Freefall
o11.
Ryan sits at the small card table, playing with his fingertips, chewing on his nails. Some others roam around the white-washed room: pacing, checking the clock, mumbling to themselves under their breath.
Every couple of days, the inhabitants of the facility were lead out of their rooms, down the long corridors, and into a sort of gathering hall. Ryan supposed they wanted them to socialize with each other, help to make each other better, but he couldn’t help but feel it was because they got some time to themselves, to enjoy drinking coffee without having to worry about sick people: the stable ones anyway. They wouldn’t help one another anyway: they didn’t care, were too afraid to reach out of their own broken worlds to possibly merge into another’s. And so here they found themselves, every week, just pacing, and muttering, and staring at walls. He didn’t mind so much. He’d never talked to any of them, and they had never so much as glanced toward his table. He stifled a laugh: his table? How long had it been? Two weeks and he had already claimed a table: a ramshackle one at the back of the room, with scratches and markings spinning woeful tales of their authors’ hearts.
He’d thought many times about adding his own story to the book, thought about carving some of his own raw pain into the numbness of the wood. But… what would he write? What could he write that would ever suffice, would ever attempt to fix him, fix all of the wrongs? Nothing, he’d concluded, could ever make it go away, no matter the amount or usage of words. It would never be the same…
A small voice clears its throat across the table from him, ripping him from the undue safety of his mind. His eyes trail across the battered tabletop, up the fragile frame of the person, and land on two glittering green eyes. She smiles warmly at him, but doesn’t say anything. Neither does he, nor does he return her smile. She shouldn’t be over here, shouldn’t be at his table, shouldn’t be smiling at him. Whoever she was, she obviously didn’t know how this group thing worked. They stayed to themselves, didn’t look at each other, and certainly didn’t smile at each other.
There was something different about her: something that struck Ryan as out of place in this hell hole. She didn’t look sick like all the rest of them. Her eyes didn’t have dark circles under them, weighing them down. Her mouth wasn’t bordered by lines of worry, of paranoia. Her skin still held the crisp pink tinge that had become so distant to all of their sunken eyes. And she was smiling. This little girl of no more than eight was sitting before him, in this room full of sick people, and she was smiling at him. It wasn’t one of those fake smiles that the attendants sometimes gave you as they walked you from place to place. It was a real, warm, genuinely caring smile. And it repulsed him.
He musters up as much hatred as one dared to show in the presence of a little girl, lathering his face and body language with it. But this girl… she didn’t seem even the least bit phased.
“My name is Jesse,” she smiles, speaking in cool, honey tones. “What’s your name?”
No answer, just a controlled hate filled stare.
She continues calmly, “My daddy works here, and sometimes,” she lowers her voice, leans farther across the table, closer to Ryan. “Sometimes I sneak in here. Daddy says I’m not allowed, but I do it anyways.”
You should listen to him, Ryan wants to scream, pound into her head. He’s right, you’re wrong. Don’t play with knives. No… he pushes it from his head. This was not him, this was her.
The girl reaches a petite hand down under the table, retrieves a deck of playing cards. “Do you wanna play a game with me?”
Ryan catches, twitches, stiffens. Game. The word rings around inside his head, bouncing off his skull. Everything shifts, clicks to the right, farther out of order. “What kind of game?” he asks sheepishly, staring her down with focused blue eyes. They are drained of hatred, filled with curiosity. This Ryan can talk. This Ryan can feel human.
“Go fish?” she asks, dumping the cards out on the table, mixing them into a cluttered heap.
“Is it a nice game?” he asks, frowning. Her head bobs up and down vigorously, signaling that it was, indeed, a very nice game. So Ryan nods his consent, watching her flick out a certain number of cards to them each.
“Now you have to find a match,” she explains politely, a smirk forever plastered on her thin lips.
The clock on the wall drags on and on, its hands seeming to slow down with each passing tick. But the two don’t notice, too busy engrossed in the workings of the game. Basic conversation had evaded them throughout it all, as had words in general, save for the ones necessary to play. They didn’t need it though. They just needed each other, just needed to be able to acknowledge the presence across from them. They just needed a friend.
