Chapter 2
The single bulb behind the plastic cover in the ceiling that is always lit provides the only light in my room, though it is more than enough. It is blinding with the stark white room, everything colorless. Sometimes I want to just fade into the darkness like before. If I could, I'd wish for a heartless to take me once more, to leave only the shell of me. Then I can't feel pain anymore. And maybe Sora and Riku will come back. To rescue me. I wouldn't be alone.
It is night, though I don't know that from the sky. There is no window here. Only the one on the door so the people here can gawk at me. I know this because the hall lights are dark, only shadows flitting across the walls. I wish I was out there. Away from the light. I feel like a moth, hungry for the dark and despising the shining bulb above me.
At last, I can think by myself. No annoying attendants forcing me to go to the common room to socialize with the other patients. I don't have to worry about counseling sessions or therapy. This is the only time I don't mind being by myself.
I lie on the stiff bed, the mattress only a vague reminder of my own bed at home. The thin blanket covers the restraints so I can imagine they aren't there. I can imagine the white walls as a blank canvas and I'm painting a picture of my room.
Over by the door which is now thick wood stands an oak bureau. My bookshelf with my favorite novels sits by my desk that faces the window. I can sit in my desk and look out the window to the beach as sun shines through and casts its light over the room. It is a large window, with a window seat my father built for me. I would sit there an read all day or watch Sora and Riku sparring below my window as they each try to prove who is better. A window that doesn't exist in my present room.
I turn my memory away from the window and the memory of sun as I blink back a tear. I don't cry anymore. Crying hasn't helped at all. Crying couldn't get me out of here as I begged my parents not to leave.
The invisible nightstand next to my bed is where I focus my attention now. It is a mistake. I see my radio and my lamp, pale violet and blue and pink. I see pictures standing in their frames, happy moments in my life captured within their wooden borders.
The picture of my family does little to ease my pain. It only fuels my anger. Of all the people I trusted, my parents were the ones who turned against me. They abandoned me here to die, wilting away into nothing. Father used to call me his precious, his rose. Now I must be just his weed, a problem in his life that disgraces him.
Snapshots of me, Sora, and Riku fill the rest of the surface. I smile, just a bit, remembering some of the times. We were all just children, me sitting with tears in my eyes after the boys had accidentally wrestled with each other through my sand castle. One depicts us in school, Riku and me dumping a bucket of water on Sora after he'd switched everything in our lockers so I ended up with a wooden sword and a pair of old gym shorts while Riku was greeted with my brush, mirror, and my various other girl essentials. Others just show us all smiling and happy, something I haven't felt for a long time.
As I finally come to a picture of us taken only a week before the incident, I wonder what had happened. We are standing by our unfinished raft, the three of us planning our adventure. It had to have happened, right? Or was I really crazy? Did I dream about it all, about the heartless and the storm? Did they leave the island without me and drown at sea?
No. It did happen. I am positive. My lucky key chain is gone. I swear with my life that I gave it to Sora. And I remember clearly his promise to return. I'm not the crazy one. Why would I kill my two best friends? Why would I lie about them being sucked into other worlds?
I want to take a closer look at the picture, to cherish and remember the last cheerful moment I had, but as I reach for the memory, a knock shocks me out of my trance. A white figure devours the window of the door, and a light peers behind it. I've been so entranced in thoughts that I haven't noticed the staff arrive and hall wake up in
"Good morning dear," the fat attendant Mary greets in her fake cheerfulness as she peeks into my room. "I brought you breakfast. I'll come back later to take you to visit Dr. Mason."
I don't agree with her happiness and ignore her as she places the tray on my table and shuts the door with a little twiddle of her fingers of a farewell as she bustles down to tend to her other charges.
The oatmeal in my breakfast grows cold as I disregard the meal, the apples browning. Why should I bother eating? I don't do anything but lie around all day. I don't need the energy.
Reluctantly, I rise to sample the food, the gnawing in my stomach demanding to be fed. I sit alone and eat, more for something to do than to ease the hunger. The oatmeal is gritty and thick and the fruits are sour. I lose my appetite. Lunch might be better.
The room spins a little as I stand. Did they drug my food? They must have slipped pills into the oatmeal after the struggle from the previous night. Damn them. Why can't they let me be?
Mary appears once more as I turn around slowly. She seems content that her little trick seemed to work. I am docile and helpless. What more does she want?
"I see you're ready now, Kairi," she acknowledges, though I can see a man behind her for backup just in case. "We're going to talk to someone now, so I want you to be on your best behavior."
