Soul Screamers Collection

The room was claustrophobically small. Empty, other than me, the camera mounted in one corner, and the high, hard mattress beneath me. The walls were sterile, white cinder block. There were no windows in my line of sight, and I couldn’t see the floor. But the decor and the antiseptic smell were dead giveaways.

A hospital. I was strapped to a hospital bed. All alone.

It was like one of Emma’s video games, where the character wakes up in a strange room with no memory of how he got there. Except, in real life, there was no chest in the corner holding the key to my chains and survival advice written on parchment.

Hopefully there were also no video-game monsters waiting to eat me the moment I got loose, because even if someone had left me a gun, I wouldn’t have known how to use it.

But my objective was clear: Get out. Go home.

Unfortunately, that was easier said than done without the use of my hands.

My pulse swooshed in my ears, a hollow echo of real fear. That overpowering need to scream was gone, but a different kind of panic had settled into its place. What if there was a fire? Or a tornado? Or more screaming? Would anyone come get me, or would they leave me here to die? I would be easy prey for those shadow things, or a natural disaster, or any random psycho who wandered past.

I had to get off the bed. Out of these stupid … bed cuffs.

“Please …” I begged the camera, frustrated by my own weak whisper. I swallowed thickly, then tried again. “Please let me out.” My words were clearer that time, if no louder. “Please …”

No response. My pulse spiked, pumping adrenaline through me. What if they were all dead, and the last person on earth was strapped to a bed? Was this how civilization would end? With leather straps and padded handcuffs?

Get a grip, Kaylee.

The reality was probably much less far-fetched, but just as scary: I was trapped. Helpless, and exposed, and vulnerable. And suddenly I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t make my heart stop racing. If I didn’t get out soon, I was going to start screaming again—from normal terror this time, but the result would be the same. They’d shoot me up again, and the cycle would repeat ad nauseam. I’d be in this bed for the rest of my life, cowering from shadows.

So what if there were no windows and the overhead bulbs bathed the room in light? Eventually there would be shadows, and they would come for me. I was sure of that.

“Please!” I shouted, almost giddy to hear my voice coming back. “Let me—”

The door opened seconds before I would have started fighting my bindings in earnest. “Hi, Kaylee, how are you feeling?”

I strained to lift my head and put a face to the smooth, masculine voice. He was tall and thin, but looked strong. Bad skin, good hair. “Like a frog about to be dissected,” I said, as he unbuckled my left arm.

I liked him already.

“Fortunately for you, I was never very good with a scalpel.” His smile was nice, and his brown eyes were kind. His name tag read: Paul Conners, Mental Health Technician.

Mental health? My stomach tried to twist itself in knots. “Where am I?”

Paul carefully unbuckled my other wrist. “You’re at Lakeside Mental Health Center, attached to Arlington Memorial.”

Lakeside. The psych ward. Shit.

“Um, no. I can’t be here. Somebody made a mistake.” Panic poured into my bloodstream fast enough to make my skin tingle. “I need to talk to my aunt. Or my uncle. He’ll fix this.” Uncle Brendon had a way of straightening things out without pissing people off—a skill I’d always envied.

Paul smiled again and helped me sit up. “After you get settled in, you’re welcome to call them.”

But I didn’t want to settle in.

My own sock feet caught my attention from the end of the bed. “Where are my shoes?”

“They’re in your room. We had to take them off to unlace them. For everyone’s safety, we don’t allow shoestrings, belts, drawstrings, or robe ties.”

My shoestrings were dangerous? Fighting back tears, I leaned forward to free my right leg.

“Careful. You might be a little stiff and shaky at first,” he said, already working on my left ankle. “You were out for quite a while.”

My heart thumped painfully. “How long?”

“Oh, just over fifteen hours.”

What? I sat up and felt my eyes glaze over in horror. “You left me strapped to a bed for fifteen hours? Isn’t there some kind of law about that?”

“Lots of them. And we follow every single one. Need help getting down?”

“I got it,” I snapped. I knew my anger was misdirected, but I couldn’t help it. I’d lost fifteen hours of my life to a needle and four-point restraints. I wasn’t capable of friendly at the moment. “Why was I buckled in?”

I slid carefully off the bed, then leaned against it while my head spun. The dingy vinyl tile was cold through my socks.

“You arrived on a stretcher, screaming and thrashing though under heavy sedation. Even after you lost your voice, you kept flailing around, like you were fighting something in your dreams.”

