by Krystal Wade
A man laughed and the blanket flew away, ripped from her bed, sending a blast of icy air over her itchy skin. Two freezing cold hands wrapped around her ankles, two more her wrists. They lifted Rose from the mattress and flung her onto the floor, knocked the air from her chest. The bugs were all over her now, burning and itching and biting and pinching.
“Just a dream. Just a dream. Just a dream,” Rose muttered, eyes closed tight, afraid to see her attacker.
The man laughed again. She focused on his voice, on the feel of him occupying the room, trying to discern something unique about him. A clue. But he said nothing else.
Rose’s back throbbed from the collision with the hardwood floor. She sat up, gasping and rubbing her spine, and finally looked around. Two hooded figures stood perfectly still by the bathroom door. Rose tried to scramble into the hallway, but one of the figures reached out his foot and knocked her feet out from under her. He yanked her back by her ankles, and Rose’s face smacked the floor.
Licking her lips, the rich, salty potency of blood flooded her mouth.
This felt real.
This couldn’t be a dream.
Nerves awake and aware and just as clear as her head, she scrambled to get up again.
“Stop,” one of the figures boomed, voice clear and distinct and ringing a bell of recognition.
Could be Thomas. Maybe Martin.
Rose stopped thrashing about, unable to disobey even though she wanted to because her arms and legs were held in place by strong, sure hands. Those same hands pulled her to her feet and marched her out the door and down the hall, down the stairs into Hall HS, and into room 206 Briar.
Normally this part of the nightmare was a blur, the world around her unclear and fuzzy, but she knew, knew, this was no dream. She knew because she stopped taking her medications that she wasn’t quite as out of it as she was supposed to be.
Rose knew Phillip was right, and her heart knew too, pounding a million beats per minute against her ribs.
One of the hooded men stuck the skeleton key into the door and pressed it open. The other man shoved her inside, then they slammed it.
Hands and feet free, she pounded her fists against the metal barrier, begging to be let out, for them to stop this, that she was going to tell Dr. Underwood about what they were doing to her at night. There was no response, and she turned and pressed her back against the door, sucking in rapid breaths through her tingling, sore nose.
Suddenly, strobe lights flashed all over the room, illuminating the spindly trees on the walls. They shook back and forth as though they were marching toward her. Rose closed her eyes and put her hands over her face to mute out the light.
She repeated wake up, wake up, wake up even though she knew she wasn’t asleep.
Something soft caressed her skin, and she trembled, refusing to open her eyes. Screams started to the left of her, then circled around the room, chasing, as if the person screaming ran around Rose, taunting her.
Another soft touch on her arm. Then a hard touch brushed her leg, and something pierced her elbow.
“Open,” a man said, his voice distant, like the room was full of static and he could barely speak over the cacophony of noise.
Wake up.
Wake up, Rose.
Then another thought whispered across her mind: Fight.
Fingers encircled her wrists and pulled her hands away. She opened her eyes to see who was doing this to her, but the person had gone. Nothing but trees stood around her, her trees, very close to her, and they shook their gray leaves. Trees couldn’t peel off the walls and move. Trees couldn’t thrash against her. The room spun as she tried to make sense of what was happening.
The strobe lights blinked, and she twitched and jerked as if the light caused her physical harm, like it touched her. Then she realized something was touching her. The trees pressed in on Rose, left her no room to breathe, no room to run, scraping her with their black bark and bare, white branches.
They shifted and danced around the room in the pulsing light, suffocating Rose as they pushed her around like a pinball, bringing her to the wall where she’d drawn them. Now an empty wall, a blank canvas of nothing but white. One of the trees pressed a charcoal into her hand as if to say “Draw. Draw more, damn you. We’re lonely.”
But Rose stood there, shaking, cold, afraid, arms hanging limply at her sides. She wanted to believe this was a dream, that she was asleep and having a really vivid nightmare, that Dr. Underwood was right, but the fact she knew it wasn’t made her feel that much worse. Trapped. Stuck. Alone.
