Possession (2 page)

If I answer
yes, will they give me another shot or force pills down my throat?
I made
myself look calm and collected. “I’m fine. The pain is going away.”

“Good. Good. I’m so happy to see you. It’s been a
while.”

“I’m sorry I don’t remember you. Have we known
each other long?”

“Almost two months. I met you the first week you
came here.”

I’ve been in
this place for a couple
months
?

“My son is one of the
patients,
and I visit him as much as I can.” Rachel pointed toward
a young man sitting in a chair a few feet away. His chair was the only one in
the room not facing the windows. He had short dark hair, sharp cheekbones, and
a broad chin. He looked about my age and had the most incredible deep blue
eyes. It took me a moment to realize that, although he was looking in our
direction, he didn’t seem to be focusing on us. Instead, his blue eyes were directed
above
our heads. Even odder, there was
absolutely
no expression whatsoever on his
face. He was pretty hot, despite the vacant look in his eyes.

“Is he all right?”

She got up and walked over to him. She touched the
top of his head. “He’s fine. Aren’t you, Dean?” She leaned down and gave him a
kiss on the cheek.

Dean didn’t react to her voice or her caress. He just
had the same slack-jawed look on his face.

She saw me watching him. “He’s been like this ever
since…ever since the accident. They say there’s nothing
actually
wrong that they can find, but he hasn’t come back to us.”
She patted his cheek. “But I’m hopeful one day soon you’ll come back to me,
won’t you, honey?” She looked over at me. “Would you like something to eat? You
missed lunch, but I can ask the nurse for some Jell-O.”

My stomach rumbled, and I realized I was hungry.
“Yes. Thank you.”

“I’ll be right back. They said the shot may make
you feel woozy for a while. Best to stay in the chair until you get your legs
back under you.” Rachel got up and left the room.

We were in a large space. White walls, white
floor, white ceiling. We weren’t the only ones there—about two dozen
people mingled around. Some were in chairs like mine, others were walking
around, and a few sat around in small groups at white tables. There was a large
glass partition with a nurse sitting behind it, and next to that was a set of
large metal doors.
A big man dressed in all white,
his arms crossed in front of him, stood next to the doors. An orderly. Like the
ones who held me down while the nurse gave me the sedative. I spotted three
more scattered around the room, watching the patients as if waiting for someone
to act up so that they could restrain and drug them like they had me.

I recalled that someone told me I needed to escape—that
I was in danger.
The dream I had when
they drugged me
. The whole thing was probably a by-product of the drugs
acting on my subconscious.

A cold breeze slid across my hand. The hairs on
the back of my neck rose. A voice whispered in my ear,
“Help us.”

I looked over at Dean. He hadn’t said a word. His
stare and expression hadn’t changed.

The voice sounded more urgent this time.
“Help us.”
As the words faded away, a
magazine flew off a nearby chair and fell onto the floor.

“Are you all right?” It was Rachel, now standing
in front of me, holding a plastic cup of blue Jell-O in one hand and a plastic
spoon in the other.

“Everything is fine.” I made myself meet her eyes,
trying to push away the creeped-out feeling that was causing goose bumps to crawl
across my skin.

She gave me an odd look. “Are you sure? You look quite
pale. I can call a nurse.”

“Please don’t,” I begged her. I didn’t want to
bring any more attention to myself in this place. I reached out for the Jell-O.
“I’m just hungry.”

She handed it to me. “It’s your favorite flavor.”

It was strange talking to someone who knew things
about me when I had no clue who she was. I had no memory of this place, of this
woman.
I’ve been here for months? Where was
I before that? Where’s my family? Why can’t I remember?

Luke
.

The name came out of nowhere and slid across my
mind. As it did, a feeling of deep sadness filled me.

I tried to focus on the name, but a sudden pain
shot through my temples. I raised my hand to my forehead.

“You’re not okay. The nurse said that you could
have some pills to help with the headache when you woke up. I’m going to ask
them to get you something.” Rachel didn’t wait for me to respond. She got up
and headed toward the nurse sitting behind the glass.

I decided I wasn’t going to take any more pills. Not
if I could help it. I’d had enough of this mental fogginess. I needed to
remember, and the drugs I suspected they’d been pumping into me couldn’t be
helping.

I was so lost in my own thoughts that I didn’t
realize someone was standing in front of me, talking to me.