The blood drained from my head so fast I got dizzy again. “I was?” No wonder I hurt all over; I’d been fighting my restraints for hours. In my sleep. If chemical comas even qualified as sleep.

Paul nodded solemnly and stepped back to give me space when I stood. “Yeah, and that started again a couple of hours ago, so they had to buckle you back up to keep you on the bed.”

“I was screaming again?” My stomach had become a bottomless pit of horror, swirling slowly, threatening to swallow me like a black hole. What the hell was wrong with me?

“No, thrashing. You went still about half an hour ago. I was on my way to unbuckle you when you woke up.”

“What did they give me?” I reached for the wall when a fresh wave of dizziness rolled over me.

“The usual mix. Ativan, Haldol, and Benadryl to counter the side effects of the Haldol.”

No wonder I’d slept so long. I had no idea what the first two drugs were, but Benadryl alone was enough to knock me out for most of the night during allergy season. It was a miracle I’d woken up at all. “What if I’d been allergic to any of that?” I demanded, crossing my arms over the T-shirt I’d worn to the mall. So far, waking up in my own clothes was the closest thing I’d found to a bright side.

“Then we’d be having this conversation in the E.R., instead of the restraint room.”

The restraint room? I was vaguely disturbed by the fact that they had a name for it.

Paul pulled open the door. “After you.”

I steeled my spine and stepped into the bright hallway, unsure what to expect. People walking around in straitjackets, mumbling to themselves? Nurses in white uniforms with starched hats? But the hall was empty and quiet.

Paul stepped past me, and I followed him to the last door on the left, which he pushed open for me.

I shoved my hands into my pockets to hide how badly they were shaking, then made myself cross the threshold.

Another white room, not much bigger than the first one. The bed was a mattress set in a heavy wooden frame, too narrow and too low. Draped with a plain white blanket. Empty, open shelves were bolted to the wall in place of a dresser, and there was one long, high window. No closet.

My stringless shoes lay at the end of the bed. They were the only things I recognized in the entire room. Everything else was foreign. Cold. Scary.

“So … I’ve been committed?” My voice shook. I couldn’t help it.

“You’ve been hospitalized,” Paul said from the doorway.

“What’s the difference?” I stood at the end of the bed, unwilling to sit. To get comfortable.

“This is temporary.”

“How temporary?”

“That’s up to you and your doctor.” He gave me a sympathetic smile, then backed into the hall. “One of the nurses will be by in a minute to get you settled in. Hang in there, Kaylee.”

I could only nod. A second later, Paul was gone. I was alone. Again.

From outside the room came the steady rattle-clank of a cart being pushed down the hall. Shoes squeaked on the floor. And somewhere nearby, someone cried in great, dramatic sobs. I stared at my feet, unwilling to touch anything for fear that it would make the whole thing sink in. Make it real.

Am I crazy?

I was still standing there like an idiot when the door opened, and a woman in pale pink scrubs came in carrying a clipboard and pen. Her name tag read: Nancy Briggs, R.N.

“Hi, Kaylee, how are you feeling?” Her smile was wide and friendly, but felt somehow … measured. As if she knew just how much to give. How to appear friendly without welcoming actual conversation.

I missed Paul already.

“Confused and homesick.” I gripped the edge of the shelf with one hand, willing it to dissolve beneath my touch. To fade into the bad dream I’d surely wake up from any minute.

“Well, let’s see if we can’t fix at least the first part of that.” The nurse’s smile grew bigger, but no warmer. “There’s a phone in the hall. Someone’s on it right now, but when it’s free, you’re welcome to use it. Local numbers, legal guardians only. Tell someone at the front desk who you want to call, and we’ll connect you.”

Numb, I could only blink. This wasn’t a hospital, it was a prison.

I patted my pocket, feeling for my phone. It was gone. Fresh panic exploded in my chest and I shoved my hand into my other pocket. Aunt Val’s credit card was gone. She’d kill me if I lost it! “Where’s my stuff?” I demanded, trying to stop the tears that blurred my vision. “I had a phone, and some lip gloss, and a twenty-dollar bill. And my aunt’s credit card.”

Nurse Nancy’s smile thawed a bit then, either because of my tears or the fear they no doubt magnified. “We keep all personal items locked up until you’re discharged. Everything’s there except the credit card. Your aunt took it when she left last night.”

