by Abe Moss
Clark lifted his hand and waved.
✽ ✽ ✽
Emmett could tell right off that something was different, that he wasn’t the same. When he stood to greet him, Clark didn’t seem in any hurry to meet him halfway. Somehow it wasn’t a mutual surprise. Whereas Emmett could hardly believe his eyes, Clark’s drifted around the library, more interested in their surroundings than in reuniting with his old friend.
They seated themselves on the sofa Emmett had already been occupying, choosing to stay in the quiet of the library.
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again,” Emmett said. “Where have you been?”
Clark shrugged. “Lots of places.”
“Different asylums? Why?”
“I don’t know,” Clark said. His voice was dry, nearly monotonous. “They just did.”
Despite sensing something was changed about him, Emmett was relieved to have his company. After Zachary, and the distance with Tobie… he thought he’d spend the rest of his days in The Cradle alone.
“You seem… different,” he said.
“I am different.” Clark gazed over the library thoughtfully. “They told me I would never be the same after everything that happened, and they were right. Especially after they had their way with me.”
“Who are you talking about?”
“The doctors. The counselors. The guards. All of them.” Clark closed his eyes, as though remembering. “But maybe it was for the best.”
“I’m sorry,” Emmett said. It was the strangest feeling. He’d missed Clark so much all this time, and now they were together again, sitting side by side, he felt he missed him all the more. “I wish you could have been here with us…”
“I tried to kill myself.” He opened his eyes, lifted his face to the ceiling like he was listening for something, though the library was its own small bubble of quiet. “A few times. I just wanted to forget. Couldn’t stop thinking about it…”
“About what? You mean what happened at the Holmes’?”
Clark went on, as though he hadn’t heard the question. “They gave me medication to help me forget. Except… now I forget lots of things. Not just the bad.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’ve been to more than two asylums before this one. But I don’t remember them very well. They kept moving me around for some reason. I don’t know…” He turned his palms up in his lap, looking them over. “Maybe I won’t stay here long, either.”
“I hope you do,” Emmett told him. “Jackie and Tobie were both here. But they moved Jackie somewhere else, too.”
“I almost didn’t recognize you when I saw you,” Clark said, still not acknowledging Emmett’s half of the conversation. “That’s how easily I’m forgetting things, I guess…”
“Tobie’s still here, though…” Emmett considered, an idea forming. “I should take you to him! I bet he’d be glad to see you!”
“I never liked Tobie,” Clark said bluntly. “I wouldn’t mind never seeing him again.”
“Oh.”
There went that idea, Emmett thought. Still, he was happy to see him again, even if he was just a fragment of his prior self. He hoped Clark was wrong. He hoped they were done moving him different places. They could spend time together every day, almost like before…
“I’m glad you’re here,” Emmett said.
His heart ached for his friend to reciprocate the sentiment, but Clark said nothing.
✽ ✽ ✽
It happened all too quickly. Luckily, his body did the majority of the work while his mind wrestled with the confusion between being suddenly awake and the twisting in his gut. As he opened his eyes he was already sliding out of bed. Hot, pulsing sickness bubbled out of his stomach like a baking-soda-and-vinegar volcano. It climbed his throat just as he dove through the curtain surrounding the toilet in the corner and pressed his scrunched-up face into the bowl. His tiny body arched like a hissing cat as he retched painfully into the toilet.
Once, twice, three times.
It was begun.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
PAIN OF THE PAST
You’re not eating this morning?” Clark asked as Emmett took a seat beside him in the cafeteria empty-handed.
“I don’t feel like eating…”
Clark watched him, his expression blank by default and never changing much beyond that, though it was evident plenty of thought went on behind his dulled eyes.
“You don’t look well. They must have started you on something.”
Emmett nodded. “A couple days ago. To… help with my mood, or something… I think…”
Clark began eating regardless. He spoke with his mouth full, his voice casual and yet somehow wise to Emmett’s ears, so that just the sound of it lent credibility to anything he said.
“They don’t really know what the medication will do,” he said. “It’s not really for us.”
“She said it would help me not be sad.”
“That’s just what they tell you. They don’t know. That’s the whole point, actually. It’s not because we need it. They just need someone to test it on. That’s all these places are really for.”
“What do you mean?”
“These asylums aren’t for curing people.” Clark chewed his food meditatively. “They have no intention of helping anyone here. We’re lost causes, so who better to experiment on…”
“How do you know that?”
“I’ve been to so many facilities the last couple months, and they’re all the same. No one who leaves is actually going anywhere, except another asylum. I also met some other kids… They were older. Almost adults. I don’t remember much these last couple months, but I remember them. They made a lot of sense. Basically, they said these places don’t want to help us. The doctors and scientists are using us to try and make…” Clark paused, thinking. “What’s the word… a vaccine. For regular people, before they can get sick. But there’s no easy way to test it, or to know if it works unless the person is already showing signs… and if they’re already showing signs, well then… they’re already in a place like this, aren’t they?”
