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Link Details for: | A Room Without Walls (Chapter 1) |
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| Link ID# | 158 |
| Link URL | http:// |
| Submited By | Jeff Davies |
| Added On | Fri_Jan__7__2005 |
Description:
There is a place that I always go to when the world is bothering me. It is a place of serenity. It’s like my old house. The house I used to live in, but don’t anymore due to it being torn down. It’s the place that no one knows about. My special place.At the very end is a place that is filled with mystery and fear, and I tend to stay away from it. I’m not sure what it is, or what is in it, and I don’t feel like finding out. The world right now is filled with a lot of different emotions, different lives and different hopes and dreams. Mine is the same as everyone else. To never give in to the pain of life. I have a problem remembering things. Sometimes, I have to stop and think before continuing, which makes for a difficult lifestyle. The walls of my brain have been severely damaged, taking wear and tear every time I use it. (Which would be all of the time) I also have a difficulty putting together the puzzle pieces of my past. Even though it is quite memorable, it is completely shrouded in mystery. The last twenty years has been here and gone, and have disappeared faster than any one had noticed they were there. Anyway, many people don’t know why I function the way I do. Some say I have two sides to me, a good side, that would rather do good and help people, that would rather live the life of happiness and healthiness, you know, the righteous side. On the other hand, half of me is a sick and twisted individual, a sadistic bastard who would rather watch the worm die than pull it out of it’s dirt ridden grave. An evil smile masks my guilt-free frown everywhere I go. Except lately, I have been grounded in this world of morbidity. I haven’t been able to move, think, or breathe clearly for a week. I’ve been clamped to this bed for what seems like forever, and right now I don’t remember anything. I don’t remember my name, my age, barely my gender. I woke up in this room about six days ago, and have had no contact with anyone for quite some time. I scream, but no one hears me. I try kicking, but to no avail. I try to remember who I am, or what I’m doing here, but my head keeps pounding. Whatever the case, I’m stuck here till somebody finds me. I’m not claustrophobic, but this room is really intimidating. It feels like it is actually trying to communicate with me, trying to talk to me. I attempted to talk out loud for the first time today, but my lymph nodes are irritating me, so I must be losing my voice. I never knew I sounded so whiny. I can’t help it now. I must get out of this room. As time goes on, more questions arise: Why am I here?Who would put me here? Am I going insane? These questions were going to be answered, but I wish it was soon. Suddenly, I heard voices in the hall. A first in days. “Go check on patient 09367, Jennifer.” It was a man’s voice, a masculine one, and he said I was a patient, so I must be in a hospital of some sort. “Right away, Doctor Wieland.” It was the first memory of a woman’s voice that I remembered, and how soothing it was to hear such an angelic one. I wondered what she looked like, what she smelled like, if she thought the same way I did, and for a minute, without even seeing her, I felt love flow over me. This would be the first time I came in contact with another living being since my awakening. My room was very small, very empty. Just a bed in the middle, no mattress, no sheets. Just me, strapped to a wire frame by means of leather belts. Chained down like an animal. Footsteps drawing closer. Kill the thoughts. I thought I heard someone say. Kill them all. Kill. Kill. Kill. The words repeated with every step that the nurse took. KILL THEM- Suddenly, the nurse came into the room. “Ah, so you are him.” Him who? What is my name? “Are you ready for your test?” I managed to choke out a yes, or at least I thought I did. I just laid there, looking at her, looking at her. She was my first memory. Before this, I had never seen a woman to my knowledge. “Can you-can...” I tried to say, but the words would not form correctly. I told her what I wanted. She didn’t sound surprised. Almost like she expected me to say it, or wanted me to say it. “Later, I promise.” “Wait, who am I? Where am I?” She looked at me like I was crazy. “Enough questions for today, Mr. Troublemaker.” Okay, lets look at the clues, I did something wrong, and I being punished for it. A screech as loud as the voices in my head pounded the back of my brain, my screams couldn’t even be heard by me. It was a siren-like sound, something coming from outside. Another voice called to me from within the walls. Ask the woman her name. I didn’t know where it was coming from, but I decided to see where it was going. “What is your name?” I asked with what seemed like two voices were coming out of me. “Jennifer. Jennifer McDermott. I’ll be coming back here at two.” I felt the room shifting shape, I was in a living, breathing room. Or was I dreaming? No, I can’t be dreaming, dreams are more surreal, but even now I was willing to believe it. She was gone for hours. I didn’t count the seconds, I forgot how long a second was. All I could think