“Aunt Val was here?” I used my bare hands to wipe my eyes, but they filled again instantly. If she was here, why didn’t she take me home?

“She rode in the ambulance with you.”

Ambulance. Discharged. Locked up. Those words played over and over in my head, a litany of fear and confusion. “What time is it?”

“Eleven-thirty. They’ll bring lunch in about half an hour. You can eat in the common area, down the hall and to the left. Breakfast is at seven. Dinner’s at six.” She reached to her left with the hand holding her pen and pushed open a door I hadn’t noticed, revealing a tall, white industrial toilet and a shower stall. “You can shower whenever you like. Just come to the nurses’ station first for your hygiene kit.”

“Hygiene kit?” My eyes went wide as my insides went numb. This isn’t real. It can’t be.

“We hand out soap and shampoo as needed. If you want to shave, you’ll have to be monitored by a staff member.” I blinked, uncomprehending, but she continued. “There’s a group session about anger management at nine, one about coping with depression at eleven, and one at two this afternoon about symptoms of mental illness. That’s a good one to start with.”

She smiled patiently, like she expected to be thanked for passing out information, but I just stared at the empty shelf. Her entire briefing was irrelevant to me. I’d be out very soon, surely, and the only group I was interested in was the group of my own family members who could make that happen.

“The boys’ rooms are in the opposite wing, on the other side of the common area. Girls are not allowed on that wing, and vice versa. Visitation is every night from seven to nine. Lights out at ten-thirty. Someone will check on you every fifteen minutes when you’re out of sight of the nurses’ station.” She paused again, and I made myself look up to meet her detached gaze. “Do you have any more questions?”

My eyes watered again, and I didn’t bother to wipe them. “Why am I here?”

“That’s a question for your doctor.” She glanced briefly at her clipboard. “Dr. Nelson. He makes rounds after lunch, Monday through Friday. So you’ll see him tomorrow.” She hesitated, and this time set the clipboard on the shelf bolted to the cinder-block wall. “How’s your neck? You didn’t need stitches, but they did clean out the wounds …”

Wounds? My right hand flew to my neck, and I flinched at how tender the skin there was. And how … rough. My heart thumping, I rushed into the bathroom. The small, reflective aluminum mirror over the sink showed that what little mascara I’d worn the day before was now smeared beneath both of my eyes. My skin was pale, my long hair hopelessly knotted.

I tilted my chin up and angled my body toward the overhead light. My gasp echoed in the small room. My neck was a tangle of blood-crusted scratches.

And suddenly I remembered pain at my neck. Wet, sticky fingers.

My right hand shook as I held it up to the light. Dark crust still clung to my cuticles. Blood. I’d done this to myself, trying to make the screaming stop.

No wonder they thought I was crazy.

Maybe they were right.

The nurse had said I wasn’t allowed to close my door, but I closed it while I showered, and again when I got out of the bathroom, because she’d left it open after one of the fifteen-minute checkups.

Were they afraid I was going to kill myself? If so, it’d have to be a pretty creative suicide. The only things not nailed to the floor or the wall were the towel on a shelf over the toilet and the tiny bar of hand soap on the sink. In the end, my pride won out over vanity and I washed both my body and hair with hand soap, rather than go begging for basic hygiene supplies from people I’d never met.

After my shower, I found a clean set of purple scrubs folded on the bed, but I’d have to go without underwear until someone brought me some clean clothes. Nurse Nancy had said Aunt Val was supposed to bring them, but when and if my aunt showed up, she was not leaving without me.

Clean and dressed—if not exactly to my satisfaction—I stared at the door for a solid three minutes before working up the nerve to open it. I’d missed both dinner and breakfast, so I was starving, but less than eager to mingle. Finally, after two false starts, I shoved still-wet hair back from my face and pulled the door open.

My laceless sneakers squeaked in the empty hallway, and I walked slowly toward the clinking of silverware, acutely aware that while I did hear a couple of soft voices, there was no actual conversation. Most of the doors I passed were open, revealing room after identical room. The only differences between those and the room I’d been assigned to were the personal possessions. Clothes stacked on open shelves and pictures taped to walls.

Halfway down the hall, a girl a couple of years younger than me sat alone on a bed in a room almost as bare as mine, talking to herself. Not whispering under her breath, or reminding herself not to forget something important. Actually talking to herself, at full volume.

