Chapter 1 - The Gift
Our deepest wounds surround our greatest gifts - Ken Page
It was days later before the foretold visit from his mother actually happened. They took him out of solitary and allowed him to shower before he was escorted to the visiting room. The odd thing was that, in addition to being escorted by the orderlies, one of the ladies in charge of the asylum also escorted him.
Algae Acres was under the proprietorship of the Algae sisters; Director Lupita, Doctor Anne, and Head Nurse Arella. It was Director Lupita who was escorting him, the oldest and worst of the sisters. It was rare that the administrator would leave her office, but she seemed to take as much pleasure in the suffering of the 'patients' as her sisters did.
"Are you doing alright today, Mister Silver?" asked the director in that way that conveyed a false sense of respect but really it just came off as her talking down to him; no one called a twelve year old 'mister' unless said twelve year old was in some kind of trouble, yet she tried to sound friendly about it. She wore what looked like a white doctor smock, though the material seemed wrong somehow. Every time he tried to focus on it directly it looked like a normal white smock made from some kind of cloth, however whenever he looked at her with his peripheral vision he was sure that it was leather, not cloth. "You seem a bit livelier than usual."
Sterling carefully nodded his head, to indicate that he was fine. Speaking was a dangerous thing to do; it took him three years to learn that lesson, but he finally learned how to construct the perfect mask. He was the master of his emotions; no one could see what he didn't want them to see.
To wit: if he told them that he had a radio visit from what he suspected was his 'father' then he'd have another round of therapy with Dr. Anne...and he was still trying to recover from the last time he had therapy with her. It was days before he was able to remember his name…and she kept him in the darkness. The thought made him shudder.
"Still reticent as ever, though. So, this is the first time in a long time that she's decided to visit you. Isn't that exciting?" she asked, in her kind yet insincere tone. The truth was, he wasn't sure how to feel about seeing his mother. It was three years ago that he was committed to Algae Acres. He wasn't even willing to leave the house after he was attacked by a teacher. No one believed that he was attacked by said teacher, and why should they? Sterling was known for being a tad...unhinged. Many of his peers thought he was mute due to the fact that he didn't speak during class. Even when he was called on he often wouldn't answer, feigning ignorance, or mumbling to himself until the teacher got impatient and moved on to something else.
After that incident, he decided to stop leaving the house; nothing made sense in the world anymore. His teacher was a monster, but no one else could see it or believe it. It was like finding a rotten apple where you least expected it. If one person was a monster then who else could be? No, not leaving the house seemed safer that way, but his mother disagreed and felt that he needed help that she couldn't give him. While he wasn't on the best terms with his mom, he couldn't help but feel abandoned.
Even so, Sterling nodded silently, affirming that he was, indeed, excited to see his mother.
"Good. I'm sure she's taken time out of her busy schedule just to see you. We know how rare it is that she visits," added the director innocently, "Though it must be a busy job, being the CEO of her own company." Sterling gave the woman an askance look; it took him a few months to notice it, but the director was not especially outright cruel. Not like her sisters, at least. She had a way of saying things that planted a seed. Doubt, hatred, pain...it didn't matter. The seeds would grow and plant grief; the grief would grow like a weed and attempt to strangle the soul of the person. Sterling seen it in action...she would whisper something into the ear of a patient and whether it was five minutes or five days later that person would inevitably have some kind of mental break.
He was sure that he went through the same thing, but nowhere near as bad as the others. It hurt, though; the thought of his mother, abandoning him. Like he was some worthless piece of garbage to be thrown away. The voices in his head spoke all at once, saying things that he thought but never actually said out loud.
"She only wants to see you suffer."
"She hates you."
"She's evil."
"Vile!"
"WHY WON'T YOU JUST DIE?!"
The voices were terrifying, but Sterling did what he always did-he hummed to himself. Director Lupita glanced sidelong at the twelve year old as he began humming his favorite song. He didn't know what it was called, he didn't really even know the words. His memory was a more than a little fuzzy thanks to his 'therapy' sessions. He could only assume that the song was his favorite since it was a tune that he could remember easily enough when he had such a hard time remembering anything else.
It took a few minutes but the voices finally lowered to a murmur. They weren't silent, but they stopped saying those hurtful things.
He and the director finally reached the visitor area. It, like the rest of the building, seemed to be in a state of disrepair. Only some of the lights worked, the tables were old and dingy, as were the chairs. The muted television played an advertisement for Monster Donut. A light flickered and a roach crawled out from under a table and disappeared underneath a bookshelf, but none of that mattered. Sitting at a table that was perfectly in the middle of the room was his mother.
She wasn't an especially tall woman, but what she lacked in height, she more than made up for in presence. Her skin was an earthy shade of brown, her eyes a surprising dark shade of green. Her black hair was in a small conservative bun.
The director escorted him to his seat; instead of giving the two privacy, however, she stepped back to the wall, watching the two with a small silent smile.
His mother gave him a small cursory once over. "You haven't been eating."
Sterling ducked his head. "No, ma'am."
"I've also heard that you've been attacking the guards."
"Yes ma'am. Only the rotten apples dressed as guards."