Emmett was silent as his young mind somersaulted, in awe of these concepts Clark introduced, even if he didn’t fully understand any of it. It sounded impressive, at the very least.
“That’s why they put us on so many different medications, and never for very long. They want to see if the results last, or if our brains go right back to being sick once the medication stops. And sometimes the medication does nothing but make us sicker…”
Emmett was immediately reminded of Zachary, and he felt a cold punch remembering his own nausea the night before.
“Medication isn’t the only thing they’re testing, either. They perform surgeries. Open up people’s heads. Other operations, too. But I’m seeing it much less here than the other facilities I’ve been to…”
“Jackie said there were girls with scars on their heads.”
Clark nodded.
“The boy I used to share a room with died,” Emmett said. “He kept getting sicker and sicker…” He paused, his empty stomach growling without any appetite. “I think it’s going to happen to me, too…”
Clark observed him, chewing his food dispassionately.
“You shouldn’t be worried about death,” he said. Fork in hand, he gestured to the rest of the cafeteria, to the other children around them. “This is the rest of our lives. Either the drugs kill us, or they make it so we barely notice we’re alive anyway. So… when you think about it… being dead wouldn’t be the worst thing ever.”
“Oh…”
It was at that point Emmett decided he was done with the subject. He let Clark finish eating without any further questions.
Suddenly his company wasn’t as comforting as he first thought.
✽ ✽ ✽
By dinner, he felt his appetite returning. He stood in line with Clark and they ate together, avoiding their earlier subjects if he could help it. However, avoiding d
epressing subjects seemed to limit Clark’s interest in conversation at all.
“I’ve always thought the food was good, at least,” Emmett said, to which Clark merely grunted unconcernedly.
Oh well, Emmett thought. If it was conversation about death or no conversation at all, he would gladly take silence.
Soon their silence was broken, however, by a commotion at the other end of the cafeteria. They both turned to see what it was, along with most others sitting around them. Shouting. Shrieking. It came from one of the corridors, echoing loudly into the cafeteria, getting closer. The closer it came, the more Emmett recognized the voice responsible.
“Let me go! Let me go! No! No!”
A guard entered the cafeteria from Ward B, bringing the noise with him. He hauled something over his shoulder. Kicking and screaming.
Not something. Someone.
A child, bare feet kicking, fists beating against the guard’s back in what mostly seemed a rather unconvincing battle. The boy lifted his head to the ceiling and screamed his throat hoarse. It was Tobie.
“Is that who I think it is?” Clark asked. Somehow his voice was almost bored as he said it. “Oh, I think it is…”
“That’s Tobie,” Emmett said, standing from his spot on the bench involuntarily as he tried to track them across the room.
Tobie continued to scream.
“Let me go! Let me go! I shouldn’t be here!”
Unfazed, the guard quickly made his way across the expansive room toward Ward C. Tobie’s thrashing did little to slow them.
“Jackie!” he screamed. “Where are you? Where are you?”
For a moment he grabbed hold of the guard’s hair, dug his fingers in. In one smooth motion the guard flipped Tobie off his shoulder and swung him around his side, carrying him under his arm like a bundle instead. From there Tobie continued to thrash just as unsuccessfully.
“Peter! Peter!”
In another instant they were out of the cafeteria, disappearing into Ward C, where Emmett imagined they were taking him to Detainment. As his screaming faded, the others’ attention returned instantly to other matters. Emmett took his seat, staring blankly at the food left on his tray. What little appetite had been restored seemed to escape him now.
Clark continued eating, entirely unbothered by the event.
“I forget,” Clark said casually. “Who was Peter?”
✽ ✽ ✽
It was time for bed and once more Emmett was not in his. Shivering under his own weight as he supported himself over the toilet, arms flexing in a cold sweat, he dreaded the moment the sickness would come but also begged to be rid of it, stewing inside him. Reaching its boiling point. He regretted eating dinner. He would never eat again, he thought. The very idea of food, in fact, sent his body—
—please let this be it, let me sleep, let it out of me—
He vomited into the toilet gratefully, knowing that soon after the pain, relief would follow.
✽ ✽ ✽
The next day, skipping breakfast and leaving Clark to eat alone for a time, Emmett ventured to the yard in search of Tobie.
It was unlikely they’d make up, or that their friendship would ever be like it was, but at the very least he wanted to make sure he’d returned from Ward C in one piece. Just a glimpse of him was all he asked, to settle his worry-stricken stomach.
But to his mounting concern, Tobie was nowhere to be found.
Not that day or the next.
✽ ✽ ✽
“I want to see her,” Emmett said.
Officer Hollings looked down his nose, Emmett standing so close he had to crane his neck nearly all the way back to see the guard’s face.
“See who, now?”
“Dr. Marks.”
Hollings’ cool eyes flickered down either end of the corridor, perhaps wishing someone else was there to witness Emmett’s pitiful attempt at authority. But alas, his amusement would be his alone. Emmett never took his eyes off him—focused, nostrils flaring.
“It doesn’t work that way. You’ll have to wait until your next appointment.”