Desperate.
The trees pressed into her back, flattening Rose against the wall covered in paper. It crinkled and pulled each time she got near. Then the trees spun in circles, smacking her with their branches. Pain blossomed in the back of Rose’s skull. A swift whack made her ribs ache. They were begging, pleading with her to draw.
Just draw, she told herself. Just draw and they’ll leave you alone. You’re like him.
And so she lifted the charcoal to the paper on the wall and drew the lines of a girl’s face, the girl from before the Big Fight with Leah Briar, but this did not please the trees. They whipped Rose’s hand with their branches. Stinging welts reddened her skin, and Rose cringed. She had no idea what they wanted, no idea how to make anyone happy.
But she hoped, prayed, that if she could just finish this piece, the slaps and scrapes would stop. They’d let her go back to bed and rest. Rose pulled the charcoal down in long, smooth swoops, over and over, until the girl’s hair looked wild, like it floated around her as she was trapped mid-fall. She took a step back to appraise her work, but a tree shoved her forward, and Rose’s elbow cracked against something hard. Instead of rubbing it or showing how much that hurt, Rose put her tool back against the canvas and finished the eyes. They were wide open, panicked, crazed. The girl knew she was falling, knew she was a mess and didn’t have long to live, but she knew there wasn’t a thing she could do about it.
“I’m done,” Rose lied. She’d never be done with this piece. It looked just as horrible as the one she’d been working on at home. Something about the girl’s bone structure was all wrong, but every time Rose tried to make her cheekbones sharper or fuller or change them in any way, they just looked like they were drawn by a child who didn’t have a clue how to draw. Normally, Rose would ask her mother what she thought, but she couldn’t. Not now. Locked away in this place and surrounded by nightmares. “Mom, help me, please . . . .”
“Good,” the man said, the static calming down.
The trees backed away, all but one that came closer, and it pressed its branches against her arms and pushed her against the wall. A sudden stinging started at her elbow, and warmth raced through Rose’s veins and pulled her out of this dark, frightening space. She drifted into a pleasant memory, cocooned in comfort soft as feathers.
Rose’s mother held her daughter’s five-year-old little hand and tugged her through the parking lot and into Michael’s to buy a paint set for her birthday. Her mother loved when Rose drew her pictures, and Rose loved making her mommy happy.
“Here we are,” she said as they reached the aisle with every paintbrush, color, and artistry item Rose’s little self could imagine. “Pick which one you want, and I’ll buy it for you, sweetheart.”
“Thank you, Mommy.” Rose bounced on her toes, giddy in a way only a child can manage.
“Anything for my girl on her special day.” Mrs. Briar touched her finger to Rose’s nose and smiled so big and proud and full and happy. “Just promise me you’ll never stop drawing pictures for me, Rose.”
“Promise, Mommy.”
A tear slid down Rose’s cheek as she lay in bed. She couldn’t remember how she got here, or when she first broke that promise to her mother, but Rose had.
Until the Big Fight, almost every picture she ever drew hung on the wall around their house, all marked with the words to Mom or to Mommy, depending on how old Rose was at the time. Together, they
used to sit in the attic—a place transformed from a dusty old room with boxes and furniture draped with sheets to a studio filled with everything Rose could want or need, complete with a picture window overlooking the Smoky Mountains. A backdrop for several of her pieces.
The two of them would spend hours up there after homework and dinner were finished, Rose painting or sketching while yacking about what girl dared wear what to school, her mother attempting—and failing—to draw the same thing while listening to every detail and commenting as if she actually cared.
How did they lose that?
What went wrong?
The tears came faster now, and Rose opened her eyes to snap out of this—
She froze.
The falling girl she drew while downstairs hung on her wall. No, not hanging, drawn on the wall. How could that . . . ? She’d drawn on paper, in another room. She knew. Rose hadn’t taken the medicines. Her mind was awake and aware. How could this happen?
