Burn It Down

The next day, I walked into our group session happily, excited to see Zack. I looked for him while everyone else filed in and didn't see him. The session started and he still didn't come. When the session was finally over an hour later, I did my best to sneak into the guys' wing. I got caught a couple of times and told to go back to my room, but finally I made my way to his room.

Looking through the window in the door, I could see at once that the room was empty. It looked lived in; his things were clearly in there, but he wasn't. Figuring maybe he was just having an appointment with his doctor or something, I made my way back to my room. The plan was to try again after lights out, so I waited.

I felt like I'd been waiting forever when the ward finally fell silent and it was safe for me to go. I sneaked past Stella quietly. She glanced up at me and shook her head slightly before returning her attention to her book.

I approached his door quietly, not wanting to wake him if he was already sleeping. No chance of that, I realized, because the room was still empty. I cracked the door open and slipped inside. No sign of him. Like before, it was obvious the room was lived in; his clothes and other personal items were strewn about everywhere and there was even a half-full coffee on his bedside table. I checked every inch of the room, even under the bed and he was still nowhere to be found.

I made my way back to Stella, feeling extra somber. Mostly I was confused. Where the hell could he have gone?

"Doin' alright, dear?" Stella asked as I walked past her and I stopped and leaned on the counter.

"Zack is... missing?" I said, and she cocked her head to the side.

"Missin'?"

"Yeah. He hasn't been in his room all day," I told her and she automatically started typing something on her keyboard. She scrolled and read and was silent for a while.

"Now, this is completely confidential so I'm definitely not tellin' you right now, but it seems he's staged a runaway," she told me, and my eyes grew wide.

"A... runaway?" I asked, and she nodded slowly.

"Nobody's seem him since this morning when they went in to remove his restraints," she told me, looking around to check if anyone else was listening.

"What... what do they do about that?" I asked, and she shrugged slightly.

"Seeing as this is a facility in which you have to sign yourself in, they can't force you to come back. If he wanted out, he wanted out. I'm sorry, love," she told me quietly, and her eyes told me she really did feel bad for me.

I felt numb as I walked back to my room. I couldn't believe what I'd just found out. I'd thought we'd had such a good thing. I couldn't believe he was gone. I was sure I'd never see him again; how would I? My heart ached as I threw myself down in my bed. We'd seemed to be so good for each other. He'd made me feel okay for the first time I could remember. I knew I was being stupid; I'd only known him for a little over a month, after all. But I'd gotten so attached to him in that time. I didn't know what I was going to do without him.



The next morning, my name was called over the intercom, telling me I had a phone call. I made my way down the hall and to the six phone booths that were attached to the wall. I picked up the one that they'd transferred my call to.

"Hello?" I asked into the receiver hesitantly. I hadn't gotten a single phone call since I'd been there; I had no idea who would be calling now.

"Emma," a quiet masculine voice came through and I recognized it at once. Zack. "I'm sorry," he said, and his voice was sad.

"Where did you go?" I asked, and for a minute I thought maybe he'd hung up.

"I had to get out of there," he said in a voice barely above a whisper.

"Are you okay?"

"I don't know. I'm sorry," he said again, his voice sounding ragged.

"Z, where are you?" I asked, and he paused for a long time again before answering.

"I have to go, Emma. I'm sorry," he said, and then a second later the line went dead.

"Zack? Zack?!" I yelled his name into the phone even though I knew he wasn't listening. Slamming the receiver down into its cradle, I took off down the hall back to my room, trying my best to come up with a plan.