Chapter 33: Thirty One - Good Behavior

Good Behavior

“Human nature.”

Clap. Clap.

“Wanna Be Starting Something.”

Clap. Clap.

“Dirty Diana.”

Clap. Clap.

“I Just Can’t Stop Loving You.”

Clap. Clap.

There was a momentary pause as Parish tried to think of another title. “Um, Ben.” Damn. I frowned. A second longer and I’d have won the round.

Clap. Clap.

“Will You Be There.”

He waited for the two claps and said, “Smooth Criminal.”

I rolled my eyes. Why hadn’t I thought of that one? “Jam.”

Clap. Clap.

“Beat—” The sound of Parish’s door opening met my ears. “It.”

I froze, wondering who was visiting Parish. It was too early for his session with Darren, so it was probably Patty coming in to bring us breakfast or something.

“Excuse me?” I felt the blood freeze in my veins when I realized who Parish’s visitor was. It wasn’t Patty. “What did you just say to me?”

“I wasn’t talking to you.” Came Parish’s monotonous reply.

“Who were you talking to then?”

“There really isn’t much to do in here, so I was trying to name as many Michael Jackson songs I could think of.” He said, still sounding immensely bored. “You just happened to walk in when I remembered Beat It.”

“Hmm.” I climbed back onto the bed as softly as possible while Dr. Larkson determined whether or not Parish was telling the truth. “Doctor Michelson and Nurse Malone tell me that you and October have been behaving yourselves.”

“Not surprising.” He quipped. “Not much havoc we can wreak in here anyway.”

She ignored the sarcasm. “They advocated for the both of you and asked me to release you on good behavior.”

I sat up straighter on the hard bed. “That’s nice of them.” I shook my head at Parish, slightly marveling at his ability to remain so calm and disinterested.

“I’m going to check up on October and inform her of her your release.” She stated dryly, clearly fed up with Parish’s snark. “Maria will escort you to your room. You can either stay there, or go and join Witherberry at breakfast.”

“Whatever.”

When no reply came, I realized that Larkson was probably on her way over to my room. So I laid back against the pillow and dropped my palms over my eyes and began humming softly to myself. I heard a few shuffling noises before Parish’s door shut once again. A few seconds later, my own door opened and Dr. Larkson walked in, her heels clacking loudly against the tiles.

“October?”

“Hmm…?” I removed my hands from my face and sat up to face the doctor. I tried not to smile at the look of pure discomfort that was plastered on her face. She looked like someone had stuck a slice of blue cheese in her nose.

“You’re being released.” She said matter-of-factly. Like I should have known that already.

No need to mention that I actually did know.

“Why?” I asked, feigning a look of confusion. “I thought I was supposed to be in here for a week?”

“Doctor Michelson and Patty vouched for the two of you.” She mumbled. “Said you’d been behaving yourselves and insisted that I let you go early.”

“Oh.” I stood up.

“Brent will take you to your room. You can either stay in there or go down for breakfast.”

“I can skip if I want to?”

“You can.” She nodded disinterestedly. “But your doctor advises against it.”

Of course he does, I thought, thinking of what Darren had said to me earlier that morning. How had he known I’d try to skip breakfast?

“All right.” I nodded, following Dr. Larkson out of the room. Standing silently just outside the door was Brent. It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the dimmer lighting, but once they did, I saw the reason for Brent’s unpleasant scowl.

His nose, once straight and sharp, was now a twisted lump on his face. Someone had fixed it, but it still bent awkwardly at the bridge of his nose, deviating slightly to the side. Parish’s punch had really messed Brent’s, otherwise perfect, young Nick Carter face up. He’d definitely made himself an enemy the other night.

“Brent.” Larky’s voice caused me to drag my attention away from the nurse’s cockeyed nose. “Take October to her room. I’m late for a conference call with the Chief.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He nodded at her already disappearing figure. Once she’d gone through the single metal door at the end of the hall, he turned to me and beckoned me forward. “Come on.”

I followed the sulking nurse out of the solitary wing and downstairs to the floor that consisted of the patients’ rooms. The solitary wing was actually originally supposed to be an attic; at least that’s what Kara told me once. She said that, at one time, the solitary wing was actually on the east wing of our floor, but as the occupancy of the Institute steadily grew, the Board had no choice but to convert the solitary rooms into additional bedrooms for patients, and renovate the attic until it was able to serve as solitary wing.

Underneath my tennis shoes, the floorboards creaked and groaned as Brent and I strolled through the empty hallways, making our way to my room. Once we got there, I was relieved to find it empty.

There was something I needed to do.

“Thanks, Brent.” I said, opening the door and stepping into the room. He merely grunted in reply before turning on his heels and walking away.

“Breakfast is over in half an hour.” He reminded me over his shoulder before turning around the corner and disappearing from sight.

The minute the cost was clear, I ran down the hall and slipped into the girl’s bathroom. I emerged a minute later and tip-toed over to the room I shared with Kara. This time, I noticed that I wasn’t alone. A smiling Kara sat cross-legged on the bed closest to the door, staring at the half-opened door expectantly.