It was an old woman with long white hair that hung
down her shoulders and looked like it hadn’t been brushed in days. She wore a white-and-blue
polka-dotted sundress with yellow stains splattered across the front.

Her smile was wide, but the look in her eyes was a
bit unsettling. It was too intense. “It’s you. Hi, where have you been?”

“Do you know me?” I searched her face, trying to
force some sort of recognition, but the effort only made my head throb
painfully.

She gave me a tentative smile and moved closer. “I
know you. You were here before.” She looked over her shoulder and then back at
me. “And then the other one came. I don’t like her. She’s not very nice. She
tried to bite me once in the cafeteria.”

“Uh…” I had no idea what she was talking about. She
wasn’t making any sense.

She stepped closer and poked at my shoulder.
“You’re Colina. You’re not really supposed to be here. You’re on a secret
mission. I remember—you told me. You haven’t been gone that long.”

“A secret mission?”

The woman started fiddling with the collar of her
dress. “You came here looking for someone, but I didn’t tell anyone. I never
did, you know. Even after you went away, I never did tell them about you.”

“I went away? I don’t understand.” I was beginning
to feel like Alice in Wonderland. What was going on? How did I have no memory
of these people, of this place? Was this crazy woman truly a friend of mine?
And if she was nuts and we were both in this place, then that meant I should be
questioning my own sanity.

“When the other one came. You know, she talks to
people that aren’t here.” She moved her finger against her temple in a circle.
“The other one…she’s crazy if you ask me.” She leaned in and whispered a name. “
Morgana
.”

As the words echoed in the air, I felt a tug
somewhere deep inside. Like something deep within my belly was moving. There was
no other way to explain it. It felt like something was trying to crawl out.

The woman pointed at Dean. “You came for him. In
the daytime, he never says a word or cracks a smile. Not since he’s been
here…going on how long now?” She wasn’t asking me the question—she was
talking to herself. She started counting on her fingers, and once she went
through all ten she started counting them a second time. “One. One year he’s
been here. And not one smile, not one wink.”

She bent down so her face was level with mine. “I
still have it.” She looked around the room and then reached into the pocket of
her dress. She pulled out her hand and extended it toward me. A metal medallion
lay in the middle of her palm. “I’m keeping it safe just like you asked. Our
deal is still on, right? You won’t back out on your word? You promised, and a
promise is a promise.”

“What deal?” I asked, reaching for the medallion.

Before I could touch it, she closed her palm and
pulled her hand back. “You promised that when you leave here you’ll take me
with you.” A nurse walked by and the woman stopped talking. She waited until
the nurse was out of earshot before she continued. “I don’t know when you’re
planning on leaving, but you’d better make it soon. It happened again, you see.”
She reached out and poked my arm. “You’re still alive and kicking. I told you I
didn’t think you were next.”

She suddenly cocked her head to one side as though
listening to something. Her body began to sway back and forth like she was
dancing to music. If she was hearing music, then she must’ve been hearing it in
her head because the only noise in the room was the low hum of far-off conversation.

She suddenly stopped moving and focused on me
again. “Sabrina—you remember the little redhead a few doors down from
you? I don’t know how the doctors think she could have done it. She was so
slight, so small that if she turned sideways a hard wind would blow her off her
feet.” She cracked up at her own joke. “There wasn’t an ounce of muscle in that
girl’s arms. How do they think she could have had the strength?”

She was talking about people I didn’t know, saying
things that didn’t make sense.
She
is
in an insane asylum
, I reminded myself.
But something in her eyes took on a look of clarity when she talked about Dean.
For the last few minutes, she’d actually looked sane and intensely serious. With
a jolt, I realized she was waiting for me to respond.

I replayed the last thing she’d said to me and
asked the first question that came to mind. “What do they think Sabrina did?”

“The fools think the girl hoisted her bed up
against the wall. They think she climbed up, tied the bed sheets into a rope,
slung the rope over the pipes in the ceiling, and hanged herself.”

Her words shocked me. “Hanged herself?”

“Killed herself. But we both know they made it up
to cover up the murders. You told me you thought
you
were next, but see, you were wrong. You’re still alive, and
Sabrina is dead. They killed Sabrina, not you.”

“Who killed Sabrina?” I looked at her, trying to
decide whether she was making this all up. She looked crazy, she sounded crazy,
but for some reason I found myself hanging on her every word.