about was her. The beautiful nurse with the blond hair, the perfect legs wrapped divinely in white stockings, and white shoes with the little heel. Her uniform was opened to the third button down, her red undershirt down to that measure as well, giving a generous view of her breasts. Her ruby red lips gleaming off the light in the hallway. The epitome of perfection. I looked out the only window in the room, a tiny one across from me. I saw a tombstone with the name “Mitchell Cook” on it and underneath it read “died September 9th, 1967.” A small message was read under it, but I couldn’t make it out. I didn’t think it mattered for now. I made up my mind. I needed to find my way out of this room. “So, nurse, what’s wrong with him?” Doctor Wieland asked patiently. “He’s suffered from more than just mild schizophrenia, doctor. It seems he doesn’t even know where he is. In fact, he’s so lost in himself, he’s mad with lust because I’m not only the first person he remembers, I’m the first female.” “Highly unusual.” Wieland paced back and forth, trying to get a hold of this, trying to figure out how one man could be so unfunctional. “It doesn’t seem to be possible, but this man is a living mystery. I don’t even have his records. He is totally unknown. I don’t even know his name, it’s like-” A young man with blond hair came running up to the two and sounded like he was completely out of breath. “Doctor, we have an emergency in Block C.” Wieland didn’t sound surprised. “Oh, freaking great. It must be her again.” He was talking about Jessica Werrin, a woman who was known to have two faces, being bi-polar, she was a tough case to come by. She was an odd case and she had to be constricted every so often due to momentary outbursts. “Bring me some medical anesthetics, we are going to take her down faster than a drunk elephant at Mardi Gras.” The other doctors stopped and looked at the doctor at his sudden lack of seriousness. They couldn’t understand why he was making light of the situation, and not taking his job the way a normal doctor should. But then again, In this line of work, you had to have a sense of humor. “Do you remember me?” A voice seemed to call out to him enigmatically. He didn’t know where it came from, but he was sure it was talking to him. “Come on, Luke, look at me.” “Why do you want to go so badly? It’s going to be there tomorrow.” “Well,” she hugged him, and kissed his cheek. “I want this to be special. This is your birthday, and I want to make it the best you ever had.” He remembered her name was Rebecca. Rebecca...something. Her face was the only thing he could concentrate on and that was somehow enough. “Please, Rebecca, can I just sit this one out. I don’t feel too good.” He was blushing. Her hand was on his and he was very shy. Not knowing how to talk to women was one thing, he had that problem since elementary school, but not knowing what to say to her benevolence, well, that was just being absentminded. He stood up and brushed himself off. He was covered in leaves, so he guessed they had been laying in the leaf piles again. That put the time period somewhere in the fall. But why didn’t he remember this? Was this even a memory? Or was this a time somehow outside his own, like a dream or a repressed imagination, otherwise known as daydreaming. “Rebecca, why don’t we-” He looked around, but she was nowhere in sight. Instead there was a man who didn’t have a face. “They’re waiting for you.” It said. And in an instant, I woke up to alarms. It seems that I was dreaming. But did that explain why I remembered something? So there is a past. A doctor that I had never seen before came in and looked at me. “Ah, I see you’re up. Did you get some sleep?” He asked me. I didn’t say anything in fear that things might become worse than they already are. I just gave him an empty stare for what seemed like forever. He sat down on a metal seat that he brought in. It matched the walls, a blank white, but a hint of tan. I didn’t much like the look of this man, being new to these memories, I knew that things weren’t going to be easy. “Okay, I’d just like to ask you a couple of things, and I want you to answer them as honest as you can. Alright?” His tone was soft and assuring, but answering questions would be hard. I wasn’t sure what an answer was offhand. “Okay, first question: What did you do?” “I don’t know.” I answered. I was being honest. There was no memory of what I did, if I even did anything to end up here. The doctor sighed. He wasn’t going to get that answer for a while. “Second question: Do you know why you’re here?” “To be honest with you, I don’t even know where here is.” There was the understatement of the century. “Now, I don’t want to alarm you, but you were admitted here a week ago. Before that, I don’t have any knowledge of you. Which is odd, because I admit all patients myself. It seemed like you just appeared here out of nowhere. You see, this is Summerdale Mental Ward. You were placed here for some reason... I just don’t know why...” Now my heart started pounding. “Why am I being chained down?” “Maybe you pose a threat. I remember tying you down in the first place –wait. I remember now...we found you lying in a pool of your own blood, chanting something morbid, like, ‘Close the door.’ I don’t know what was going on, but you were badly hurt. You had a scratch mark as big as your arm on the left side of your chest, and one of your eyes had been nearly gouged. You had been beaten on the head severely, perhaps that is why you are lacking any memories. The reason we brought you here was because there was another body lying about two feet away from you. A gun shot wound to the head, and the gun was in your hand.” He sighed again, taking a sip of water, his throat was scratchy. “You’re trial lasted a hour and all the evidence pointed to you and you were sentenced to life in prison. But since it seemed you had a mental illness, your sentenced was reduced to twenty years in here. You’re lucky that you survived that fight, and didn’t lose more than your memory. “But I remember something else... ”The doctor stopped dead in his tracks. “Please tell me anything that you know.” “I just had this dream, and it was so real. I saw someone I knew. Her name was Rebecca. And then she disappeared and I saw this man who I shouldn’t have seen, but I feel like I know him as well.” This new information was not only essential, it meant that parts of his memory still remained intact. But why parts? “What did he look like?” “He didn’t have a face.” Before I knew it, I was back in my room, with my shackles of despair and my bed of hard, cold metal. I couldn’t move again, which meant that I couldn’t be trusted, or I never left my room. It was impossible to sleep because of all of these screams. I guess this really is a mental hospital. What was I supposed to do? I can’t move, I can barely make a sound, I really can’t do much...so how do I escape? Is that even an option? My life has been complicated ever since my reawakening, but now that the news about my sudden admittance to a mental institution has come as a complete shock. My world has suddenly been torn apart. How the hell am I supposed to get out of here? Since I was stuck, I may as well get used to this room, it was going to be my home for awhile. Looking at the alabaster walls, a new memory was implemented into my head. It was the time my cousin Ricky and I went to the water hole. We had many a good memory, but the time was when we were both seven and we went down to the stream to fish, but was slowly wondering why he picked that spot to begin with. The month was September, most of the foliage had already turned a nice golden brown, and the water was just starting to get cold. It had been raining for the past three days and that made the ground moist, and susceptible collapse under their weight. “Come on Luke,” Ricky said. “How many times do I have to tell you? We walk down here all the time. Be careful. The dirt here is like fucking quicksand.” His mouth was as bad as his attitude and it showed. He was four months older than Lucas and he used that to set an example. The thing about Ricky was that he didn’t care. Lucas would use that language around his mother. His mother was Catholic, and fuck was one of the words that she just would not tolerate. Fishing had always been one of Luke’s favorite pastimes, and always wanted to have his own lake and stock it full of fish and go everyday, but the money it would take to make such an elaborate scheme would put his single mother not only bankrupt, but where she would never see money again. They finally got down to the lake, which was perfectly still, like a mirror that hadn’t been touched since God made it at the beginning of time. Like they were the first ones to see it. Ricky fit a small worm on his hook and threw his line out a decent distance. Seconds later, his plastic bobber dunked under and he frantically reeled in a nice six pound panfish, which wasn’t trophy size, but Ricky felt the need to brag that it took him only under a minute to catch a fish. “See here, Luke?” A huge smirk on his face. “That’s how you catch a fucking fish.” “I wish you didn’t talk like that.” Luke said. “You make a bad impression on me.” When Luke looked back to scowl at his cousin, he was nowhere in sight. His pole sat there, the fish flopping like mad, trying to breathe, but Ricky was gone. Instead, all he saw was a man in black, standing on the water. “The lost search for their missing as well, Lucas.” Lucas stopped him. “Who are you? I’ve seen you before. Why are you haunting me?” The man in the black coat disappeared and materialized in front of Luke so fast that he didn’t even see him move. Was this a bad dream? Why was this man stalking him? “You are the pawn of the man who doesn’t exist, Luke. You are the one who must learn of who your aren’t. Then he can be awakened.” “Who will be awakened? Who the hell are you?” “Go now. They’re waiting for you.” Again, I woke up in my room. I must have dosed off. But who was that man? Why was he always plaguing my dreams? Is he someone I know and now just remembering him? That’s the problem, I don’t remember anything, let alone my own name. Could it be that “Luke” name that I’ve been hearing? There was a small crash outside and I directed my attention to the door. Strangely enough, I no longer had my shackles on, so I was able to move, but my legs were still tied down, and so I was still conformed to this room. There was a knock on the door, and there was enough of a pause for me to allow whoever was knocking to be let in. I did so, and watched the nurse I first met come in. Her uniform looked ragged and wondered if it had been hours since we last talked, which would mean