by Hulden Morse
After sitting there for a few minutes, he accumulated the motivation to rise out of bed and use the restroom. Charles descended the ladder and crept across the room to their shared toilet. He flipped on the bathroom light (one of the few things he had control over) and relieved himself with gratification. As he turned away from the bowl, he saw a security camera sitting in the top corner of the bathroom, just above the door. It disgusted him to think that someone was watching them use the toilet, rubbing their fingers with perverted pleasure like a pubescent boy ripping open a skin magazine for the first time.
He wanted so badly for his roommate to understand that the lack of privacy, that kind of extreme control, was not typically found in a shelter or clinic. The bizarre actions of the employees, the repression the roommates were experiencing, were not commonly found in the real world. Charles glared at the camera as he opened the door and exited the bathroom.
After licking his lips absentmindedly, he noticed the rancid taste within his mouth. Something as simple as being unable to brush his teeth was hell for the well-off businessman. Even the air expelled from his mouth had a noticeable flavor, a thick aroma that stung his nostrils like acid to the eyes. He longed for a toothbrush, dreamed of some toothpaste, though acknowledged that compared to the other afflictions, dental hygiene was low on his wish list.
The man took a seat at the table and noticed that Damian was waking up. The bunk creaked and groaned as he rolled out of the sheets and placed his feet upon the ground.
“Morning,” Charles said stoically.
“Hey, man,” Damian mumbled to his roommate.
“How was the first night?”
“Damn good. Not gonna lie,” he said as he walked over to the table and sat next to Charles.
“You serious?”
“Yeah. I either sleep on a street or in a crowded shelter, sometimes on the floor there. This is a great place.”
The CEO could not empathize with his new friend, though he could sympathize with him.
“I get it,” he said with compassion. “I don’t get it, but at the same time I do.”
“You really think this place is dangerous?”
“Yes. I do. They have cameras in the bathroom! We’re fed through a slot in the door. This is inhumane! We’re being treated like animals.”
Damian listened politely, though Charles could see the disappointment in his eyes. It was as if his new roommate felt bad for him, pitied him for being frightened of a gift they had been given.
“Charles. Look. I was homeless before this. I hadn’t showered in a long time. But I come here, and they showered me.”
“They gave you a shower?”
“Yeah. Must have been when I was asleep ‘cause I was filthy before. They gave me new clothes.”
“You mean this prison garb?”
“Hey, I’m tryin’ to get you to see my side. I get where ya coming from. Now try to get me. I feel like I’ve been sent to rehab or something.”
Charles looked at the man next to him in disbelief, offended that someone would consider a jail like that to be a rehabilitation center.
“This is not rehab,” he said angrily.
“How do you know?”
“I run rehab centers. I founded the company Reaching Dreams. We’re the largest rehabilitation nonprofit for the homeless population.”
Damian stared at him blankly, as if the middle-aged man were a spoiled child bragging about a new toy he was given by a divorced parent competing for his affection. Charles waited for a response but was met with only skepticism from his audience. After several seconds, the CEO began to laugh hysterically, causing Damian to recoil in surprise. He doubled over in the chair and placed his hands upon his knees, cackling uncontrollably into the ground. Damian shifted away from the demented man, as if he had officially cracked and would do something violent.
“Hey, man. What’s up?” he said with concern. But Charles continued to laugh.
“Dude, there ain’t no reason to laugh like that,” he said again.
Charles sucked in the air with deep inhales, fighting to control his breathing and cease the incessant laughter. He wiped the tears from his eyes and patted Damian on the leg.
“Sorry, man,” the CEO said after catching his breath. “I just thought about what I said, and it seems so stupid.”
“So it’s not true?”
“Oh no,” Charles said, chuckling again. “It’s completely true. But it doesn’t matter! Not in here. That’s what’s funny. I heard myself telling you this, and I thought, so what? Who gives a shit? I had a beautiful house and a nice car and a family, and now I’m trapped in here. Nothing out there matters in here.”
“That doesn’t seem like a reason to laugh,” Damian said in concern.
“Well, if I didn’t laugh then I was going to cry. Either way I was going to be hysterical and laughing seemed like more fun.” Charles smiled warmly at his roommate who could see the tears collecting in his eyes.
“Let me talk for a bit,” the skinny man said to his emotional roommate. “It may help you relax.”
“Yeah. That’d be alright. Thanks.”
Damian was about to speak when the lock on their door turned and two men pushed their way into the room. Two guards stood there, a wall of muscle, and pointed at the newest inhabitant of room 42. Charles called for them to leave him alone, to leave both of them alone, but was quickly thrown a dirty look by the guards.
“Don’t do anything stupid, Pearson,” one of them said. “We’re here for Damian. Back off.”
“It’s okay, Charles,” his roommate said. “It’s okay. I’ll be back. I know it.”