Rose tried to get up but found she couldn’t move. She was shackled to the bed. Why was she shackled? Why was that picture on the wall?
“Ah, Miss Briar, welcome back.” Dr. Underwood rose from a chair at the foot of the bed, a frown on his face. He didn’t look disappointed to see her, how she had imagined; he just looked sad, defeated, tired. Following her gaze to the wall, he sighed, then turned back to Rose, the skin around his eyes swollen. “I must apologize about the security measures we had to put in place, but it seems we allowed visitors a bit too soon for you, and you got quite out of control. We found we had no choice but to restrain you.”
“What happened?” She tugged against her restraints, pulled and made the bed frame quake, then lay back down.
He nodded. “I suspected you might not remember, but I was kind of hoping you would. Do you? Remember anything, that is?”
The tears she’d shed over losing the connection to her mother still slid down her cheeks. “Yes. No. I mean, I couldn’t sleep last night, and Thomas and Martin came in here and surprised me. I bumped my head, and then Nurse Vicki was in here, kicking them out and checking on me. Then I fell asleep and woke up thinking I had bugs all over me. Then I was attacked and dragged downstairs, to Hall HS, to room 206 and Briar, and I was forced to draw that”—Rose pointed at the wall—“all while trees attacked me over and over.”
Dr. Underwood sat on the edge of the bed but refrained from picking up her hand or offering any of his usual comfort, which unsettled Rose a little. She longed for him to tell her everything would be okay, for someone to lie to her. “So, another nightmare?”
“It felt so real. I was sure that it was.” Rose pulled against her arm restraints, taking out her frustration on them. The metal cuffs cut into her wrists, but she welcomed the pain, welcomed something that might leave a mark so she could remember this moment.
“But you drew,” he said, returning his gaze to the wall. “Which is good. Actually, this piece is fantastic. Really impressive, the amount of talent you have at such a young age. Were you drawing in defense of something or someone again?”
She nodded.
“May I ask whom?”
“Myself.”
Dr. Underwood smiled. “Incredible.”
Rose wasn’t sure how incredible it was. Every time she looked at that piece she saw its flaws. She wondered why the girl was falling. Why she was so afraid. If she’d jumped off a bridge, she’d look more peaceful, knowing the end of her misery was coming. Was someone pushing her over the ledge? If so, why was she suspended? The girl needed work, reflection. “Thanks.”
“Any appearance of your friend Phillip in last night’s nightmare?” Dr. Underwood asked, meeting her eyes. “Or were you alone?”
“No Phillip. And I certainly wasn’t alone. The trees I’d been forced to draw the other day were attacking me. However crazy that sounds.”
“Artists have a different connection to the universe. They hear things and see things others do not. I don’t believe them crazy. I believe them in tune to the world, of a higher intelligence.” He sighed again, like he was drained and trying to suck some life from the air around him. “What inspired you to draw this, Rose?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Just something I’ve had in mind a long time and thought I could submit to the Chicago school, but that won’t do me any good now.”
Dr. Underwood’s eyes lit up like a kid’s at Christmas, but he didn’t add anything. He just tipped his head toward the door and said, “Your parents are beyond disappointed they won’t get to talk to you today, but I’m sure they’ll understand.”
“My parents?” Rose looked over and saw her mother and father pressed against the window. Leah Briar lacked any of her usual makeup, and her hair was out of place and hanging down to her shoulders, scraggly. She was crying, and Stephan Briar gripped her shoulder in a supportive, loving way, his face ashen with black circles surrounding his eyes. He mouthed I love you, and Rose couldn’t take it. She couldn’t take seeing them on the other side of that wall containing her art, her dark, harsh art, the girl reflecting more of how Rose felt now than she was ever supposed to: crazed and paranoid.
She couldn’t take seeing her parents broken.
Like her.
