She stared at nowhere. Tears like balls played down her eyes as she relieved each memory....
Gates and bars, doors and chains adorned her home… no it was a solitary confinement, a cell. No light, no not a single ray did she ever allow into the room. Not even the ‘wardens’. The corridor was also dark so no light filtered in when each meal was brought in. they left the same way, barely touched.
She didn’t need any light… she had no sight. Hear her… ‘Hmmm’, she just sighed. That’s seems to be the only sound that was ever heard from the room. Wait, she also made a beautiful euphony whenever she bumped into the only piece of furniture in the room, an old rickety one, she would sleep on nothing else probably the floor. In the dead of the night, mutterings could be heard, who was she talking to? After each session, silence ruled the air.
Today, she ate a little more, agreed to take a bath and allowed human contact. Her skin was pale from years in the darkness. Her hair was curtain-like and fairer than her skin. She had asked for a stylist. ‘Please do send in the psychiatrist. I’d like a word with him’, she said to whoever came in with lunch.
*******************
‘Sir, patient 040 requested for a psychiatrist…’ the Rookie Warden began. The director looked up from the screen. ‘Finally, he realizes I have been here for the past twenty minutes’, the Rookie thought within. ‘Go over that again’, he demanded. ‘040 requested a shrink, sir’. ‘What are you waiting for, the apocalypse? Don’t be the oaf you are. Get the shrink in by tomorrow and get the heck out of my office!’
The Rookie scurried for the door, ‘Hitler, Napoleon …the world’; he heard the director mutter to the television set. Half way down the corridor, his lips settled in a smile. ‘Me, an oaf? Wait till he finds out how moronic and stupid I find him be, he is such a galoot’, he told the deaf cleaning lady.
*******************
‘What is today?’ she asked. Her voice was coarse and hoarse as she struggled to coordinate her vocal cords. Dr. Scythe tried not to get irritated but didn’t sound cheerful as he told her, ‘25th of July…’ She raised a skinny finger to her lips, ‘I don’t care to know the year. It’s of no consequence’. The room was poorly lit and the stench oozing out was offensive. She had insisted on having the session in her room. As he moved uneasily in his seat, he hit his foot against the stool on which the recording device was placed. She didn’t want him taking any note.
It’s been eight years since had willing engaged anyone in a conversation. Eight years since the police walked in on her. She was bleeding from both eyes with an eye ball on the floor. Her father and brother laid dead just eight step away from where she knelt with a knife in her hand.
‘I am happy today, doctor… so happy.’ She began, ‘after now the world would make me its heroine’. Dr. Scythe had to agree so as to keep her talking. Besides, every patient is allowed to indulge in their own fantasy. ‘Then start the recording’. After a fit of cough, she continued, ‘dinner that evening was like every other. It was the best meal I had made ever since mama died. Father never kept any money aside for housekeep, not even feeding. I had to leave school and started working three jobs. Some days I worked till I couldn’t feel my fingers anymore. What well-paying job could a girl of sixteen get? I was just a young teenager. I longed to go back to school, have first date, first beer and all the firsts… I wanted to knock on the neighbors’ door and tell someone what they did to me each night. Not just them alone, their friends what did I get? “Get away you whore, you’re tainting the very air I breathe in, how many banged you the previous night?” They knew what was going on but no one seemed to care’.
She stared at nowhere. Tears like balls played down her eyes as she relieved each memory. Scythe placed his hands on hers, a comforting gesture. On impulse, she broke the contact. ‘The touch of a male human repulses me…’ She sniffled a little. ‘I killed them doctor, I put the bullets in their heads and backs. How did I feel? Elated and relieved’. ‘I am not a coward… I am a survivor of incest that began at the age of ten and child prostitution following Mama’s death’.
Her face broke into a grin. I did everyone a favor. I got rid of the worst creatures that ever crawled the face of the earth. I’d kill them over and over again. Dr. Scythe finally found his voice, ‘how did you then lose your sight?’ he couldn’t help asking. This time she didn’t grin or smile, she laughed. ‘I didn’t lose my sight, I gave it up. I couldn’t go on staring at the soulless bodies of those two. It was my second act of bravery. It was worth it, I got to be my own heroine…’
The Rookie gasped where he hid to listen to the scoop of the year. He thought he could sell the information to a newspaper. The approaching foot step of the doctor sent him running down the hall. ‘Who was there?’ she asked. He told her that he didn’t see anyone but promised to lodge complaints.
‘I’d like to check on you the day after tomorrow. Would that be okay with you’, he asked. ‘Do as you please, I’d always be within these walls. I’d still be here’. He nodded then raised his hands to wave her goodbye but quickly remembered that gestures as that meant nothing to her. ‘Goodbye ’, she said.
******************
The rookie sat at the reception desk with his head bent. He was in another world. The rapping of the table sent him standing at attention. It was Dr. Scythe. He had come to see patient 040. He was led to her room and left alone at the door. He wasn’t greeted by a poorly lit room, not even that awful stench, the room was painted and clean. There was no sign of her. He hurried to the reception but met no one. He looked out the window and saw a little crowd gathered. He went out the door to find out what was going on. No one was willing to break the silence. He looked to the right and saw a grave stone… ‘Patricia Adams…’
He heard the wind whisper, ‘I am a heroine’.
- Dear reader, I hope you enjoyed the story. But always remember that we are the society and the society is us. We have to change what needs be changed and leave what needs be left.
- Hearing from you is an essential ingrediant, please drop your comment in the box below. Thank you.
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