The CEO held his tongue, one of the hardest things he had ever done, and watched as the guards guided Damian out of the room, shutting the door loudly behind them. Charles stood from the chair and began pacing the room, agitated. He honestly believed that he was put on the planet to help people. His entire purpose in life was to protect those who had either been forgotten or simply needed protecting. He had given his time, money, sweat, and tears to save the lives of countless individuals, and he would give his own life to help another person. But here he was, the CEO of Reaching Dreams, and he had just let those heinous brutes walk away with a truly good person. They may torture Damian for information, or enact twisted experiments upon his body, and Charles did nothing to stop them.
The man was sickened by his lack of action. The place was changing him. He used to be all-accepting, non-assuming, and courageous. And there, in that facility, trapped in that building, he had started judging people by their appearances, resorting to prejudice, and his ability to face any challenge had been lost somewhere in the recent past. Was that the goal of the employees? Was he supposed to be warped by the ideals of those who ran the facility, charged to operate beneath their image in order to become a pawn in their game?
Charles started to feel sick. He quit pacing and waited for a bout of nausea to pass, though it only grew worse in intensity and inevitability. He hurried into the bathroom and knelt before the toilet, gripping the metal sides like they would stabilize his spinning mind. His family was out there somewhere, waiting for him to come home, and he was wasting his time in front of a shitter, about to purge the second-rate food that was slapped onto a dirty tray for him to scarf down as a pig devours garbage in a trough. What would they think of him? How could they want such a spineless, prejudiced, worthless human as their father and husband?
The nausea worsened. He felt like he was about to burst. Sweat crept onto his forehead and his body became clammy, causing his arms and legs to quiver. He was glad there was not a mirror in the room. He knew what he looked like. Pale in the face, weak in the limbs, and flabby in the gut. There was a reason he was alone as a child. No one wanted him. Who would want him now? He couldn’t even get out of that damn building, let alone survive on his own in the real world. He
, a CEO in charge of helping homeless people? Of helping anyone? Who the hell did he think he was? He couldn’t survive on the streets, and now he was trapped in a room, unable to help himself. The torture was deserved, as was the brutality and illness. That was why he was there! He was the one that needed rehabilitating. The doctor was right. It was a sickness, and only the tough regimen that the facility provided could drive the disease from his body and save him from a life of hypocrisy, mediocrity, and delusion, steering him from a path that would ultimately conclude with a gun in his hand, a bullet in his head, and the smile of relief creeping across his face.
Charles vomited into the toilet, losing the little food he had placed in his stomach the day before. He felt his gut tighten again as it pushed more partially digested food out of his mouth, filling the bowl with pungent sick. He coughed violently, forcing the painful stomach acid out of his throat, and then retched again. His abdomen was sore from the strong contractions, but he sensed that the nausea was over.
After leaning over the toilet for a few more minutes, spitting out as much vomit as he could, Charles washed his mouth in the sink and splashed his face with water. He ignored the thoughts that had bred and hatched demonic ideas within his troubled mind, blaming their dark nature on the stress that had collected within him, and crawled onto the top bunk to relax.
Within ten minutes, Damian returned to their room and glanced at his roommate, scrunching his nose at the odd aroma in the air.
“Someone throw up?” he said lightheartedly.
“Yeah. Sorry, man. Not taking this well.”
“Hey. It’s okay. Don’ worry ‘bout it.”
“What’d they do?” Charles asked curiously.
“Just took my picture. Took info from me. That’s all.”
“Yeah, they did that to me yesterday or the day before. Or before that? Not sure.”
He continued to taste the stomach acid and swallowed hard, feeling a burn in the back of his throat.
“Damn,” the CEO said. “I want to brush my teeth so bad.”
“You get used to it, man,” was the only response.
Damian sat down and looked up at his roommate who was laying on his side, peering over the edge of the bed.
“This feels a lot like rehab, Charles,” he said hesitantly.
“It’s not.”
“But it feels like it.”
“Have you been to rehab before?”
“Yeah. Once.”
“For what?” Charles asked.
“Drugs. I got clean, but I just like being on the street and chose to stay there.”
“How’d you end up homeless?”
Damian shifted in the chair and stared at the ground. A wry smile formed on his face but quickly disappeared. His fingers twiddled unremittingly.
“Believe it or not, I went to college. Or at least part of it.”
“Really?” Charles said. Hearing the backstory of his Residents was one of the most rewarding parts of being a member of Reaching Dreams. Those people had gone through so many different experiences, seen so many different things. Understanding their points of view allowed him to treat each individual more passionately and specifically, not to mention it was plain interesting.
“Yeah. But my… um, my family died my first year.”
“Shit, man.”
“My parents, grandparents, and my brother.” Damian coughed lightly, trying to open his tightening throat.
“How does that happen?” Charles asked, stunned by the thought of losing so many people in one year.
“Plane crash. They were… ahem, they were coming to visit me. All o’ them. I was at the airport waitin’. Just, uh…” He let out a long sigh before continuing. “The plane never showed up. We was told to go to this special room where they told us what happened.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry, man.”
“Yeah. Me too. They were great. Supportive.”
“What were you in school for?”