The man takes my arm and leads me out as we follow Mary. I don't bother fighting the drug. It's useless.
We stop outside a door with a gold plated sign it. "Dr. Mason," it says. My first psychiatrist counseling. Just another quack like the ones I used to see before I was placed in Cypress Grove.
The room is different from the halls right outside its threshold. Instead of the white, I see wooden paneling and furniture. It seems welcoming and warm, a big difference than what I have been getting used to these past few weeks.
I am led to the couch where straps are attached to my wrists to anchor me to the couch. They must expect me to lose my temper again and attempt to harm the doctor. I sit quietly with my hands folded in my lap and stare at the floor, ignoring the other door in the room open to admit a petite woman with thin glasses and hair tied in a bun. She reminds me a bit of a librarian like all the other psychiatrists I've seen.
"Take those restraints off the girl, James," she tells the man. "I don't want her to feel uncomfortable." He is reluctant but obeys, standing by the door just in case. The lady nods to Mary and the fat nurse leaves. Good. Of everyone here, I hate her most. I don't want her around if I am to be telling my life story.
"Now, Kairi," says the librarian-like lady, the kind expressions looking foreign on her tight, serious face. "I'm Dr. Mason. Look at me while I'm talking dear."
I ignore her and she lifts my chin with a finger. "There now. I can see you're a very pretty girl." I start putting mental walls around me. People always compliment you when they want you to let your guards down, but I've learned.
"I see in your records here," she says, flipping through a file as I advert my eyes to the ground once more, "That you've been through some hard times. It says here a couple of your friends disappeared and you seem to not have recovered from that trauma."
"My best friends," I whisper, tensing up at the memory. I don't want to talk to her at all. This is a waste of time. She would just pretend to listen and get paid for it while I get sent back to my little niche in hell.
"Now, my dear, why don't you tell me what happened since they vanished," she says softly. I can't tell her. She'll just give me more odd looks and prescribe more medicine.
"Kairi, listen," she says, reading the file once more. "It says here you claim your heart was taken by something called heartless and your friends are stuck in other worlds after one of them saved you, is that correct?"
I don't answer. She must be looking at the accounting of my tale I had written in my diary after I returned when no one would listen to me. They had taken my little book when I was admitted, saying it might help them determine my psychological problems. My diary was the only one who would listen and not judge me as insane or give my secrets away. Now everything I ever felt is laid out like an open book.
"Well," she says, closing it and holding my chin in one hand to force me to look at her. "It is a very good story, but it's impossible. The police believe they had left in their boats and were killed in the ocean when the storm struck. The boats were missing and they weren't seen during or after the storm. They said only bits of wood and what looks like the remains of a raft washed up.
So the raft hadn't made it through the storm It had been our ticket to freedom, and now its mutilated corpse only aided in everyone's explanation that Riku and Sora had tried to test out the raft and never returned.
"They're not dead," I say, my voice hoarse from lack of use lately. "Riku is in Kingdom Hearts and Sora is out there somewhere."
Dr. Mason just nods. I can see her jotting something down on a notepad, but I can't make out anything.
"So it seems to me," she says, "That your problems started after the storm cleared." Once again I'm silent, not denying nor agreeing.
Minutes tick by as she writes. Clearing her throat, she stands and walks to her desk. She returns carrying something.
"Now Kairi, listen sweetie," she says, handing me a pale purple bound notebook, the kind with no wires. They must think I'd try to hurt myself with it. "Look, it's your favorite color, isn't that right?" I don't say anything. Purple was the old Kairi's favorite colored. Now, I prefer anything dark, dark so I can hide in unlike my white enclosure.
"Honey, I want you to write everything that happened from that moment, can you do that for me?" she asks, though I know she is demanding more than requesting. "Write your feelings or anything you want in it. Bring it in every session and we can discuss it, is that alright?"
I hug the book to my chest, hungry for something I can express everything to but reluctant to accept it. They will just use it as a tool to prove I am truly insane.
Dr. Mason doesn't seem to notice it as she hands me a pen as well, motioning James back over.
"Take her back to her room," she tells him. "She should rest for today. She can go to the common room tomorrow and I shall see her on Thursday." Adjusting her glasses, she ushers us out of her office and back into the blinding white hall, closing the door.
"Come on kid," James mutters, grabbing my upper arm hard and dragging me back to my room. I try to keep up, but my mind is elsewhere. The notebook in my arm presses against my chest, inviting me to write. Maybe I will write. It doesn't matter if they believe me or not. They never believe me anyways. I just want to