“When is that?”
“Whenever she asks for you, I suppose.”
“Can you tell her I’m ready now?”
Hollings rolled his eyes. “Is this an emergency of some kind?”
“Yes! It is an emergency.”
“What’s the emergency?”
“I need to ask her something.”
They held each other’s gazes for a long moment. Emmett remained as he was, stern and positively glowering. Regardless of that, unfortunately, as he was only a child he could hardly be taken seriously.
“I’ll let you know when she’s ready for you.”
Huffing, Emmett folded his arms in disappointment as Hollings strolled leisurely away for other sources of entertainment.
However, to Emmett’s surprise, Dr. Marks would be ready for him sooner than he expected.
✽ ✽ ✽
The helmet was sitting plainly on her desk as he entered her office, but he paid it no mind. Perhaps at the sound of his unusual haste, Dr. Marks looked up from her scribbling to see him approach.
“Oh, Emmett, are you all right? You look terrible!”
Perhaps she’d hoped to disarm him with her words, but they only fueled his temper.
“I’m sick,” he said grumpily. “I’ve been throwing up ever since you gave me that medicine. I can’t eat. I don’t even want to eat.”
“I did warn you that might happen. It’s absolutely normal—”
“Where is Tobie?” Emmett asked, determined not to be sidetracked.
“Tobie?”
“He’s been gone for three days! I can’t find him anywhere.”
Dr. Marks appeared baffled. “I don’t know about your friend, Emmett, I’m sorry. He’s not one of my patients.”
“But you still know.”
“No, I’m sorry. I don’t.”
He looked woefully toward the empty chair where he was meant to sit as his mind raced in every direction.
“I was told yesterday you were very eager to see me, but I couldn’t clear a time for an appointment until today. I’m sorry about that. Is that what you wanted to ask me?”
Emmett’s breath puffed noisily. He couldn’t decide if he was angry or worried or nauseous or all of the above.
“Have a seat and let’s talk about it.”
Grudgingly, he did as she suggested.
“When was the last you saw Tobie?”
“Three days ago.”
“All right. What were the two of you doing?”
The question threw him for a bit of a loop, considering they hadn’t been doing anything.
“Well… nothing. I saw a guard taking him away.”
“Oh, where were they going?”
“I don’t know. Tobie seemed scared and was screaming a lot and then… now he’s been gone for a really long time.”
“Perhaps he was taken to Detainment for misbehaving.”
“But that was three days ago.”
Dr. Marks threw her hands up in a ‘what can you do’ gesture.
“Some children can be very stubborn. It’s possible it’s taken him this long to behave again.”
“You mean they might still be giving him that stuff?” Emmett asked, aghast. “Punishing him for three days?”
“That’s not what I’m saying. He’s likely being treated for whatever may have caused the bad behavior to begin with. For instance, you were released very quickly after your trip to Detainment because I decided it was likely an isolated incident, given what I knew about it. Your friend’s case, however, might not be so simple.”
Emmett considered what she said. What had caused Tobie’s outburst? Strangely he hadn’t thought much about that.
“Do you know why he was so mad?” Emmett asked.
“Like I told you before, Tobie isn’t my patient. I don’t know much about his file.” Dr. Marks watched while Emmett digested what little she’d g
iven him. “Are you ready to move on to other things?”
He wasn’t any readier than he’d ever be. But it would be futile to resist at this point. He had come to her. He brought this on himself, and they both knew it. The helmet, already neatly presented between them on her desk, said as much.
“Can I see it?” Emmett asked.
She opened her desk drawer and removed the necklace. The black pendant glimmered in its dull way as she placed it on the desk beside the helmet. He wondered why he hadn’t heard the music again since that day outside the storage room. Perhaps it didn’t need to play the music any longer, as he’d finally found it.
Or it had found him.
“You remember the deal we made?” she asked.
“You said I could keep it.”
She scrunched her lips up to one side, debating. “That’s if this goes really well. We’ll only know that when we’re finished. But… I’ll keep my promise if it does.”
Emmett swallowed his dread.
“Are you ready?”
He nodded that he was.
Dr. Marks picked up the helmet and made her way around to him. He sat rigid while she placed it on his head, turning it this way and that, straightening it. Like the time before, she fiddled with the mechanism underneath which tightened it around his noggin.
“This is a different helmet than last time,” she said, still toying with it. “Same kind, only this one’s not broken.”
She wrapped the same collar which was attached to the helmet around his neck. Once it was in place, she retrieved another small, black device from her desk and slotted it inside the helmet. Then she returned to her chair, pulled herself to her desk and took up her pen.
“All right…” She opened her notebook to a blank page. She glanced many times at the helmet on his head as she jotted down her first notes. “Are you nervous right now?”
“Yes.”
He saw no point in lying.
“Of course. You feel very put on the spot, I bet.”
Like the previous time, the weight of the helmet—which wasn’t much—froze him in place. He must have appeared comically petrified to Dr. Marks. He wondered what the bulbs did to reflect that.