MADNESS

7. Sleeping Could Help

NOAH PIERCE

She's not here today either. It's been 4 days since Tyler hit her and she's still not here. We do have a new assistant that's replacing her though, but she's bitter, and if I'm not wrong, she even looks grossed out when talking to some of the people in here. Including me. And seeing her scrunching up her nose at me just saying "hello" pisses me big time. She's not even trying.

"How long do you plan on staying here?" I ask bitterly, just like her.

"For as long as I am needed here, smart guy. Do you think I enjoy being here so much that I'd want to stay forever?" She gets visibly upset.

Good.

"If you hate it so much, why did you even accept the job to replace Sydney?" I tilt my head.

"Why is everyone so pressed about that girl Sydney not being here, what's so special about her?" She crosses her arms to her chest in a defensive manner.

"Have you ever thought it's not even about her, but about you being the problem?" I say.

She's not going to like that I said that, I'm sure.

But I don't want her to like me so.

"How could you say that? I'm trying my best to do this job." She looks offended now.

Good.

"And yet she does it without effort." I shake my head. "You do realize your job is just talking to the patients, right?" I raise a brow in annoyance of her thinking she has to move huge weights around here.

"Yes and that's hard considering all of you being-"

She was going to say something inappropriate, I know it just by the look in her eyes.

"Being what?" I cut her off. "Come on, spit it out. Being weirdos, freaks, maniacs- just go on and insult this whole room, it would surely help you do your job better." I mock her ignorance.

"It's you that makes my job harder. You're almost the only one who can hold actual conversations, but all you have to say is mean shit that I don't want to hear. Why are you even here if you seem so... okay?"

"I'm just special I guess."

She doesn't have to know.

"And I'm not mean, I'm straightforward." I add.

"Oh, thank you so much for clarifying that." She rolls her eyes.

I may not be an expert in whatever qualities people need to have in order to do this this job properly, but I can understand interest and she's lacking of it. She's here for the money. It's clear as day that she doesn't want to be here for the job itself. Which for some reason just bothers me extremely much.

"Pierce!" I hear a guard shout my name so I snap my head in his direction.

Not again.

"Cell time."

The guard, whose name I think is Caleb, grabs me by the arm roughly. At least this time it's not two of them on each side as if I am an animal with rabies.

"Easy tiger." I gesture him to calm down with my other arm. "I can walk myself."

"It's the procedure." He says, without looking at me.

"Whatever makes you sleep at night." I stop fighting his grip.

I look back at the nameless assistant that doesn't have a name badge and wasn't kind enough to share her name with us. She looks annoyingly pleased that I have extra cell time. I wish I could wipe that smile off her face, but it's a shame I'm to far from her to use that mean mouth of mine. It could've done the trick. I had some more words to say.

"Do you, uh, have a pack of cigarettes that I could borrow?" I ask the guard. I'm not serious about it, I want to frustrate him more than he already is.

"Shut it, Pierce."

"Make me." I mockingly answer, making him throw me harsher in the cell, closing the door with an obnoxious noise right after.

Does nobody here have the littlest bit of a sense of humor?

This cell is so depressing too. Only one bed on the side that unfortunately I'm too tall for, my legs get the cold treatment at night. A dirty sink in the corner with no warm water, just freezing cold, could easily make me fucking hypothermic. A toilet next to it that's also filthy, but still pretty decent for a place with such low maintenance of the cells. Then, as a bonus, a minuscule window with bars that I assume is there for oxygen, because it isn't too welcoming-looking, it isn't big enough to escape through it and it's too close to the ceiling. The walls of this asylum are immense.

"You think you're so funny, don't you?" I hear a chuckle so I turn around.

"Humor is all about taste." I start. "You just don't have any." I form a line with my lips in teasing disappointment. He gives me a look.

"That mouth of yours is not going to help you in this place, trust me." He locks the the cell aggressively. I managed to irritate him, exactly what I wanted.

"Oh, that's too bad then. Because I actually love seeing how angry it makes you." I smirk on purpose.

I've noticed smirking has two different effects on people. It either annoys them, as in genuinely makes them want to climb walls, or it's perceived hot- a personal favorite. I enjoy seeing people's different reactions to it and I don't know how many of them are aware that I can sense their feelings towards me in body language, movement of the facial muscles or the rhythmical changes of their breathing. My mom, back in the day, was a body language analyst and not just a simple one, a body language analyst in law enforcement, which interprets non-verbal cues and gestures to understand a person's thoughts, feelings, or intentions. She thought it was helpful to teach me some of what she knows, before she fell ill. I'm really grateful for that.

"I'll make sure you get no food tonight because of this." He shakes his head in anger.

"Go ahead, it would only make me want to chat lovingly like this with you again, you know that." I smile.

He sighs in defeat and leaves me here.

As much as I hate to say it, I wish he would've fired back, because now I have no one to talk to. Life in this place was already boring as it was, but having extra time in the cell is definitely not the highlight of my days.

I throw myself dramatically on the bed and start looking at the stains of ceiling. You can see the humidity coloring the line of the corners of the room. Why would people use a white caustic alkaline substance that's consisting of calcium oxide to paint these ceilings in the first place? It's obviously not long-lasting giving the conditions in which this fucked up building is maintained.

I guess it must've been cheaper.

I can't stop thinking about what happened to Sydney. How bad is she actually injured? I knew she would get to stay home a day or two, but 4 days is making me think she's not doing so great. And that sucks. For her, for me, for Emma, and for all of the patients stuck with that new assistant with a shitty attitude.

Maybe Emma knows about her.

But how do I talk to Emma? She's never in the main salon or in the hallways near the cells, and I'm never near the infirmary. That's 2 floors up from this one.

So I give up thinking about it.

Sleeping could help. If I sleep I would just get quicker through the day, wouldn't I?