Every day at the Institute was the same. It began with her waking up in a cold sweat, still shaking from nightmares featuring her mother’s bloated corpse and Sybill’s shredded body. She never gave herself time to dwell on any of it because she knew that if she did, she would fall down the hole that had been dug out inside of her. Once that darkness swallowed her, she would never be able to claw her way back out. So instead, she would roll quickly out of bed to dress and make her way down to the dining hall. There, she would sit with Val over a breakfast she couldn’t eat, trading stories about her adjustment period (“So how are your Mastery Sessions going?” “Great, except I’m being taught by a reptile who lacks basic empathy.” “Can I have your pie?”). Then she would head to the Sanctum for meditation. Her attendance was mostly for show. Sophia had no intention of “going within.” Instead she sat there and suppressed her feelings, mentally reciting prayers she had learned as a kid in an attempt to distract herself from her own thoughts. If grief or anger tried to enter her mind, she would force them back out onto the threshold of denial and increase her efforts.

Now I lay me down to sleep…

Sybill’s body, a collapsed string puppet of limp, bloody limbs, dripping in her arms….

I pray the Lord…

The sound of branches splintering, flesh tearing, ripping and screaming…

My soul to keep…if I should die…

Mom’s cool hands soothingly stroking her hair…

Shit. If I should die…

It’s okay, Mom, everything will be okay, I love you and everything will be okay…

IF I SHOULD DIE BEFORE I WAKE…

Sybill’s smiling face, but her mouth was a slit in a human-like mask…

I PRAY THE LORD MY SOUL TO TAKE…

Sybill and Mom sitting at the breakfast table, sunlight splashing across the white tablecloth, but there was blood on the cloth too, it was a blotch of darkness, it spread towards Sybill elbow…

NOW I LAY ME, DOWN TO SLEEP….

By the time that forty minutes came to an end, she was shaking and dripping with sweat.

After the hellish moments in the Sanctum came her “meals” with Clara. She was taken to a different room in the infirmary each day and forced to take memories from comatose patients---or rather, that’s what she was supposed to be doing.

“I don’t understand your hesitation,” Clara said one day, pursing her lips in frustration. “Do you want to starve?”

“I’m trying,” Sophia said through gritted teeth, picking herself up from the floor for what felt like the hundredth time.

“No, you’re not. Muzzle your scrupulosity, Sophia. This is about survival.”

“Was that part of your Hippocratic oath?” Sophia said snidely.

Clara jabbed a finger at the patient lying on the bed. Today it was a young woman with blonde hair.

“Again,” she ordered.

After these sessions came her allotted recreational period. Terrified at the thought of being alone in her room with her thoughts, Sophia would sit in the Meadow Ward lobby and people-watch. Visiting hours at the Institute seemed flexible; residents from other floors would come and go all day, mingling and laughing with one another. She never saw Val during this time, but on a couple of occasions she spotted the chameleon boy, Jude. But he never came over to talk to her.

Once her free time ended, she went to therapy with Hazel, who offered private counseling as soon as Sophia had made it clear she wouldn’t be participating in group therapy. Their appointments were predictably asinine.

“How are you adjusting to your new home?” Hazel chirped, folding her stubby hands in her lap.

“It’s a wonderland.”

“How do you feel about your fellow residents?”

“They’re fine.”

“Have you made any friends?”

“Loads.”

“How are your classes going?”

“Riveting.”

“That’s wonderful! Which ones are your favorite?”

“Gee, it’s so hard to choose.”

“Have you thought about your mother lately?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“How about Sybill?”

“I’m not talking about that either.”

Hazel would nod, an infuriating look of pity on her face. “We can end our session early if you want. I’ll see you tomorrow. Don’t forget to keep journaling.”

“Keep journaling” implied that she’d started in the first place. Hazel had handed her a generic black notebook at the end of their first session and told her to spend some time each evening writing out her feelings. “It helps with the grieving process,” she promised.

Sophia had taken the offered journal without comment, gone back to her room, and thrown it in a corner. It had remained untouched ever since.

