Monster.
Three.
Belleview Psychiatric Facility was a big, old, ugly, red-bricked building. Honestly, there are not enough negative adjectives in the English language to describe it. My escort must have noticed my reaction as we pulled up the driveway because he leaned in close to me and whispered in my ear.
‘Don’t worry, it’s not that bad on the inside’, he said and then gave a small chuckle.
His warm breath on my ear made me shudder. He’d been staring at me the whole way here and he gave me the creeps. He was lying, it was worse on the inside. My first impression as I was shuffled through the reception area was one of loneliness. The walls were uniform hospital white but everything looked old and outdated. We were standing in a long corridor with at least seven metal doors on each side with a nurse’s station at the top. There was no one around except me and my escort and a receptionist who glared at me as if it was my fault she was made to do some work. She’d been talking on the phone and smoking as we walked in. I was pretty sure you weren’t allowed smoke in hospitals these days, any sort of hospital. What sort of place was this? The whole place smelled musty and damp as if no one had been in here in years. Where were the patients and the nurses? I couldn’t see anyone at the nurse’s station or even hear anything coming from any of the rooms. I watched the receptionist typing away on the old Dell computer in front of her searching for my name. I was mesmerised by her nails; they were at least 2 inches long and painted a deep blood coloured red. I drew my gaze away and glanced over the rest of her. She was slim with badly dyed peroxide blonde hair, deep red lips and a white shirt with a nametag stating her name was Jessa. She was wearing a lot of lime green eye shadow and was plastered in foundation that wasn’t really covering her bad acne. As my eyes fell on her large, red lips I was seized by a sudden urge to bite. I wanted to latch on to her bottom lip and pull it away with my teeth. This abrupt reappearance of these thoughts terrified me and I couldn’t help it. I vomited all over her desk and her long talon like nails and then fainted right on the dirty hospital floor.
I woke up in a ward with six beds. Typically, it was painted white but not so typical was the fact that there were bars on the two big windows at the far end of the room. I hadn’t noticed any bars from the outside of the building. The light outside the window showed that it was getting dark; I’d been out for a while then. It was morning when I’d gotten here and had my little ‘incident’ as it would be called. Two of the six beds were empty. My bed was at the top of the ward near the giant, imposing metal door. Sitting next to the door on a hard backed wooden chair was an overweight, brunette nurse who appeared to be asleep. Finally my ears made sense of a sound that I’d been ignoring since I’d woken up. It was a low pitched humming that I realised was coming from the woman sitting in the bed across from mine. She was sitting straight up in her bed humming whilst rocking her arms back and forth as if lulling an imaginary baby to sleep. The woman’s eyes locked with mine and with amazing speed she lunged off her bed at me, her long black hair flying behind her. Her humming had been replaced by a growling noise and there was an evil, crazed look in her eye.
‘You took my baby!’ she screamed at me, ‘You killed her!’
She was on top of me now, trying to claw at my face. I pulled the blankets up around my head praying for help or for this maniac to go away. She was still screaming that I’d killed her baby, desperately trying to hook her nails into the flesh of my arm left exposed. Her nails were long and sharp and I felt blood trickle down my arm as she finally managed to break the skin. All the other patients in the ward were hooting and laughing at this display of madness as if they found it hilarious. I heard loud, thumping footsteps over the woman’s guttural screaming and she was pulled off me. The ward nurse had woken up and gone to get two orderlies to help before she even considered getting the woman off me herself.
‘Now, now, Maggie, it’s okay’ she said soothingly ‘this poor girl didn’t take your baby, she only got here this morning’.
I couldn’t believe it; the nurse was trying to comfort this mad woman! Surely I was the one who needed comforting; I’d just woken up and been attacked. The two male orderlies seemed to have restrained her. They were large men with arms the size of tree trunks and they had no problem keeping her off me. The nurse produced a syringe from her overall pocket and jabbed it into the woman’s arm. Almost instantly all of the fight was gone from the woman. Her body went limp and her eyes glazed over, all look of madness in them gone. The two orderlies carried the woman to her bed, making sure to tie her arms and legs in restraints. The nurse gave them a brief nod of thanks and they left through the metal door. She turned her attention to me and the look on her face told me that I wasn’t going to get any sympathy from this woman. She took some bandages from a first aid box on the wall then came and bandaged up my arm where Maggie had ripped the flesh off with her nails. There was no gentleness to this nurse as the worked and when she was finished my arm throbbed worse than before. She straightened up and looked me in coldly in the eye.
‘My name is Nurse Jackson and you will take care not to provoke the other patients and cause such problems in my ward again’.
I couldn’t believe it. I had done nothing to provoke that crazy woman! She had attacked me, how on earth was it my fault? But the look in Nurse Jackson’s eyes told me that I would get nowhere by voicing my opinion on what had happened.
‘Y-yes, Nurse Jackson’ I stuttered, my eyes dropping to my hands in my lap.
She said nothing in reply, just turned on her heel and left the room, probably to tell a superior what had happened and what ‘problems’ I had caused. With a bit of luck whatever she’d say would warrant me being moved to a different ward. A quiet giggling came from the bed next to mine. A girl was lying with the blankets pulled around her head, only a lock of blood red hair and her vivid emerald green eyes visible as she stared at me.