“The orderlies. They’re all in on it. If you’re
going to leave, you’d better make it soon. Sabrina died…” She started counting
her fingers again. This time she went through all ten fingers four times before
answering. “Three weeks ago. It was the last day of the month. A new month—you
know what that means. One dead every month. You were wrong thinking you were
next, last time. But maybe this time, maybe this time, you’ll be right. Maybe…just
maybe…you’ll be the one to die this month.”

The strange woman moved on as soon as she saw Rachel
returning.

Rachel looked distressed. “She hasn’t been
bothering you, has she?”

The old woman told me the orderlies were murderers
and I was next on the list to die. I’d say I was bothered. I’d been in a maze
of confusion ever since I woke up in the padded room. I felt completely freaked
out. The more time went by, the more desperate I was to get out of this place.

I opened my mouth to share my thoughts, but
suddenly stopped. A strong urge came over me to keep what the old woman said to
myself. Would Rachel even believe me if I told her? I was in an insane asylum.
The doctor said I’d been manic and hearing voices. How far out of my mind had I
been in order for them to decide to give me electroshock therapy? More
importantly, what proof of sanity would they need to let me out of this place?

Rachel seemed to be a kind woman. She obviously
cared a great deal for her son. I had no reason to doubt her words or
sincerity, but something strange was going on in this place—I could feel
it in my gut.

But even so, I didn’t believe the old woman. I
very much doubted murder was going on…being in a nuthouse didn’t give you
license to kill.

I looked up to see a nurse standing beside Rachel,
hands outstretched. She held a cup of water in one hand and two white pills in
the other. Both the nurse and Rachel
 
looked at me expectantly, so I
reluctantly reached out for the pills and made a show of swallowing them.

But I didn’t.

Instead I slipped them under my tongue, and, when they
weren’t looking, I spat them out and tucked them under the blanket in my lap.

Whatever was going on, I wanted a clear head. I
needed to remember who I was and how I got here.

The nurse walked away. Rachel stayed. She moved
next to her son and looked down at her watch. “Visiting hours are almost up.
I’ll be heading home.” She reached out and stroked her son’s arm and then
stopped and looked up at me. “I hope to see you again when I come back.”

I gave her a smile. “Thanks for the Jell-O.”

“Take care of yourself and hopefully you’ll start
feeling better soon.” She hesitated a moment, hovering over her boy. It was
obvious she didn’t want to leave. She gave a long sigh, turned away, and walked
out of the room.

I studied Dean. He hadn’t shown any sign of
following our conversation. I wondered if he could hear us. Did he have any
clue of what was going on around him?

“Help us.”
It was the voice again, this time behind me. I whipped my head around. No one
was nearby.

An orderly noticed my sudden movement and focused
on me. I gave him a ghost of a smile and turned back toward Dean.

The old woman said Dean was important, that I had
come here for him. None of it made sense. I had a chance to give Dean a closer
look now that Rachel was gone. I started to get out of the wheelchair, but Rachel
was right—my body was still shaky after that sedative. So instead, I
rolled my chair over until it was parallel to Dean’s.

A feeling of being watched washed over me. I
glanced across the room. The orderly closest to us was now staring directly at
me with a serious expression on his face. His body looked tense, as though he
was ready to move at any moment. Did he think I was going to harm Dean? I gave
the orderly a half smile. He frowned. I tried to look unthreatening and
reminded myself to make slow, small movements. The last thing I wanted to do
was piss off someone. The sedative they gave me earlier had taught me to be
more careful.

If I was going to get myself out of here, I would
have to play things smart.

I leaned over and peered into Dean’s face. There
was no reaction. I waved my hand in front of his eyes. He didn’t even blink in
response. Man, his eyes were blue…like the color of the ocean. There was
something about him that seemed oddly familiar. I leaned closer, my eyes
lingering on a very wide forearm attached to a surprisingly fit bicep. Shouldn’t
he be all wasted away after a year as a mental vegetable?

The feeling of being watched suddenly washed over
me. I looked over my shoulder to find that the orderly had turned his attention
away from me. Casually I lowered my hand, reached over, and pinched Dean’s arm
as hard as I could.

Nothing. Whatever world he was in, my actions
didn’t seem to penetrate it.