But as bad as the therapy sessions were, the worst time of day was when she had to go to bed. In those dark, silent moments just before sleep, when her guard was down, grief would pounce. It ransacked her body with its relentless shears, shredding her heart into thousands of bleeding pieces. She would soak her pillow with tears, biting down on the sheets to muffle her sobs.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Then she would wake up the next day and do everything all over again.

***

Sophia paused outside Hazel’s office, staring at the door with a slack expression as she mentally prepared for the session. It was a rainy afternoon. She could hear the drops pattering heavily on the roof and the growl of thunder, like a monster roaring in the distance. The sound grew louder and louder until it filled her ears to the point of bursting. She suddenly felt like she couldn’t breathe; images seared through her brain. She thought of city lights smearing through her fluttering eyelashes, rain pelting her face as she lay in an alleyway which smelt of dirt and cigarettes, water dripping down her neck and forehead and dribbling into her eyes. Stay here, Soph.

She turned and ran down the hall. When the panicked fog had faded from her mind, she realized she had stumbled into a hall she didn’t recognize. She spotted an open door and casually wandered through it, trying not to look out of place or too out of breath. For a second she thought she had stumbled into the Meadow Ward lobby. Then she realized that it was a very similar room, but with minor alternations: the walls were light purple and there was a fuzzy lavender rug spread across the shiny tiled floor. The fireplace here was black marble. She saw staff members and patients wandering around in lavender scrubs, and suddenly became conscious of her own green attire. She hurried over to a loveseat in the corner that was half concealed by a giant fern. As she lowered herself into it, peeking through the leafy branches to make sure nobody saw her, she heard a sharp hissing noise. Something stirred beneath her. She jumped back to her feet with a small cry. A familiar head and chest materialized.

“What’re you doing?” Sophia snarled as the rest of Jude Fitzpatrick followed.

“Me?” he said irritably. “This isn’t even your floor.”

“I’m ditching therapy.”

He stared at her for a minute, raising his pale eyebrows until they disappeared into his shaggy bangs. Then he sighed.

“Fine. Sit down.” He patted the seat next to him. “Quick, before they see you.”

She obeyed, glancing around nervously. “Who?”

“The people I’m hiding from.” His skin was still returning to normal. There were patches on his upper body that were still flowered, like the upholstery. He held his arms up to his eyes and scowled. “Shit. Guess I’m looking like grandma’s couch for the rest of the day.”

“Does that always happen?”

“Only with certain patterns.” He sighed again, slumping comfortably in his seat. Then he turned and looked at her. “So what’s your deal, Noob?”

“My deal?”

“Your tragic backstory.”

“Maybe I don’t have a tragic backstory.”

“Bullshit. It’s not like anybody’s sent here for stealing lunch money.”

“What’s yours, then?”

“Do you have a pen and paper ready? This is award-winning material.”

A reluctant smile pulled at her mouth. “I’ll make sure to remember it for the test later.”

“I was born in a small town that you’ve never heard of because it’s like every other small town in America. It smelled like pollution, thanks to the nearby steel mills, and it had a dirty river full of questionable aquatic life. Our forms of entertainment included a grocery store and a bowling alley---then the bowling alley went out of business.”

“A charming backdrop for an eventful life,” Sophia said.

He bowed his head. “Obviously. I’m an only child and the pride and joy of my parents. My list of accomplishments includes flunking every class I ever took and then getting kicked out of four different schools for fighting. Apparently, I have a mouth that gets me in trouble.”

“I never would’ve thought.”

“Yes, the accusations shocked me too.”

“So did you do something to a classmate? Is that why you’re here?”

“I’m here because I pulled my vanishing trick on my parents one too many times and they got sick of it. I used it to sneak out all the time.” He yawned and sank even further into the couch cushions. “I guess spray painting the mayor’s house and breaking into cars isn’t something a decent person does. But see, I don’t really know what a decent person does, because I had a mother who drank and beat me whenever she wanted---I could look at her the wrong way or just fart in her direction, it didn’t take much to set her off---and a father who was never home because he was too busy being a defense attorney for every scumbag in town.”