“They called yesterday and said they wanted to visit,” Dr. Underwood said, breaking through Rose’s panic to add more to it. “But given how you responded to your friend Megan’s visit”—he pointed at the drawing—“I’m not sure it will do you any good right now. Sure wish you would have shared what happened with me.”
No. She had to see them. Rose had to apologize, find a way to get back to her mother, back to the days they’d hang out and draw and laugh together. She needed to apologize to her dad, for using him to get her way, for everything she’d done wrong the last year and everything before that.
“Please,” Rose begged Dr. Underwood. “You have to let me see them. I miss them so much. I need to talk to them.”
“I’m not sure why you’d want to.” He looked at her parents, then back to Rose, the exhaustion replaced by something else, something Rose couldn’t quite place that didn’t fit the face of the man she’d grown to know, to care about, who she believed cared about her. His look contained rage, or jealousy, or something else that didn’t quite fit. “Given how you feel they’ve squashed your dreams.”
“Of course I want to see them. They’re my parents!” Rose jerked against the restraints, holding her mother’s gaze, hoping she could recognize her daughter’s need for her, but her father led her mother away, both of them crying harder, and Rose broke down. “Help! Get me out of here. You have to get me out of here. This place is making me crazy. Please! Please, Mom, Dad, you have to help me!”
Nurse Judy came crashing into the room with a syringe full of clear liquid.
“No! No more drugs. Please. Mom, Dad, help me! These drugs are making me crazy.”
“I’m sad to hear you think that way, Rose,” Dr. Underwood said, lowering his head.
The sharp prick was exactly how it had been last night, followed by the same warmth rushing through her veins and pulling her under.
The last thought Rose had as the drugs brought her to a place of complete comfort and euphoria was I’ll never see my parents again.
13
A blanket of darkness shrouded Rose’s thoughts, kept her under a spell where she couldn’t move, couldn’t open her eyes for more than a few seconds at a time. But every time she managed a look around, she’d see Dr. Underwood sitting in the chair by the foot of her bed. He’d glance up, smile a sad, small smile, and Rose would mutter a number she heard while asleep, “One, one, one.”
The next time she opened her eyes, she didn’t know why, but she repeated another set of numbers, “One, two. One, two.”
This went on for so long, where she felt out of control, powerless, trapped, that she’d eventually worked her count up. “One, two, three, four, five.”
And on this count of five, Rose opened her eyes to the sound of the alarm. Se
conds turned into minutes, and she lifted an arm and found it unrestrained. She did the same with her legs and then sat on the edge of the bed, bare toes grazing the cold wooden floor. Dr. Underwood no longer occupied the room, but her art did. The girl on the wall stared at Rose, radiant morning light bouncing off her dark outlines. The girl mirrored what Rose felt inside, and she wanted to cover her up or hide.
Rose escaped into the bathroom and cleaned up. Her hair was matted and oily. Her clothes sweat soaked and grimy. Her teeth were caked in gunk. And the numbers ran through her head continually. One, two, three, four, five. One, two, three, four, five.
She knew what they meant, what she had to do with them. Rose had to write the passage of five days down. Five days the doctor kept her drugged and restrained for her psychotic break. Someone had whispered the numbers to her every night. Deep inside Rose knew that to be true, but trusting in herself became more and more difficult with each passing day.
Concentrating on the mystery voice, Rose toweled off and then put on fresh, white scrubs, but no matter how hard she thought about it, she couldn’t discern who the voice belonged to.
Before Rose could leave and get back to her regularly scheduled activities, Nurse Judy bounded into the room with a lot more purpose than usual. She closed the door behind her and beelined for Rose, placing a hand on her shoulder and looking her straight in the eyes, chewing on her plump bottom lip.
“I have two seconds to tell you this, my precious girl, and I hope to God it doesn’t get me in a world of trouble. I have mouths to feed, mind you, but you’re too sweet, Rose, too sweet to walk out there and not know this.” Judy glanced back over her shoulder, squinting. Her hand shook, and Rose placed hers over the nurse’s.