The name was familiar. “I know you.”
“Yep. I know you, too.”
“Then why did you ask me…” Wait, what had he asked me? I rubbed a hand over my face. The buzzing noise just seemed too loud all of a sudden.
“See that nurse?” Bodhi asked, but when I looked up, he was focused on the puzzle pieces. “I’d probably just gut her, you know, slam the knife in and twist it—maybe wiggle it around a bit so I made sure I nicked a major organ or four. Then I’d let her die slowly, gut wounds take a while. It’s painful.”
Oh.
“That guy? Yeah, he’d need some correcting. Maybe break a few bones.” He matched a couple of pieces and when I reached over toward them, he let me take them, cause they matched the pair I was putting together. “Yeah, broken bones. Sounds good, right?”
There was only one “guy” over there. He was the big guy. The mean one. “He’s mean.”
“How mean?”
“I don’t like him.” I went back to the puzzle.
“So, definitely breaking bones. Work from the inside out or the outside in?”
Something tickled in the back of my mind. “I know how to break someone’s fingers.”
“Cool,” Bodhi grunted. “Useful.”
Especially if people kept touching me when I didn’t want them to. I turned the idea over in my head along with the puzzle pieces. “Hands first.”
“Oh, I can work with that. Knuckles, like at each joint of his fingers, then down to his wrists. Think tools would be better or just keep it really ‘hands’ on?”
His chuckle made me smile. “Could do both. Is that an option?”
Bodhi stared at me for a moment. “Give me that piece there,” he told me and when I slid it over to him, he grinned. “You want both. I can do both.”
Some of the buzzing quieted and the giggle that escaped didn’t seem appropriate and at the same time, it was funny.
“Now that chick,” Bodhi said with a scoff. “She needs something special.”
It took me a second to realize Janice was “that chick.”
“She’s my nurse.”
“Got any good ideas?”
No. Except… “You have to be really happy when you hurt her,” I said. “She’s always cheerful when they take me to the white static.”
“I can be very cheerful.”
That was good.
We had almost half the puzzle together when Freddie got there. His arrival heralded an almost audible pop in the muted bubble around me. Relief flooded through. I hadn’t imagined him. He really was here. What if…
“Boo-Boo,” he said as he slid into the chair next to mine. Dark smudges under his eyes worried me and I wanted to reach over and brush the hair away from his face. He looked terrible. “You’re here.”
“So are you.” Did he think I was a dream too? Were we both dreams? Wait… “I’m not naked.”
He blinked for a moment and even Bodhi looked at me, then he leaned sideways as though to look under the table. “Nope. Do you want to be?”
Freddie snorted. “That’s my line.”
I grinned. “I mean, if I were in your dream, I’d be naked. So, I’m not and you’re not. That means we’re real.”
For his part, Bodhi just looked thoughtful then nodded before he went back to the puzzle.
“Definitely not in a dream here. You haven’t been here the last few days.”
“Days?” How long?
“Three,” Freddie continued as if I’d ask the question aloud. He kept his voice pitched low. “And you’ve been out of it when I came to your room.”
“You didn’t forget me,” I whispered, soothed that he’d still come, even if I hadn’t known he was there.
“Never,” he promised.
“I probably will,” Bodhi said. “But you didn’t ask me. Probably a good thing to forget. If I don’t know you, can’t testify against you.”
That actually made sense.
“What about her?” The woman who came in seemed familiar, but I couldn’t place her. She wore white like the other orderlies and her resting bitch face just didn’t quit.
Freddie frowned. “What about her?”
“Depends on if you want it to hurt or not,” Bodhi offered.
Yeah, I didn’t know that answer yet. I didn’t even know her.
The next two days were better. Freddie’s agitation had taken on a life of its own. Fortunately, I remembered when he came to see me. I worried too. How many more times could he sneak into my room and not get caught? What happened if they did catch him?
They sent me to the white static because I slapped the doctor’s hand. But Freddie told me it would be fine. “Course, we’re not waiting anymore.”
“We’re not?” It was almost time for him to go back to his room. He’d brought a book with him and we’d been taking turns reading it. I had no idea what it was about, but listening to him soothed me.
“No,” he said. “I think Bodhi will help us and I have a couple of ideas. So tonight, when I get here—we’re going to go.”
I wanted to believe him so badly.
“I know, Boo-Boo. Should have done it two days ago, but you were still—”
Out of it. I was better now. I nodded.
“Today,” he said as he scooted off the bed so I could lay down. He reached for the first strap and his expression darkened. “Today, do everything you can to not have them drug you. Pills only.”
Yeah, the pills I could gag up sometimes. The shots—I couldn’t do anything about those. I swallowed as he secured my ankles first, before he came up to wrap the strap around my arms.
“The last time was cause I hit the doctor.”
Freddie scowled. “Do you have to see him today?”
I lifted my shoulders. No one told me my schedule. I didn’t even know how long I’d been here. Time had kind of lost all meaning.
“Why did you hit him?”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I won’t hit him today.”
The fierceness of his frown intensified. “Boo-Boo, I don’t care if you hit him. If he deserves it, you lay his ass out.”
“But you can’t get out of here if I’m drugged.” Because clearly, he wouldn’t leave me.
“We’ll make it,” he promised, then pressed a kiss to my forehead. “We’ll make it. Tonight.”
I nodded and then he was just gone and I was strapped back to the bed.
I hated this place.
When Janice took me to the doctor’s office instead of group, my heart sank. The doctor waited for me, dismissing Janice and waving me in to sit down.
“How are we feeling today?”
I just had to play along. Then Freddie and I could leave. “I’m fine.”
“Good,” he said as he waved me into a chair. Instead of sitting down across from me, he circled behind me. That was enough to make my stomach plummet, but when he put his hands on my shoulders I went cold. “Glad to hear it. You know we’ve been worried about you.”