"Huh. Still speaking in riddles, hmmm?"
Sterling slowly looked up at his mother. Already knowing the answer, he had to ask a certain question. It was the same question that grated at him every second of every minute of every day for the past three years.
"When...when am I allowed to leave?"
His mother sighed and dug into her purse. She pulled out a cigarette and lighter. He glanced over at Director Lupita, but the other woman didn't appear to raise any objections to his mother lighting a cigarette in what was supposed to be a psychiatric institute.
His mother took a long draw and blew out a plume of smoke like a lazy dragon before she shook her head. The small bit of hope he felt quickly transformed into cold devastation and transmuted into righteous anger.
"But this place can't cure me! I'm guarded by rotten apples and thorny bushes! I...I don't belong here!" Shouted Sterling, pounding the table, " I'm being good! I'll be good! I'll promise not to see the things or hear the voices anymore!" Sterling's rebellious spirit quickly gave way to desperate pleading partway through his speech.
Sterling didn't even realize he was standing until he noticed a guard edging towards him. As if to make matters worse tears, unbidden, sprang into his eyes. He tried to keep them reigned in and let out a barely restrained sob. He sat quickly and buried his head in his arms, his body trembling with emotion. It was easy to try to keep things in check on most normal days; he could pretend that nothing was real.
His mother's presence made everything seem so real, though, and it threw his control out the window. It was easier to pretend that everything that had happened to him was really just happening to someone else. The terrible food that tasted like cardboard, the dank and cold room he was kept in, the ache in his arms from the straitjackets they put him in whenever it was time to take him down for treatment, the actually mind-numbing torture that was his treatment, the soul crushing loneliness that he had to endure every single day that was only abated by the occasional visit from the 'radio' voice that he foolishly pretended was his father.
Madness born from loneliness.
"Please don't leave me here anymore," he begged, his voice cracking as he spoke, feeling the tears flow from his face and into his sleeves. They were hot like molten lava and burned as on their way out. "Please! Please!"
"Sterling," said his mother, voice stern, "Stop your sniveling and look at me." He looked up as commanded, tears still falling as he hiccuped, attempting to curb his sobbing and only making it worse. His mother stared at the pitiful mess of a boy, her gaze passionless. "You know why you must be here. Your time is not finished just yet."
Sterling couldn't help the sting of hurt that so readily pierced his heart. He knew that it would end this way. It always did but rejection from his mother always seemed to hurt as much as the first time.
He tried not to look at Director Lupita, whom seemed to watch the proceedings with a pleased look. Sterling laid his head on the table again and focused on rebuilding his mask. It was so hard to do, he almost forgot what it was like to be that calm again. He had to be smooth like obsidian and hard as diamond. It was hard to remember how to be that hard, however, when his heart was so ready to break like paper mache.
He didn't look up as he felt more than heard something being placed on the table. Something was slid over to him; the object only stopped once it hit his arm. He looked up at the plain white box, confused. It looked like a small jewelry box, like it held perhaps a ring or something.
"Excuse me; the residents are not allowed gifts," said the director.
"Surely I'm allowed to give my son a cookie," said his mother, turning her gaze to the director, a patient look on her face.
Sterling couldn't help but give his mother a confused look. He rubbed at his weepy eyes with an overly long sleeve and sniffled noisily. Letting out a shaky breath he looked at the object again, this time with clear eyes. Obviously the ring box was not a cookie. He thought that the director would point that out but instead she frowned before nodding.
"I suppose cookies are allowed…" mused the woman, looking somewhat amused by the thought. Sterling was smart enough to know that she was appreciating the subtle cruelty in the gesture. The cookie was a bit of normalcy to remind Sterling of just how horrible his situation was.
"And he can eat it later; a snack to remind him of how rare it will be that he'll ever be treated so kindly again," said his mother with a small smirk. It was as if his mother had read his thoughts.
The doctor grinned and made minimal effort to not seem so pleased. Sterling was still confused. He looked at the white box; it clearly wasn't a cookie. It likewise wasn't big enough to house a cookie or even be possibly confused for one. Was there something that he was missing? He had to strongly resist the urge to pick up the box and lick it, just to be sure.
Even if the box was big enough to house a cookie or shaped to resemble a cookie, it wasn't like the director had looked inside the box to confirm that there was, indeed, a cookie. That said, why was the director and his mother convinced that there was a cookie on the table and not a white box?
"The poor dear child," said the doctor as she clicked her tongue, "just as well. Visiting hours are up."
Sterling's mother stood. She fixed her son with one more stoic look. "Remember; no dessert until you finish dinner."
Sterling watched as his mother left. He heard footsteps approach from behind. He turned to see Dr. Anne approach and couldn't help but tremble. He knew what was coming next and in spite of his calm mask, his trembling worsened.
"And it's going to be a long time before you have dinner," said the director from her spot against the wall, her voice calm as the lights flickered. Dr. Anne's silhouette did something strange in the dark; it was as if she gained giant bat-like wings. When the lights came on, however, she looked normal.
"I hear tale that you lost control of your temper, dear child. I believe it's time for another round of...therapy," said Doctor Anne.
A/N:
Total word count: 3597
