This is the Season Where We Do Things- Short stories and One Shots

8 Minutes (Chapter 1/Episode 1)

I peer into the front seat of the SUV. My hands and feet are bound with an itchy twine, so it is a bit difficult. The two individuals are rushing, scrambling about as if they are late for a certain appointment or really have to relieve themselves.

"Are you two alright?" I ask, cocking my head to the right. Dr. Emerson says when people tilt their heads, it means they are confused. The man and the woman in the front of the black vehicle stop what they are doing and simultaneously turn around to look at me. I look at me too. They do not answer my question. They do not tilt their heads, so I don't know what they are feeling. Maybe confused was the wrong emotion for me to use. I'm not good at that sort of thing yet, but they added to my contract that I should be better with emotion.

They face front in their seats, before speeding away from the facility. "Where are we going?" I ask, "Do I have an appointment of some sort? Am I meeting someone new?" The last time I left the facility I had to do a check up. Doctors and scientists did a whole lot of scans and did something that made my stomach hurt a lot, but they said I did a good job and I got to go back to the facility with Dr. Wade, my primary caretaker. She's raised me since I was very little and now that I am turning sixteen she told me that the facility is allowing me to leave and attend high school. Although I think she's supposed to seem like a mother, she told me to never regard her as such. I am starting to take that into consideration, but a long time ago, I read a book about mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers and aunts and uncles and cousins and all of that stuff, and she seems like she could be a mother. The book also mentioned this thing called love, but I do not know what that is. Dr. Wade told me the book was bad and had it incinerated. 

The two do not answer. The man keeps his eyes on the road and the woman stares down at her lap. "Is it that you cannot hear me? Shall I speak louder?" I ask. I suppose I should not be asking this myriad of questions; Dr. Wade told me that it is considered annoying. I do not know what annoyance feels like, but I suppose it is a bad thing, so I try not to ask so many questions. I go to lick my lips--I do this when I am nervous although Dr. Emerson told me not to because I appear suspicious or may come off as creepy slash perverted-- but I realize there is a cloth wrapped around my head, right over my mouth. "Why is this over my mouth?" I ask. "I have not bitten anything for three years, I am okay now. You needn't worry." 

"Can you get 'er to shut the hell up?" The man says loudly. 

"I believe your friend has not said a word, sir." I inform him. He must be hard of hearing. I tap my bare feet on the floorboard of the backseat. The carpet is spiky, so I stop. The woman turns around,   with her lips turned down and rips the fabric away from my face. She jerks my head, so I get a little dizzy. 

"How are you holding up, sweet tea?" The woman brings the corners of her lips up. I wonder if she is angry, but her voice sounds like she is happy.

"I have never tasted such a beverage. Dr. Wade drinks it all the time though. She has never allowed me to try it." The woman's mouth twitches.

"I didn't call you sweet tea, I called you sweetie."

"Okay," I say, tilting my head again. I try to make the face Dr. Emerson calls smiling. It means happy. 

"She's lucky she's cute," the woman says to the man quietly. I have to strain to hear it. 

I am starting to get uncomfortable. Why have they restrained me so?

"Why am I bound in such a fashion?" I ask.

"We're taking you away, sweet heart." The woman says. I don't know what a sweet heart is, but I have to stop asking questions.

"When can I go back to the facility? I get to see Dr. Emerson. I have been practicing my emotions. See?" I make a sad face, a happy face and an angry face. 

"You aren't going back, sweetie."