The Fall of Never(100)

That’s it, she thought. That’s why this place is so similar to my home. It’s because both places feel alive.

Home. It wasn’t her home.

She moved down the hallway toward the nurses’ workstation. The air smelled strongly of antiseptic. Somewhere within the maze of the first floor, a young girl was shouting something about Gavin, Gavin, where did you go? Kelly felt herself begin to tremble, the pressure at her groin growing more intense. What little she remembered about the place was suddenly reinforced; and all that she’d forgotten had started filtering in through the cracks in her mind.

Just before approaching the front desk, she turned and dashed into the bathroom at the end of the hall. There, she assaulted a stall, dropped her jeans, sat, and urinated for what felt like an hour.

God, I can’t do this. What the hell am I even doing here?

Back in the hallway, she stepped toward the nurses’ workstation like a timid child.

Because last time I was here, she rationalized, I was a child.

“Can I help you?” one of the nurses behind the desk asked without looking up from her paperwork.

“I’m here to see someone.”

“Name?”

“Kelly Kellow. I’m here to see Jennifer Sote, a patient—”

“Relationship?”

“Relative.”

The nurse looked up at her only briefly, her eyes running a scan of Kelly’s face. “Sisters?”

“She’s my cousin,” Kelly lied.

“Identification, please.”

Kelly produced her driver’s license. The nurse scrutinized it. She was a compact little woman with squinty eyes and a lipless mouth.

“I haven’t changed back to my maiden name yet,” Kelly said to assuage the woman’s suspicion at her last name.

“Let me see inside your purse, please,” the nurse said.

Kelly spread open her purse and the nurse peered inside.

“Carrying any sharp objects, such as pocket knives, metal nail file, toenail clippers with a file, screwdrivers, or any eating utensils?”

“No.”

“Jennifer Sote,” the nurse grumbled, swiveling in her chair to face a large computer screen. Her bony fingers attacked the keyboard, hammered away at the keys.

Is it possible that she’s no longer here? Kelly wondered. It’s been roughly six years. Isn’t it possible Mouse has moved on? Doubtful she was released—she was too far gone for that, I think—but she could have moved to some other facility. Then on the heels of that: Or she could be dead.

“Jennifer Sote,” the nurse repeated, tapping a fingernail against the computer monitor. “Second floor, room 218. Would you like someone to show you up?”

“I’ll find it, thanks.”

She moved swiftly down the corridor, deliberately refusing eye contact with any of the other nurses, just as she had done as a teenager. When she turned the corner, the hallway opened up into a spacious recreation room, aligned with a multitude of television sets and activity tables. Some of the ward’s occupants had gathered here—young girls in varying stages of repression, depression or outright psychosis. It occurred to Kelly that some things never change. These girls were no different than the ones who’d inhabited the institution six years ago. Perhaps twenty years ago, for all Kelly knew. They were children: some the victims of domestic abuse, rape, incest, the whole gamut. Others were here suffering from uncontrollable bouts of depression, hopeless in the face of any type of medical treatment. And then there were others, though perhaps only a slim few, who displayed running strains of violent tendencies. No—some things never change.

A young girl passed her in the hallway, her head bent toward the floor, though she followed Kelly from the corners of her eyes. As she passed, the girl whispered, “Electric tongue,” and continued down the corridor.

The second floor housed the older residents. Though the facility did not usually admit adults, the second floor was comprised typically of those residents who had been unfortunate enough to grow old inside the walls of the institution. Had Kelly’s condition been more severe—as severe as Mouse’s, for instance—she too might never have left, doomed to haunt the second floor of the Coopersville Female Institution for the remainder of her life.

The hallways were white—white walls, white linoleum floor, white clapboard ceiling tiles. Her footsteps echoed across the floor as she advanced down the hallway. One of the doors to her left opened just a crack. A pair of bright blue eyes examined her from the other side. Two more residents paced back and forth up ahead, where the hallway emptied into a lounge and dining area. A group of women in colored sweatpants sat watching television; only one of them turned her head to watch Kelly pass.

The door to room 218 was closed.

This is insane. What could I possibly say to this woman? Why am I even here? That’s it—I’ve finally gone out of my mind.

Yet she could feel Becky’s essence piloting her actions, refusing to relent. This was something that had to be done, something that was essential to the stimulation of her memories. This place—these blank walls and blank stares—held secrets. That was fact; she knew this as plain and as simply as she knew her own name. And just as she’d been during her jaunt into the basement back at the house, she was overcome by the notion that there was something here. What Mouse had to do with any of it, she didn’t understand. But that feeling was there and she was powerless to ignore it.