He wasn’t looking at her anymore. Sophia didn’t know how to react, but it didn’t seem to matter; as Jude continued to speak, he seemed to become less aware of her.

“Dad thought I would take over the family business one day, but he eventually gave up when he realized I was more drawn to weed than the courtroom.” He laughed; it was a joyless noise that sounded more like a bark. “Anyway, add my general failure as a person to my weird power, and they couldn’t wait to make me someone else’s problem.”

There was a long silence. She watched as his distant eyes slowly returned to the present. His gaze fell on her again. He smiled thinly. “So that’s my deal.”

“That really sucks.” It was a terribly lame thing to say. She cringed as soon as she uttered the words. But she didn’t know what else to say.

“It really does. The question is, can you top it?”

“I see your tragic backstory and raise you a catastrophic life.”

His smile grew. It almost reached his eyes. “I’m sufficiently interested.”

“My father died when I was little.”

“You call that catastrophic? I call it lucky.”

“Let me finish.”

“Fair enough.”

She didn’t know what she was doing. She barely knew this guy. But maybe that’s why the words were easier to say. She didn’t care how they were received, and she just wanted to get them out of her, to expel them from her body like lumps of cancer.

“A few weeks ago my mother died in a horrible accident, and before I could even process that, I lost my sister too. She bled out right in front of me. I couldn’t do anything to help. I just sat there until she died. I think they buried her somewhere around here, but I’m not sure where. I don’t think I want to know.”

She paused, realizing she had said all of this very fast and that she was out of breath. Jude remained silent and unmoving next to her. She went on, her voice cracking:

“She wasn’t a great person, you know? I found out that she did a lot of really bad things to other people…and to me. And that really messes me up because I didn’t see it, I didn’t see anything until everyone around me was already gone, and maybe if I had, if I’d had some idea, I could’ve---I might’ve been able to---”

The words strangled her; they grew thick in her mouth and choked off the rest of her sentence. She leaned her head against the back of the couch and closed her eyes.

“Wanna help me finish this shitty cupcake?” Jude said after a long silence.

Sophia’s eyes flew open and she turned to stare at him. “What?”

“I got this from the cafeteria earlier.” He produced a squashed pastry from somewhere at his side.

“Jesus, that looks…”

“Yeah, it’s not great. Have half.”

“I can’t. Real food makes me sick. Side effect of my power.”

“Is that so?” He shrugged and took a bite. His face changed, and he stared down at the cupcake in surprise. “You know, I don’t even care if you’re lying because this is better than I thought it’d be. More for me. What’s your power, anyway?”

“I’m a Telepath.”

Jude shoved the rest of the cupcake into his mouth, then licked the icing from his fingers. She’d never seen someone eat so fast.

“You eat memories or something like that, yeah?”

He asked the question with the same nonchalance anyone else might use to ask someone to pass the salt.

“Yeah.”

“What do they look like?”

“Soap bubbles.”

He laughed. “I’ve always thought the metaphysical powers were cool.”

“Metaphysical?”

He saw her blank look and raised an eyebrow. “So I take it that in addition to ditching therapy, you’ve ditched a few Mastery Sessions too.”

“No, but I will say I don’t always listen to Clara when she’s talking. So what’s a metaphysical power?”

“Non-material, basically. So anything involving consciousness, soul reaping---oh shit.”

He was looking over her shoulder. She turned around, and her stomach sank.

“There you are,” said Hazel, her lipsticked smile looking a little more strained than usual. “I was worried when you didn’t come to our session. What are you doing all the way back here? Oh hello, Jude. Aren’t you supposed to be with Martha?”

“Oh, shoot, you’re right.” Jude stood up. His whole voice and demeanor had changed. “Thanks for helping me out, Sophia. I’m sorry I made you late.”

“Uh---that’s…fine?” Sophia said, standing up and reluctantly following Hazel. She looked over her shoulder as they walked out of the room. Jude was sitting back down, his body vanishing once more into the flowered couch. He grinned at her; then his face disappeared as well.