Chapter Nine

I don't know why institutions like this one are usually feared. No one wants to come to a place like this. But I am really starting to love it here. This is the first time I have had real friends in my entire life. Jordan and the other kids have really helped me. I don't dread the sessions with Dr. Chambers now. I just see them as a small but needed interruption of my life.

It really does feel like I've been here forever and known these people forever. They make me feel happier than Penny and Craig ever did. I just know that Carrie would love it here.

I still sometimes longed to see her. I would have dreams about her curly blond hair and how she used to be so loud and demanding. It used to be irritating to Chris and Cathy in the attic but I hardly even noticed. I loved her too much to see any flaws.

My best friends here on the second floor were, Jordan, my roommate and a small girl, named Wendy who was a year older me but much smaller. We ate lunch together in the cafeteria and we played cards and used the play doh in the recreation room.

Jordan told me he was there because he had jumped off his balcony twice and his parents thought he was suicidal. He didn't seem to mind it here. He had visitors a few times a week and they always brought chocolate bars in for him. He always shared with Wendy and me.

I had been in the institution for almost a month now and Penny hadn't come to visit. I worried that something might have happened to her. But wouldn't they tell me if that were true? What would happen to me if Penny died? I didn't even want to think about that.

Dr. Chambers and I talked about my life with Penny and Craig. I hadn't lived there long but she was always scribbling in her notebook. The Ferguson's was the one place that I had come away from with no baggage. But I guess you get baggage everywhere you go, it's a given.

I tried to tell Dr. Chambers what I remembered about the attic. It was hard to tell her because I was still afraid of forgetting everything after I spoke the words. But that didn't happen after I told her about reading the bible. She didn't seem too surprised about that, she told me her children read the bible every night.

The one thing I could tell her about was Chris's blood. I don't know if I am ashamed or just afraid she will think I am disgusting but I just can't get the words out. I think I will have to tell her because so far she seems unimpressed with the things I do tell her. It doesn't seem to faze her to hear about four children locked in an attic for years. After each session I think more and more that she doesn't believe a word I'm telling her.

Maybe I can't blame her. Who could believe a story about an evil grandmother who locks kids up? Or a mother who abandons her children for money. It does sound too cruel to be true. But it Is true and I want someone to believe me.

It had been awhile since I had had any hallucinations about the grandmother or the attic. I was happy about that. My biggest fear was that I'd have an episode and they'd take me back up to the third floor to lock me up again. I didn't think I could stand that again. I needed to be able to leave me room when I wanted. That room reminded me too much of the room the grandmother kept us in.

One day Wendy, Jordan and I were in the recreation room watching a movie. I was really into it. I liked movies a lot because we rarely ever watched them. I liked to see someone else's life instead of dwelling on my own.

At one point in the movie a white mouse ran across the girls foot and she screamed.

"Eww, I hate rats," Wendy said.

"That's a mouse, and they are perfectly clean," I told her. I don't know where this came from. I didn't remember ever seeing a mouse or a rat, let alone holding one.

Wendy stared at me a moment and then went back to watching the movie.

"Did you have a pet mouse?" Jordan asked me later that night when it was time for us to go to sleep. I didn't know how to answer that, because I didn't remember a specific mouse but I knew that I had a pet. I loved him so much, I wanted to see him again.

"I think so," I told him.

"We should catch one in the bathroom," Jordan said.

We had heard rat noises in the bathroom like they were scurrying around in the walls. It had never bothered me before but some of the kids wouldn't go in the bathroom alone because they thought a giant mouse would come out of the wall or something.

"Tomorrow maybe," I said.

I fell asleep after that and dreamed of the attic. Cathy was up there in her pink tutu. She looked so happy dancing to the Nutcracker. I liked to watch her when she was this happy. It didn't happen often for her or the rest of us.