Every couple of days, the inhabitants of the facility were lead out of their rooms, down the long corridors, and into a sort of gathering hall. Ryan supposed they wanted them to socialize with each other, help to make each other better, but he couldn’t help but feel it was because they got some time to themselves, to enjoy drinking coffee without having to worry about sick people: the stable ones anyway. They wouldn’t help one another anyway: they didn’t care, were too afraid to reach out of their own broken worlds to possibly merge into another’s. And so here they found themselves, every week, just pacing, and muttering, and staring at walls. He didn’t mind so much. He’d never talked to any of them, and they had never so much as glanced toward his table. He stifled a laugh: his table? How long had it been? Two weeks and he had already claimed a table: a ramshackle one at the back of the room, with scratches and markings spinning woeful tales of their authors’ hearts.
He’d thought many times about adding his own story to the book, thought about carving some of his own raw pain into the numbness of the wood. But… what would he write? What could he write that would ever suffice, would ever attempt to fix him, fix all of the wrongs? Nothing, he’d concluded, could ever make it go away, no matter the amount or usage of words. It would never be the same…
A small voice clears its throat across the table from him, ripping him from the undue safety of his mind. His eyes trail across the battered tabletop, up the fragile frame of the person, and land on two glittering green eyes. She smiles warmly at him, but doesn’t say anything. Neither does he, nor does he return her smile. She shouldn’t be over here, shouldn’t be at his table, shouldn’t be smiling at him. Whoever she was, she obviously didn’t know how this group thing worked. They stayed to themselves, didn’t look at each other, and certainly didn’t smile at each other.
There was something different about her: something that struck Ryan as out of place in this hell hole. She didn’t look sick like all the rest of them. Her eyes didn’t have dark circles under them, weighing them down. Her mouth wasn’t bordered by lines of worry, of paranoia. Her skin still held the crisp pink tinge that had become so distant to all of their sunken eyes. And she was smiling. This little girl of no more than eight was sitting before him, in this room full of sick people, and she was smiling at him. It wasn’t one of those fake smiles that the attendants sometimes gave you as they walked you from place to place. It was a real, warm, genuinely caring smile. And it repulsed him.
He musters up as much hatred as one dared to show in the presence of a little girl, lathering his face and body language with it. But this girl… she didn’t seem even the least bit phased.
“My name is Jesse,” she smiles, speaking in cool, honey tones. “What’s your name?”
No answer, just a controlled hate filled stare.
She continues calmly, “My daddy works here, and sometimes,” she lowers her voice, leans farther across the table, closer to Ryan. “Sometimes I sneak in here. Daddy says I’m not allowed, but I do it anyways.”
You should listen to him, Ryan wants to scream, pound into her head. He’s right, you’re wrong. Don’t play with knives. No… he pushes it from his head. This was not him, this was her.
The girl reaches a petite hand down under the table, retrieves a deck of playing cards. “Do you wanna play a game with me?”
Ryan catches, twitches, stiffens. Game. The word rings around inside his head, bouncing off his skull. Everything shifts, clicks to the right, farther out of order. “What kind of game?” he asks sheepishly, staring her down with focused blue eyes. They are drained of hatred, filled with curiosity. This Ryan can talk. This Ryan can feel human.
“Go fish?” she asks, dumping the cards out on the table, mixing them into a cluttered heap.
“Is it a nice game?” he asks, frowning. Her head bobs up and down vigorously, signaling that it was, indeed, a very nice game. So Ryan nods his consent, watching her flick out a certain number of cards to them each.
“Now you have to find a match,” she explains politely, a smirk forever plastered on her thin lips.
The clock on the wall drags on and on, its hands seeming to slow down with each passing tick. But the two don’t notice, too busy engrossed in the workings of the game. Basic conversation had evaded them throughout it all, as had words in general, save for the ones necessary to play. They didn’t need it though. They just needed each other, just needed to be able to acknowledge the presence across from them. They just needed a friend.