Crooked Halos

The wind picks at the trailing ends of my headscarf and flips them over in the air, pushes them back, over my shoulder, setting them dancing behind me, pointing back towards the hell I walked out of so many years ago.

I walked away and swore I would never look back.

But it doesn’t work like that, it never does.

I walk back there every day, there’s a gap in the wall and I climb back through every day and that’s how I live my life, pacing around inside those walls because it’s the only place that’s familiar.

It’s still deserted; no one endures their childhood behind those walls any more.

It’s empty and cold inside, so cold, almost hollow in a strange way but it’s the only place that’s familiar, it’s the only place where I can see them still in my minds eye. They’re not real, just ghosts but sometimes it seems that I can see them with open eyes.

It’s haunted, that place, yet I still go back there, every day just before the sun rises and I leave every day, just before the sun sets.

Years ago, I swore I’d never go back.

I spent a week in the light, a week in the world before I retreated back. Back into the dark, back behind the empty walls of the hospital.

In a sad way, I wish it wasn’t empty, I wish I could turn back the clock to when I lived in there, when smiles went unbroken despite everything and when the corridors rang with laughter instead of screaming.

My screaming.

I just couldn’t take it when I spent the night there last Halloween, so many ghosts of so many friends and when I saw him… his eyes glazed over, looking at me with such pity, my nerve snapped and I just couldn’t take it any more.

Apparently they thought someone was being murdered or something because the police showed up ten minutes later, I was gone by that point but apparently they found the room I had been in splattered with blood.

And I get the nasty feeling that It was quite probably my blood, which is why I write this now, on the eve of Halloween because tomorrow, I’m going back, back to the hospital and this time, I don’t think I’m coming home.

It’s where I belong, after all.

***

Ryan Ross was fourteen when he walked though the gates, I know because I watched him, I watched the officer hand him over to the warden who then showed him around the place, telling him the rules and casually letting him know that no one would watch his back here. If the other kids beat him up then that was his problem.

Harsh, but hey, that’s life.

“Mr. Urie, please pay attention.”

The bitch at the front of the classroom snapped at the boy sitting next to me who blushed an interesting shade of beet red and tore his gaze from the amber-eyed boy who was receiving the lecture on ‘101 things not to do’.

I allowed my own eyes to flicker back to the front of the classroom then down to my mediocre notes.

Oops.

“Mr. Beckett?”

I look up.

“Wha-”

She sighs in an exaggerated manner, slamming her ruler down on her desk beside her.
“I do wish you’d pay attention, now, as Mr. Leto was saying…”

She rambles on again and I catch Jared’s eye.

‘Hard luck.’ He mouths at me and I flip him off. Goddamn fucking nerd, actually listening to that bitch.

“Mr. Francis?” The dark-haired boy behind me is also caught off guard and I repress sniggers as her lips thin and her eyes fire up the way they always do when she gets seriously pissed off.

“Now, if any of you had been paying attention…”

Yeah, yeah, whatever.

I yawn and glance out the window again but the feminine-looking boy with amber eyes had gone.

“Mr. Beckett, will you please pay attention!” She shouts and someone behind me laughs, but that’s half the class, so I’m not too sure who it was, though if I had to put money on it, I’d say Pete.

What can I say?

He’s a stuck-up son-of-a-bitch who thinks he’s far better looking than he actually is. Not that I hate him or anything… I just dislike him strongly.

Allow me to introduce myself, William Beckett at your service.

“Oh, for heavens sake! Miss Jakobs!”

Kyla looks up from her doodling, wide-eyed and innocent-looking.

There’s a knock at the door and almost everyone looks away from what they were opting to do instead of learning.

“Yes? Come in.” Her voice cracks slightly and she looks exhausted. Another hard morning shouting at a class that just don’t want to learn can do that to you, I think.

“Ms. Smith.” The warden walks in, handing her a note and waiting for her response.

She sighs heavily. “There’s a spare seat over there.” She points to the empty one next to Davey but he immediately protests.

“That’s Jade’s seat!”

The warden gestures and the feminine-looking amber-eyed boy walks in, looking so scared you might have thought we were going to eat him or something. Well, I wasn’t planning on, not sure about the others.

Pete might… or Davey… or Gabe… now I come to think about it, he has every right to be scared. He’s a skinny little wisp of a thing; he wouldn’t stand a chance if Shannon or Gerard decided to lay into him.

“George Ross, is that correct?” Ms. Smith licked her lips as the skinny little amber-eyed boy nodded nervously. “Well, George, there’s a seat for you over there, next to Davey-”

“No there isn’t.” Davey frowned, glaring at little George who looked about ready to shit himself with fright. “Jade sits there.”

“Jade’s not here right now, Davey…” Ms. Smith attempted to cajole the stubborn boy into giving up his boyfriends seat for the newbie.

Un-fucking-likely, if you ask me.

“He’ll be here tomorrow! Make him sit next to Ky!”

Ms. Smith bites her lip. Usually boys and girls are taught separately, but the girls class was full, the boys class still had spaces and Kyla’s got a reputation for being that little bit tougher than most girls.

Kyla’s had her own desk ever since she arrived and its obvious Ms. Smith would rather keep it that way.

By this point, everyone in the class was craning their neck to see what she would do.

Eventually she caved.

“Fine, George, you’ll be sat with Kyla, if you’ve got any questions…”

Kyla was glaring openly at the newbie, her green eyes narrowed in open dislike as little George slid into the seat as cautiously as if he was entering the lions den.

“Now, as I was saying before Mr. Ross showed up…”

I yawn and grin at Brendon who’s staring at George like he was sent by god.

Sent by god, my ass. We’re Satan’s children… all of us, no kidding; seriously, we’re the kids in MerryWeather. Apparently we’re all fucked up in the head and we’re in here until they can ‘cure’ us.

Ha, there are fucking three year olds in here, are they fucked up in the mind too?

So he’s another MerryWeather kid, luck to him, he’ll fucking need it.