‘Welcome to Belleview -where the crazy go crazier’, she whispered.
She turned around in her bed, lay with her back to me and said nothing again for the rest of the night.
‘Don’t worry, it’s not that bad on the inside’, he said and then gave a small chuckle.
His warm breath on my ear made me shudder. He’d been staring at me the whole way here and he gave me the creeps. He was lying, it was worse on the inside. My first impression as I was shuffled through the reception area was one of loneliness. The walls were uniform hospital white but everything looked old and outdated. We were standing in a long corridor with at least seven metal doors on each side with a nurse’s station at the top. There was no one around except me and my escort and a receptionist who glared at me as if it was my fault she was made to do some work. She’d been talking on the phone and smoking as we walked in. I was pretty sure you weren’t allowed smoke in hospitals these days, any sort of hospital. What sort of place was this? The whole place smelled musty and damp as if no one had been in here in years. Where were the patients and the nurses? I couldn’t see anyone at the nurse’s station or even hear anything coming from any of the rooms. I watched the receptionist typing away on the old Dell computer in front of her searching for my name. I was mesmerised by her nails; they were at least 2 inches long and painted a deep blood coloured red. I drew my gaze away and glanced over the rest of her. She was slim with badly dyed peroxide blonde hair, deep red lips and a white shirt with a nametag stating her name was Jessa. She was wearing a lot of lime green eye shadow and was plastered in foundation that wasn’t really covering her bad acne. As my eyes fell on her large, red lips I was seized by a sudden urge to bite. I wanted to latch on to her bottom lip and pull it away with my teeth. This abrupt reappearance of these thoughts terrified me and I couldn’t help it. I vomited all over her desk and her long talon like nails and then fainted right on the dirty hospital floor.
I woke up in a ward with six beds. Typically, it was painted white but not so typical was the fact that there were bars on the two big windows at the far end of the room. I hadn’t noticed any bars from the outside of the building. The light outside the window showed that it was getting dark; I’d been out for a while then. It was morning when I’d gotten here and had my little ‘incident’ as it would be called. Two of the six beds were empty. My bed was at the top of the ward near the giant, imposing metal door. Sitting next to the door on a hard backed wooden chair was an overweight, brunette nurse who appeared to be asleep. Finally my ears made sense of a sound that I’d been ignoring since I’d woken up. It was a low pitched humming that I realised was coming from the woman sitting in the bed across from mine. She was sitting straight up in her bed humming whilst rocking her arms back and forth as if lulling an imaginary baby to sleep. The woman’s eyes locked with mine and with amazing speed she lunged off her bed at me, her long black hair flying behind her. Her humming had been replaced by a growling noise and there was an evil, crazed look in her eye.
‘You took my baby!’ she screamed at me, ‘You killed her!’
She was on top of me now, trying to claw at my face. I pulled the blankets up around my head praying for help or for this maniac to go away. She was still screaming that I’d killed her baby, desperately trying to hook her nails into the flesh of my arm left exposed. Her nails were long and sharp and I felt blood trickle down my arm as she finally managed to break the skin. All the other patients in the ward were hooting and laughing at this display of madness as if they found it hilarious. I heard loud, thumping footsteps over the woman’s guttural screaming and she was pulled off me. The ward nurse had woken up and gone to get two orderlies to help before she even considered getting the woman off me herself.
‘Now, now, Maggie, it’s okay’ she said soothingly ‘this poor girl didn’t take your baby, she only got here this morning’.
I couldn’t believe it; the nurse was trying to comfort this mad woman! Surely I was the one who needed comforting; I’d just woken up and been attacked. The two male orderlies seemed to have restrained her. They were large men with arms the size of tree trunks and they had no problem keeping her off me. The nurse produced a syringe from her overall pocket and jabbed it into the woman’s arm. Almost instantly all of the fight was gone from the woman. Her body went limp and her eyes glazed over, all look of madness in them gone. The two orderlies carried the woman to her bed, making sure to tie her arms and legs in restraints. The nurse gave them a brief nod of thanks and they left through the metal door. She turned her attention to me and the look on her face told me that I wasn’t going to get any sympathy from this woman. She took some bandages from a first aid box on the wall then came and bandaged up my arm where Maggie had ripped the flesh off with her nails. There was no gentleness to this nurse as the worked and when she was finished my arm throbbed worse than before. She straightened up and looked me in coldly in the eye.
‘My name is Nurse Jackson and you will take care not to provoke the other patients and cause such problems in my ward again’.
I couldn’t believe it. I had done nothing to provoke that crazy woman! She had attacked me, how on earth was it my fault? But the look in Nurse Jackson’s eyes told me that I would get nowhere by voicing my opinion on what had happened.
‘Y-yes, Nurse Jackson’ I stuttered, my eyes dropping to my hands in my lap.
She said nothing in reply, just turned on her heel and left the room, probably to tell a superior what had happened and what ‘problems’ I had caused. With a bit of luck whatever she’d say would warrant me being moved to a different ward. A quiet giggling came from the bed next to mine. A girl was lying with the blankets pulled around her head, only a lock of blood red hair and her vivid emerald green eyes visible as she stared at me.
‘Welcome to Belleview -where the crazy go crazier’, she whispered.
She turned around in her bed, lay with her back to me and said nothing again for the rest of the night.