The old woman’s rantings seemed more and more
crazy now. How could this comatose guy be the reason I was here? I couldn’t
deny that there was something about him that felt…intimate. Had I hooked up
with this guy? No, not possible. Rachel said he’d been in this asylum and
comatose for a year.

Still, something about him
almost
surfaced in my memory…but the thought floated away before I
could make sense of it. Frustrated, I slumped back against my chair.

A nurse walked up to me. “It’s dinnertime. I’m
here to help you to the cafeteria.”

Another nurse came up behind Dean and they
proceeded to wheel us across the room and out the big metal doors. They pushed
us down a maze of white hallways littered with doors, some of them ajar. I
looked into the open ones as we passed by. I saw patient quarters, furnished
offices, and clinical-looking rooms. The more I saw of this place, the more
helpless I felt—how would I ever be able to find my way around well
enough to navigate on my own? Maybe the floor plan was buried somewhere in my
missing memories.

But something about the place discouraged me from wanting
to wander. Whether it was the smell of stale disinfectant covering a background
odor of musty rot, or the darkness that seemed to lurk around every corner, I
found myself shuddering at the thought of exploring by myself. I breathed a
sigh of relief when we finally went through a pair of swinging doors and
entered a cafeteria filled with people.

Metal picnic tables arranged in neat rows lined
the room. At the front, two women behind a glass-topped counter dished out
food. Patients were standing in line, red plastic trays in their hands.

The nurse wheeled me to the end of a table and
pushed my chair forward until I was snug against it.

“Tonight it’s macaroni and cheese,” she said,
patting my shoulder a couple times before she left me, walked over to the front
of the line, and grabbed a tray. A few minutes later she came back, the tray
piled high with food.

“I’ll be back for you in a half hour.” She moved
away so quickly I didn’t have a chance to say thank you.

I looked down at the tray. This time there were
utensils, although they were plastic. I picked up the fork and started eating.
As I ate, I looked around the room. Dean’s nurse wheeled his chair to a table
close by, but she didn’t leave—instead she sat next to him, slowly
lifting food up to his mouth. I watched in fascination as he opened his mouth
and she shoved the food inside. Dean closed his mouth as if on cue and started
to chew. How was it possible that this guy—who didn’t seem to know what
was going on around him—knew that there was food in front of him and he
should chew?

Every time the nurse lifted up a spoonful of
macaroni and cheese, Dean dutifully opened his mouth and took it in. He chewed
and swallowed and the whole process started over again. If he could eat, there
had to be some sort of awareness inside him, somewhere deep. Both of us were
stuck: he inside his body, and me inside this place. I hoped to get out of here
as soon as possible, but how long would Dean be trapped? Would his
consciousness ever surface? I wondered what it would take for the doctors to
reach him, or if it was even possible.

I took in the rest of the room and watched my
fellow patients consume their dinners. Forty or so patients sat scattered
around the cafeteria—a few were dressed in white hospital gowns like me,
but most wore sweatpants and T-shirts. The crowd consisted of all ages and
races. It seemed no one was immune from mental illness.

A
slender man
in his twenties came over and sat down across from me. Within moments it became
clear that he was a bundle of nervous energy. His fingers ran through his blond
hair a few times before he started fidgeting with his tray. He began to move
his milk carton incessantly back and forth. When he finally got around to his
food, his left hand kept tapping the tabletop while he ate.

He started mumbling to himself. “Have to get more
salt for protection. Can’t forget the salt. They’ll be coming again tonight.”
He looked over his shoulder and then back at me. He suddenly focused on my face.
“I’m Andrew. If you’re not going to eat that roll, can I have it?”

“Sure,” I said, passing it to him.

I took another bite of mac and cheese and watched Andrew
as he began to pick small pieces off the roll. He piled the pieces on the side
of his tray. Once the bread was all in a pile, he reached for a piece and
started to chew it. “So, you’re a healer.”

“Sorry…what?”

He gestured toward my wrist. “The blue swallow. The
sign of a healer. We don’t get many healers in here.”

I turned over my right wrist, and for the first
time noticed a tattoo in the shape of a swallow.
I was a healer? What’s a healer?

“Next time I have a headache, can I come to you to
get rid of it?” he asked anxiously.

I just stared at him, not sure how to respond. I
looked down at the tattoo again.
I’m
a healer?
I had no recollection of what
that meant or entailed. Were people supposed to come to me to heal their
headaches? “You mean…I’m a nurse or something?”