When I turned the corner, I found the source of the other voice, as well as what passed for the cafeteria. Five round tables were set up in a large room occupied with normal-looking people in jeans and T-shirts. Mounted on the far wall above their heads was a small television tuned to SpongeBob.

“The trays are on the cart.”

I jumped, then whirled around to see another woman—this one in cranberry-colored scrubs—sitting in a hospital waiting-room-type chair near the doorway. Her name tag read: Judy Sullivan, Mental Health Technician. “Find the one with your name on it and take a seat.”

I took a covered tray labeled Kaylee Cavanaugh from the second shelf of the cart, then glanced around for somewhere to sit. There were no empty tables—most had two or three occupants—yet everyone ate in silence, but for the sounds of chewing and silverware scraping plastic trays.

The edges of the room were lined in more stiff-looking waiting-room chairs and small couches with pale green vinyl cushions, and one girl sat alone on one of these with her tray on her lap. She picked at the edge of a slice of meat loaf with her fork, but seemed more interested in whatever patterns she was creating than in actually eating.

I found a table and ate in silence, suffering through half of the dry meat loaf and a stale roll before I looked up from my tray—and directly into the eyes of the girl sitting alone on the edge of the room. She watched me with a creepy sort of detached curiosity, as if I were a bug crawling across the sidewalk in front of her. I wondered briefly if she was the ant-stomper type. Then I wondered why she was at Lakeside.

But I purged that thought quickly—I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to know why any of them were there. As far as I was concerned, they were all locked up for the same reason: they were crazy.

Oh, and you’re the shining exception, right? some traitorous voice asked from deep inside my head. The girl who sees things that aren’t there and can’t stop screaming. Who tries to rip her own throat out in the middle of the mall. Yeah, you’re sane.

And suddenly my appetite was gone. But Meat Loaf Girl—Lydia Trainer, according to her tray cover—was still staring at me, limp black hair falling over half of her face, revealing only one pale green eye. My return stare didn’t faze her, nor did it force her to acknowledge me. She just watched me, as if the moment she looked away I might jump up and dance the cha-cha.

But then someone else walked between us and caught her attention like a ball of yarn rolled in front of a cat. Lydia’s gaze followed a tall, heavyset girl as she carried an empty tray toward the cart.

“Mandy, where’s your fork?” Judy the mental health tech asked, standing so she could see the girl’s tray. The tense way she held herself made me nervous. Like she expected Mandy to lean forward and take a bite out of her.

Mandy dropped her tray on the cart with a clatter of silverware, then stuck one hand into the waistband of her jeans and pulled out a fork. If I’d had any appetite left, that would have killed it. Mandy tossed the fork onto her tray, spared a contemptuous glance at the aide, then shuffled in sock feet into another large common area across the hall.

Lydia still watched Mandy, but now her features were scrunched into a tense grimace and one hand clutched her stomach.

I glanced at her tray to count her utensils. Had she swallowed her knife, or something stupid like that, while Judy’s attention was occupied with Miss Fork-in-Drawers? No, all of the silverware was there, and I could see no obvious reason for Lydia’s pained look.

Creeped out now, I stood and turned in my tray—all utensils accounted for—then rushed back to my room without looking up until I’d closed the door behind me.

“Hello?”

“Aunt Val?” I wound the old-fashioned, curly phone cord around my index finger and twisted on the hard plastic chair to face the wall. That was all the privacy I’d get in the middle of the hallway.

My kingdom for a cell phone.

“Kaylee!” My aunt sounded bright and cheery, and I knew even without seeing her that her hair would be perfectly arranged and her makeup expertly applied, even though she didn’t have to be anywhere on the weekend.

Unless she was coming to get me. Please let her be coming to get me …

“How are you feeling, sweetheart?” Aunt Val continued, a sliver of concern denting her otherwise impenetrable armor of good cheer.

“Fine. I feel good. Come get me. I’m ready to come home.”

How could you let them bring me here? How could you leave me? She would never have left her own daughter in a place like this. No matter what Sophie had done, Aunt Val would have taken her home, made a pot of hot tea, and dealt with the issue privately.

But I couldn’t say that. My mother was dead, and I’d had no one but Aunt Val and Uncle Brendon since my father moved to Ireland when I was three, so I couldn’t vocalize the soul-bruising betrayal twisting through me like a vine choking me from the inside. At least, not without crying, and crying might make me look unstable, which would give them a reason to keep me there. And give Aunt Val a reason to drop off my clothes and run.