I also noticed that she’d put up a new drawing while I’d been locked up.

“I see I’m out of the cage.” I said, jerking my head towards the drawing. It was a continuation of the picture she’d drawn the day when I was first diagnosed as Schizophrenic. This time, however, Kara wasn’t in the picture. It was just a drawing of me standing triumphantly outside the cage, waving a bobby pin in Larky’s face gloatingly.

“Yup.” She nodded happily, rolling onto her stomach as I made my way over to my bed. “It was only fitting.”

I smirked. “Yeah, well, I think I’m still on probation. Larky’s going to be watching me carefully for the next couple of days at least.”

“So what?” she demanded. “Let her watch. As long as you don’t have another screaming match with Parish, you’re safe.”

I laughed. “Somehow I doubt that.”

“Didn’t take you for such a cynic.”

“I’m not being cynical.” I protested. “I just… I’ve got a bad feeling in my gut.”

“It’s probably because you haven’t eaten anything yet.” She quipped, rolling out of bed and running over to mine to pull me up. “Let’s go downstairs. Sid and Parish are still eating.” She yanked me by the arm and practically dragged me out of the room. “Can you believe they’re still serving pancakes and waffles?”

“What?” I asked, letting her haul me downstairs. “They didn’t revert back to the oatmeal and porridge?”

“Nope.” She shook her head.

“Should we be worried?”

“Ordinarily, I’d say that we should,” she tossed her strawberry blonde hair over her shoulder and shrugged. “but why question good things?”

“Good point.”

We stepped into the dining room and made a beeline for the large table in the corner, where Sid and Parish sat, telling jokes and shoveling food into their mouths.

“It was a nightmare.” I heard Parish tell Sid as Kara and I approached. “I had to resort to talking to myself and naming Michael Jackson songs to pass the time.”

“Man,” I pulled out the car next to Sid and, raising my eyebrows questioningly at Parish, sat down. We weren’t telling Kara and Sid that we could talk to each other in solitary? Why? “That’s tough.”

Seeing the box of frosted flakes in front of me, I decided that my questions for Parish could wait.

“What about you, October?” Sid asked, as I dumped the some of the contents of the box into my bowl.

“What about me?”

“What did you do to keep yourself occupied in there?”

“Nothing interesting.” I said, pouring milk over the sugary flakes. “Just hummed to myself once in a while and slept. Couldn’t think of anything else to do.”

This wasn’t entirely untrue. I’d actually woken up in the middle of the night yesterday while Parish was sleeping and, unable to fall back to sleep, had hummed to myself, until sleep eventually took over again.

Sid chuckled. “Yeah, well I bet you’re happy you’re finally out.”

“Ecstatic.” I shoved a spoonful of cereal into my mouth.

The conversation segued into many different topics after that; the new level Sid had reached on Gears of War, Kara’s urge to crush flower petals in paint and water and use them in her drawings, the new reading glasses that Dr. Larkson was not-so-discreetly showing off to anyone who’d look… pleasant things.

We finished our meal almost an hour later. And since we were the last ones to eat, we did the dishes and cleared the table, chatting about mundane things while we worked. Once we’d finished clearing up, the boys declared that they wanted to go outside and shoot some hoops.

“Wanna come with?” Sid asked Kara and me after they’d gotten permission from Patty.

“Not right now, Witherberry.” Kara shook her head. “I need to finish my new drawing. Maybe in the evening?”

“Yeah, okay.” He nodded. “What about you, October?”

“I think I’ll pass, Sid.” I declined politely. “I wanted to catch up on some reading. If you’re playing in the evening, I’ll join you too.”

“Okay then.” He said, turning to face the waiting Parish. “Just us boys then. Come on.”

With that, they ran out the door, leaving Kara and me alone in the kitchen.

Smiling to ourselves, we walked up the stairs and headed to our room. We’d almost reached it when Kara suddenly veered off-course and crossed over to the other side of the hall. “Need to use the bathroom.” She explained.

I nodded and stepped into the room, where I ran over to my bed, crawled underneath the covers and pulled out my unfinished book from under the pillows. I’d just only finished one page when Kara strolled back into the room, a concerned look on her face.

“October?”

“Yeah?” I turned the page.

“Are you sick or something?”

I felt my eyes widen. “Sick? Me? No, I’m not.” I shook my head. “Why?”

“No reason. I was in the bathroom, and I saw what you’d dumped in the trash.” She said. I felt my cheeks grow red. “Wasn’t your time of the month last week? I remember because I had to go ask Patty for a fresh pack of pads.”

“Oh, that?” I answered as unaffected as I could. “False alarm.” Her eyebrows didn’t un-furrow. “Spotting…?” I elaborated.

“Oh!” Her eyes widened in understanding. “Got it. My bad. I thought you might be sick or something. It used to happen to my sister. She’d get her friend when she was getting sick, so I was just worried.”

“It’s cool.” I waved her apology off. After all, she’d only been concerned.

Smiling, she closed the door and hopped onto her bed and began work on her newest art project. A minute later, I burst out into laughter, thinking about the lie I’d told her.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing.” I replied around my chuckles. “Funny book.”