Andrew was watching me closely now. “They gave you
shock treatment. I heard. The rumor mill in this place…word spreads like
wildfire. It’s not just the patients that gossip. The staff loves to talk in
front of the patients—it’s like sometimes they forget we’re even there. I
think they’re too used to dealing with the real wackos, the ones completely out
of their minds.” He raised his finger and gestured toward Dean. “Now
that
boy can keep a secret.” He smiled
and picked up another piece of bread. “You’re a healer. You touch people and
they get better.”

I paused a second before phrasing my next
question. Andrew’s conversation was as all over the place as his hands, and the
rapid-fire pace of it made me unsure if I’d heard him right. “What kinds of
things do healers do, besides get rid of headaches?” I asked.

“Memory shot? Not surprising. First time I had
shock treatment I forgot I hated green beans. I ate nothing but green beans for
two weeks until one day I remembered.” He shook his head in disgust at the
memory. His hand whipped across the table and grabbed my wrist. He turned it
over and studied the tattoo. “From the look of your tat, you’re part of a
Scottish clan. They said your name is Colina Campbell. Campbell is Scottish,
see? The Scottish live in a closed community. It’s not like you see a lot of
them out in the public healing strangers. Not like those gypsies. The gypsies
will heal anyone for the right price.” He let go of my arm and studied me
quietly for a few minutes. “You look fairly young. How old are you?”

“I’m not sure.” I answered his question while
still trying to process the deluge of information he’d dumped on me. “I’d say
seventeen or eighteen. That would mean you’re a newbie healer. Most folks don’t
start seriously training their kids until they hit their late teens. Now me,
I’m a reader. Or, I used to be.” Andrew shook his head and looked down at his
bread. “Too many voices screaming in my head. I couldn’t keep control as I got
older. It was all too much.” He lifted a leather cord from around his neck. On
the end of it was a purple pouch. He patted it comfortingly. “This puppy right
here helps mute my powers.”

I just stared at him, trying to absorb what he was
saying.
A reader?
Of course he was
nuts—he
was
in a nuthouse—but
his crazy sounded
less
crazy than it
should. Did that mean I was nuts, too?

“Not to worry, I can’t hear a thing you’re
thinking. You wouldn’t believe how weirded out people get around my kind.
They’re always worried we’ll pick up their deep, dark secrets.” He laughed, but
the laughter sounded strained. “Not that I haven’t picked a secret out here and
there in my time. If I told you all the things I’ve heard over the years…” He stopped
and seemed to catch himself. He stared at a spot over my shoulder for a long
time and then focused on me again; the stillness was jarring after his constant
movement. “If you’re a healer, you’re a young one. But it’s odd—I’ve
never known a Scottish healer to be put in a place like this. Normally the clans
can help their people. I hear some of your kind can take away mental pain, too,
not just physical pain.”

He waited for me to say something in response. As
the silence stretched on, the twitch in his hand slowly increased.

I’m a young
healer from a Scottish clan. If this guy’s right and clans usually help their
own kind, why am I here? Where’s my family?
That last thought filled me with
an inconsolable sadness.
Why was I
suddenly so sad?
I forced myself to shake it off.

Breaking the silence, I said the first thing that
came to mind. “So, Andrew… Have you been in here long?”

“Six months, four days, and seventeen hours.” He
gave me a sheepish smile. “Not that I’m counting.”

He lifted up a small packet of salt from his tray.
“You’ll have to be careful. See the salt?” He pointed to the packet tucked
under my plate. “At every meal, make sure you keep it. You need to get enough
of the stuff to sprinkle across your doorway and across the windowsill.”

Trying to keep track of everything he was saying
was exhausting. Could I even believe any of it? “Sorry, I’m supposed to do what
with the salt?”

“You use it to keep the spirits out.” He touched
the pouch around his neck. “This thing is great at blocking the thoughts of the
living, but it doesn’t work at all when it comes to keeping out the dead.” He
lifted up the salt packet and gave me a salute with it. “Ghosts, my young
friend. The place is chock-full of them. They don’t often come out in the daytime.”
He looked around, an expression of fear on his face. “At night’s when you have
to worry. And it’s not pretty, I tell you. They’re not happy ghosts. Not that
I’ve ever seen a happy ghost, but these spirits seem especially angry and
powerful.”