“Um … I was actually just about to head your way. Have you seen the doctor yet? Do you think I’ll be able to talk to him?”

“Yeah, sure. I mean, that’s what he’s here for, right?”

According to Nurse Nancy, the doctor didn’t do his rounds on weekends, but if I told Aunt Val that, she might wait for official visiting hours. Doctor or not, I was sure she would take me home once she saw me. Once she’d had a look at this place, and at me in it. We might not share the same blood, but she’d raised me. Surely she couldn’t walk away twice, right?

From somewhere near the common area, a booming male voice announced that the anger management group was about to start, then specifically suggested that someone named Brent should attend.

I leaned my forehead against the cold cinder blocks and tried to block it all out, but every time I opened my eyes—every time I even took a cold, sterile-scented breath—I remembered exactly where I was. And that I couldn’t leave.

“Okay. I’m bringing some things for you,” my aunt said softly into my ear.

What? I wanted to cry. “No. Aunt Val, I don’t need things. I need out.”

She sighed, sounding almost as frustrated as I was. “I know, but that’s up to your doctor, and if he gets delayed … or something, wouldn’t you feel better with a fresh change of clothes?”

“I guess.” But the truth was that I wasn’t going to feel any better until Lakeside was a distant, unpleasant memory, instead of my current waking nightmare.

“They won’t let you have anything but clothes and books. Do you want something to read?”

All I wanted to read was the exit sign on the other side of the locked door by the nurses’ station. The one you had to be buzzed through.

“Um … I have a paper due next week. Could you grab Brave New World from my nightstand?” See? I’m not crazy. I’m responsible and focused on schoolwork. Don’t you want to take me home so I can live up to my true potential?

Aunt Val was silent for a moment, and that uncomfortable feeling in the bottom of my stomach swelled. “Kaylee, I don’t think you should worry about homework right now. We can tell the school you have the flu.”

Footsteps shuffled past me, headed toward the group session. I stuck a finger in my ear, trying to block it all out. “The flu? Doesn’t it take, like, a week to get over the flu?” I wouldn’t miss that much school. I wouldn’t miss any, if she’d take me home today!

My aunt sighed, and my gut twisted around the lump of dread anchoring me to the chair. “I’m just trying to buy you some time to rest. And it’s not really a lie. You can’t tell me you’re feeling one hundred percent right now …”

“Because they shot me full of enough crap to put an elephant to sleep!” And I had the cotton mouth to prove it.

“And for all we know, you might actually be coming down with a bit of the flu. I heard you sneeze the other day,” she finished, and I rolled my eyes.

“They don’t lock up people with the flu, Aunt Val.” Not unless it’s the bird flu or Stephen King’s end-of-the-world flu.

“I know. Listen, I’ll be there in a bit, and we can talk about this then.”

“What about Uncle Brendon?”

Another pause. Sometimes there was less meaning in what Aunt Val said than in what she didn’t say. “He took Sophie out to lunch to explain all this to her. This has been really hard on them both, Kaylee.”

Like it’s easy on me?

“But we’re both coming to see you tonight.”

Except I would be out by then, even if I had to get down on my knees and beg her to take me home. If I had to wake up here again, I’d lose my mind. Assuming I hadn’t already.

“Promise?” I hadn’t asked her to promise me anything since I was nine.

“Of course. We just want to help you, Kaylee.”

Yet somehow, I didn’t feel very comforted.

I waited in the common area, stubbornly resisting the jigsaw puzzles and crossword books stacked on a shelf in the corner. I wouldn’t be here long enough to finish one anyway. Instead, I stared at the TV, wishing they’d at least show some good cartoons. But if there was a remote available, I had no idea where to find it.

A commercial came on and my attention wandered, in spite of my best efforts to ignore my fellow patients. Lydia sat across the room from me, not even pretending to watch the television. She was watching me.

I stared back at her. She didn’t smile. She didn’t speak. She just watched, and not with an unfocused stare, which was obviously all some of the residents were capable of. Lydia actually seemed to be observing me, like she was looking for something in particular. What, I had no idea.

“Weird, isn’t it?” Mandy dropped into the chair on my left, and air whooshed from the cushion. “The way she stares.”

I glanced up to find her looking across the room at Lydia. “No weirder than anything else here.” And frankly, I wasn’t looking to make conversation—or friends—with someone who stuffed forks down her pants.