that she had been worked to the core. Had a day gone by? No, that was impossible, there would probably be a change in shifts. By power of deduction, only three or four hours had passed. I don’t know why, but for some reason, lust set in again, and as soon as she came to my bedside, I immediately grabbed her hand. “Don’t be scared.” I assured her. “I mean no harm.” She smiled, as if she knew of my intentions. She leaned in closer, and gave me a kiss on my forehead. “Not yet, my love, but soon.” I smiled back, hopeful of a future with her. But in case that didn’t happen, I pulled her harder, until she fell on top of me. I held her tightly. “You’re all I’ve got now.” I whispered into her ear. “You will replace my fears and dreams of her.” She picked up her head and looked at me straight in the eye. “Is ‘she’ the one you keep muttering in your sleep? This ‘Rebecca’?” I nodded. “You look like her, a little.” The once quaint smile started to fade. She looked back at the door, then back at me. “I want you to know something, I never want you to lead a revolution here, if that happens. If they rebel, I want you to promise me you’ll never join.” I didn’t understand. “Why? What does this matter for me?” She smiled, and put my hand on her breast. “Promise me.” I liked where it was going, but I didn’t want to promise anything that I couldn’t uphold. She unbuttoned her uniform and again put my hand on her breast. “Promise me, please.” I did promise, but questioned it’s sincerity. “Promise?” “I promise.” Making love was not what I thought it was, it was more than I wanted, but I couldn’t complain, this is what I asked for. Somewhere in the process, I kissed her, and closed my eyes, and felt nothing. He looked around, but darkness surrounded him on every side. “Hello?” He shouted out, but no response came back. Being in pitch blackness was bad enough, but to be all alone was even worse. Again, he called out. “Hello, can anyone hear me?” This time, he heard a faint whisper, but too low to make out actual words. He shouted a little louder, maybe the person would hear him. He yelled at the top of his lungs, and tried flailing his arms, hoping to hit something, he didn’t even know that he was standing on solid ground. “Rebecca, can you hear me?” He yelled. “...can you hear me?” Someone seemed to say, but he didn’t know if it was directed towards him. “Rebecca? Rebecca, is that you?” He felt a hand on his shoulder and he jumped in shock. “Open your eyes, silly.” It was her, he knew it. He opened his eyes, and found that he was in a train station, which was deserted. “It’s ok, it’s just us.” Her smile captivated him, and her kisses were like candy. “Why are we here? Where is everyone?” “They all went home. We missed our train, and we have no transportation home, so we have to stay the night here, just you and me.” He looked around, and cracked a smile. “Do you think the night-watchman will care if we do it in the middle of the lobby?” She laughed that infectious laugh that made him feel better. Everything was going to be okay as long as she was there. A low hum could be heard from inside the toll stalls down the hall from them, but he disregarded the sound. They continued kissing as the hum got louder, and he knew that something was wrong, and he should speak up. “Do you hear that, Rebecca?” She kept her smile and looked around. She must have thought that he was crazy. “No, you must be hearing things.” However, the noise could not be ignored and again, he swore he heard a sound. “I’m telling you, I don’t think that that noise is normal.” She got up and grabbed his hand. “Come on, Mr. Troublemaker, put your hand right here.” She directed his hand inside of her shirt. “Touch me there.” But the noise got even louder, and so loud that he covered his ears to shield his eardrums from the intense noise. Suddenly the walls started to collapse, and were replaced by complete blackness. Rebecca didn’t seem to notice, but he was intent on finding out what was causing this. “What’s wrong?” She asked. “Something is happening to this place, we need to get the hell out of here, and quick. This place is falling apart!” With a smile still on her face, she looked at him and said a bone-chilling message. “Get me out of here, he’s got me trapped in here. Open the door.” “What? What are you saying?” The walls were totally down now, and out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the man that was haunting him. A wicked smile on his face, and he was eyeing Rebecca. “NO! YOU GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE! LEAVE US ALONE! GO AWAY!” The man appeared behind him, and whispered in his ear. “Let her go, she is mine now. You have other doors to close.” “WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?” All he did was point upwards, and by the time, he looked up, he saw the ceiling crash onto him, and darkness surrounded him again. When I awoke, I was all alone again. Did I imagine the nurse thing? Did I just get knocked out and imagine the train yard thing? This time, all of my shackles were loose, and I was able to get off my bed and move around. However, I found that the door was still locked, and came to the conclusion that slowly, I was getting out of this place by revelation of my dreams. One more and I might be able to leave this place. |
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