neena’s tale and she didn’t care to. She had heard it before, of course, but It was all just childish amusement, anyway.
The following morning, Amelia was the first person awake. She hummed tunelessly as she organized the bags of food. She needed to separate the counselor food from the orphan’s food, and then she needed to stage everything before it could be unwrapped and served. A truckload of foodstuffs had come in that morning and Amelia had received it, knowing that Counselor Nancy would be around, inspecting the operation.