“Art. I wanted to be a cartoonist.” Damian laughed. “That’s how supportive my parents were. We never ‘ad much money, ever, but they supported my dream to be an artist. They were… amazing.”
“Then what happened?”
“I got into drugs to cope with the pain. I was kicked outta school and tried to get a job. But I couldn’t hold one for very long cause I kept gettin’ high. My friends stuck me in rehab, and I kicked the habit. So I got out and tried to be a normal guy.”
“It didn’t work?” Charles questioned.
“I-I kept getting reminded of the accident. My friends were from back home, so I would visit them and see my old house. ‘Nother family in it. It hurt too much. So I stopped going back home. My friends would offer to let me stay with ‘em, but even that was too much. I would break down whenever I was with them. Started wantin’ drugs. You know what that’s like? Having to give up everything in order to stay clean? I ran away from it all. I didn’t want to remember what had happened. So then I was homeless.”
“What about your art?”
“Ah. I don’ do that anymore. That’s in the past. Always will be.”
Charles stared at the ground in awe. He had heard plenty of sob stories from Residents, but nothing of that caliber. The guy was younger than him, by maybe ten or more years, and he had lived more than a lifetime’s worth of tragedy. Charles could die in that moment, struck down by a sadistic god, and he would be at peace knowing that his family was safe at home. But Damian was denied such a luxury. He was the one to be burdened with the deaths of loved ones and somehow had to carry on living as if nothing had ever happened.
The CEO clambered down the ladder and sat next to his roommate. He placed a hand on his shoulder and said in a soft voice, “I know it’s not much, but I’m offering my friendship.”
Damian looked at him and nodded in acceptance, his eyes twinkling in the unnatural light.
“Thank you for sharing that with me, Damian,” he said. “They sound wonderful. And someday, you’ll see them again. I know it. But first, we need to get out of this place.”
Chapter 21
Water dribbled down the subject’s bare chest as the technicians unlatched the gate and removed her head from the tub. They placed the unconscious woman in a seated position as water poured from her head, flowing across her wrinkled, black skin and dripping off her dark nipples. Paul and Elaine quickly dried her hair and torso with towels before placing the body upon a table in the center of the room. Dr. Raymond stood nearby, watching the clock on the wall as it ticked away every vital second.
After prepping the subject, Elaine fitted her with electrodes, a blood pressure cuff, and a pulse oximeter. A gel was rubbed onto the woman’s chest while Paul retrieved a stack of large posters, each one with a different image printed on it. He grabbed one of them—a shiny, red apple on it—and began to walk around the room as he held up the sign. Elaine then did the same, grabbing a picture of a simple tree, and started circling the room opposite her coworker.
A technician in training quietly sat in the corner, thinking how strange her superiors looked but understanding the reason behind their actions. She had been recruited into the facility just the day before, after impressing the Outreach Team with her merciless drive for innovation. It was a job of which she could be proud, something that truly interested her, and she longed to impress the doctor that had agreed to bring her aboard.
The Trial Technicians wandered the room, turning this way and that to ensure there was complete coverage with the images. The room was silent until Dr. Raymond grew bored.
“What’s the smallest casket you’ve ever seen?” he asked, not allowing his eyes to deviate from the clock.
“Huh? What?” Elaine said, eyeing the doctor with cautious curiosity.
“Come now. What’s the smallest casket you’ve seen?”
“Um, I don’t know. I saw a
child’s casket for sale in a funeral home. It was on display or something. Kind of an odd display.”
“How about you, Paul? You seen a really small casket before?”
Paul held his poster indifferently, slowly spinning like a graceless dancer, waiting patiently for the scheduled time to be depleted.
“I ain’t seen anythin’ like that,” he said.
The new girl, Ramona, spoke up from her stool in the corner. “I went to a funeral or a celebration of life or whatever the hell you call them now, for a six-year-old. They didn’t need a pulley to lower the casket. Just two dudes holding onto the rope.”
The doctor nodded his head in approval, interested in the addition to his conversation.
“You see the kid?” he asked.
“Nah. Wasn’t like that. Would have liked to, but the poor thing was hit by a car. Not much to see.”
Dr. Raymond cleared his throat. “When I was a resident, I saw a woman come in after a nasty fall. We figured the boyfriend pushed her down the stairs, given she was pregnant. Second trimester, belly showing a bit. Anyway, she lost the baby. Nurses were crying, so unprofessional. The lady wanted to bury her baby. I thought it was strange, burying something that was never born, but she was adamant about it. Wanted a casket.”
Paul continued his bizarre twirl through the room as he ignored the conversation, devoting his brain power to humming a playful tune within his head. Elaine shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, pointing the tree at the ceiling, while Ramona remained fixated on the doctor.
“Turns out, they make caskets for failed pregnancies. You believe that? Whole industry devoted to these tiny little things. Tons of designs too. Well, this chick wanted a standard casket, so the hospital found her one and I just had to see it. So, I went to the morgue and watched as they put this tiny, tiny baby in a casket no bigger than a shoebox. It was crazy. Looked like a normal one with the white fabric inside and shiny wood exterior.”