“She’s a ward of the court.” Mandy bit into a half-eaten chocolate bar, then continued with her mouth full. “Never talks. You ask me, she’s the strangest one here.”

I had serious doubts about that.

“What’re you here for?” Her gaze traveled south of my face, then back up. “Let me guess. You’re either manic depressive, or anorexic.”

Inside, my temper boiled, but I was proud by how calm my reply sounded. “I don’t talk either.”

She stared at me for a second, then burst into a harsh, barking laugh.

“Mandy, why don’t you find something constructive to do?” A familiar voice said, and I glanced up to find Paul standing in the wide doorway, holding.

My suitcase!

I sprang from the couch, and he held the rolling bag out to me. “I thought that might make you smile.”

In fact, I was oddly excited and relieved. If I had to be locked up, at least I could be miserable in my own clothes. But then my enthusiasm flashed out like a burned-up bulb when I realized what that suitcase meant. Aunt Val had dropped off my clothes without coming in to see me.

She’d left me again.

I took the bag and headed back to my room, where I dropped the suitcase on the floor beside the bed, unopened. Paul followed me, but stopped in the doorway. I sank onto the bed, battling tears, my suitcase forgotten in spite of the rough scrub bottoms chaffing me in all the wrong places.

“She couldn’t stay,” Paul said. Apparently my emotions were as transparent as the tempered glass windows. Wouldn’t my therapist be pleased? “Visiting hours don’t start until seven.”

“Whatever.” If she’d wanted to see me, she would have, even if it was just for a few minutes. My aunt’s tenacity was a thing of legends.

“Hey, don’t let this place get to you, okay? I’ve seen a lot of kids lose their souls in here, and I’d hate to see that happen to you.” He ducked his head, trying to draw eye contact, but I only nodded, staring at the floor. “Your aunt and uncle will be back tonight.”

Yeah, but that didn’t mean they’d take me home. It didn’t mean anything at all.

When Paul left, I heaved my suitcase onto the bed and unzipped it, eager to wear, see, and smell something familiar. After just a few hours at Lakeside, I was already terrified of losing myself. Of fading into the glazed eyes, slow steps, and empty stares all around me. I needed something from real life—from my world outside this room—that would help me hold on to me. So I was completely unprepared for the contents of my bag.

Nothing in it was mine. The clothes still had price tags dangling from waistbands and collars.

Fighting back fresh tears, I lifted the first piece from the suitcase: a pair of soft pink jogging pants with a wide, gathered waistband and a complicated arrangement of flowers embroidered over one hip. At the front were two holes where the drawstring should have been. It’d been snipped and removed so I couldn’t hang myself with it. The suitcase held a matching top, along with an entire collection of clothes I’d never even seen. They were all expensive, and comfortable, and perfectly coordinated.

What is this, psycho chic? What was wrong with my own jeans and tees?

The truth was that, in her own twisted way, Aunt Val was probably trying to cheer me up with new clothes. That might have worked for Sophie, but how could she not understand that it wouldn’t work for me?

Suddenly pissed beyond words, I stripped and tossed the borrowed scrubs into a pile in the corner of the room, then ripped open a five-pack of underwear and stepped into the first pair. Then I dug through my bag for anything that didn’t look like something Martha Stewart would wear on house arrest. The best I found was a plainish purple jogging suit at the bottom of the pile. Only once I had it on did I realize the fabric glittered beneath the light over my bed.

Great. I’m psychotic and sparkly. And there was nothing else in the bag. No books, and no puzzles. Not even any of Sophie’s useless fashion magazines. With an angry sigh, I stomped down the hall in search of reading material and a quiet corner, silently daring Paul or any of the aides to comment on my epic wardrobe disaster.

After supper, Aunt Val and Uncle Brendon walked through the door next to the nurses’ station, both empty-handed; they’d had to empty their pockets and turn over Aunt Val’s purse to the security guard. That way, I wouldn’t be tempted to try to kill anyone with her lip gloss and travel-size pack of tissues.

Seeing them standing there was like seeing my dad every time he came home for Christmas. Part of me was so mad at them both for leaving me there that I wanted to shout until I went hoarse, or ignore them completely. Whichever would come closest to hurting them like they’d hurt me. I wanted them to feel scared, and alone, and without even basic comforts like their own clothing.