I saw that Chris was watching her too. But he had a funny look on his face. Kind of like he wanted to dance with her maybe. He was holding his hands just under his waist and when Cathy turned off the music he bolted down the stairs and into the bathroom. Cathy didn't see me standing in the shadows. I didn't want her to see me. She didn't know I liked to watch her. I liked having a secret. She looked sad now with the music off. I wanted to tell her to turn it back on but I didn't want to give myself away. She sat down on a dusty dresser and looked down at her feet. Her long blond hair fell over her eyes and I heard her crying. Just softly at first and then louder. Eventually she was sobbing openly, not trying to be quiet at all. I watched in horror as her hair started to grow longer and turn gray before my very eyes. Her sobs turned into cackling, hysterical laughter until she looked up at me. She looked straight at me in the corner and she cackled again.

"It'll never end Cory!" she rasped, "It'll never go away, we will never forget," she said laughing.

"No!" I cried out.

I bolted upright in bed and realized that I was in the small, white room at the institution. Jordan's bed was next to me and he was sleeping soundly.

Just a dream, I thought, relieved.

But the dreams were coming back. I was remembering more and more every day and the bad part was the dreams and flashbacks were going to come on stronger than ever.

Jordan and I did get around to going to the bathroom to get ourselves a pet rat about a week later. I didn't tell anyone about my dream. No one would understand, not even Dr. Chambers. She didn't understand anything I told her. Sometimes I wondered how she had ever gotten this job in the first place. She had the empathy level of a dead fish.

"We should put food by the vent," Jordan said.

I just nodded and watched as he took a piece of bread from his pocket and put it in front of the small vent inside one of the stalls. I didn't think a mouse would come out for that bread but I didn't say anything.

We waited for hours until we heard the announcement that dinner was ready. Jordan decided to leave the bread there and come back and check after.

When we returned, the bread was gone of course. Jordan was so excited.

"It came and took the bread!" he exclaimed.

I tried to be happy but I just wasn't in the mood. I was still nervous about having a flashback come at any time of the day. I wanted to make sure I didn't hurt anyone and I could control it.

"Let's put some more and wait," Jordan said. He broke off another piece of bread and put it out a little further than before. It didn't take long for the mouse to come out to get this snack. He was all white with long whiskers and beady, black eyes. Jordan slammed the cardboard container we had over the mouse and the bread and cried out in triumph. I cried out in terror. I could hear the horrified squeaks of the mouse from inside the box. There were scratching sounds, it was trying to get away.

Suddenly I saw Chris, he was tying two sheets together and throwing them over the window ledge in the attic.

"We can't do it Chris, we'll fall," Cathy objected.

"It's our only chance," Chris told her. Her grabbed a rat from beside him. It was dead. He opened it up and cut a piece of meat fro Cathy. She grimaced but took it anyway.

"For strength," he said.

"We can't eat him," I said.

Jordan looked at me funny, "I don't want to eat him," he said, wrinkling up his nose.

"I don't want to drink the blood," I said, staring at the cardboard box.

"Cory, we're not," he said.

I shook my head violently to get the strange flashback out of my head. I already knew we had to drink Chris's blood. I didn't want to relive them eating the two rats for strength to carry us down the side of the house. I couldn't handle it again.

Jordan managed to get the box turned right side up and he looked inside it. The mouse was shaking in fear. It hadn't even eaten the piece of bread.

"Yes!" he said happily.

We brought the mouse back to our room and put it in the clear, plastic box we had found near the garbage. We put in some food we had saved from dinner and some water. But the mouse didn't eat. It was terrified.

We had to go to sleep an hour later. Jordan didn't want to stop watching the mouse. But he fell asleep on his bed when I told him I would watch it and wake him up if anything happened. Nothing happened. I watched the poor mouse stay in the corner of the box; he didn't eat or drink.

He reminded me of how I felt the first week in the attic. Afraid and confused.

On an impulse, I reached into the box and picked up the mouse. I could feel him trembling. I tiptoed out the door and made my way to the bathroom.

"I'm sorry Mickey, go find your family," I said. I set him down in front of the vent and he scurried away without a look back.

I remembered on the way back to my room, my pet mouse, Mickey. I had loved him but I had trapped him just like we had been trapped. I couldn't do that to little Mickey Junior. I was glad I let him go, no matter what Jordan would say.