A Place in This World - Taylor Swift x Fem OC

Chapter 13

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The day that Arina goes home is a weird day.

Not like weird stuff happened, because Doctor Know It All has been telling her what the day she goes home will look like for weeks, but just weird in....atmosphere. She wakes up earlier than normal, when it's still dark out and the lights are not on except for the few in the hallway. Henry is asleep at her side, so she decides maybe laying there with him in silence won't exactly be a bad thing. She doesn't know when Henry is leaving, but she knows that he got here way before her and is staying here longer than she is.

Breakfast is the usual lifeless chatter, her sitting at a table with Kaylee and Henry playing with the grits in her bowl until it's time for therapy. Doctor Johnson only asks how she's feeling once today, putting it in the form of, "how are you feeling about going home, Miss Patel?". She doesn't exactly know how to answer that. She's not excited, and if you had told her that the first day she got here, she'd probably laugh in your face. She's just not excited, for some reason. But going home is better than staying in this place for one more second, and when she explains this to her therapist, he simply nods and tells her that's normal. Sometimes people are both ready to go and not ready to go, and she won't tell him if she had to choose between the two, she'd probably chose six feet under.

Nobody comes to visit her that day. Not Tim- though he fought his coach on that one for a whole 10 minutes-, not Miss Swift, not Taylor, not her mom's. It's fine, because she'll see most of them soon, but it's a bit odd sitting with Henry in the entertainment room, knowing she'll probably never see him again. He's quieter than normal, not wanting to do his homework with her or play blocks. She finds it odd but chalks it up to him having a bad day.

"'rina..." He whispers at one point, tugging on the bottom of her cardigan. She looks away from Wuthering Heights, sitting up on the couch that 100% has bugs to look at him kneeling on the floor with a coloring book.

"Will you come back for me when it's time for me to go home?"

The question is spoken with a tone of innocence no one else would expect from a kid in a mental hospital, but it's one Arina now looks forward to hearing. If it was anyone else, she would laugh and say it's a stupid request because why would she ever want to step foot in this place again let alone interact with someone who saw her being held down as she got a feeding tube shoved up her nose. but this isn't anyone else. It's Henry, the little boy that after watching her be tortured like that, held her hand and told her he was once forced to do it too and he was sorry and told her it was all going to be okay.

She doesn't know if she'll ever see him again. This place is a place that sometimes people step in and never step out, and as sad as it is, one day Henry could become one of the ones that never steps out. Though, if that is his fate, she wants him to go with at least the thought that she loves him enough to want to save him, even if she can't.

"Yeah. Maybe I will." She mumbles. It's not exactly a promise, but not exactly a deny. Somewhere in between to the point she'll still feel guilty when she doesn't complete the task, but it also won't weigh her down forever. He seems to understand, because he doesn't smile or hug her. He just nods, hesitating a moment before he hands her a messily scribbled drawing of Saturn and then goes back to his coloring book.

When it's time for her to go, she doesn't truly know if she wants to.

This place sucks, and she just wants to go home, but standing in the big exit doors, one foot outside of it onto the concrete but one still in the same spot she was just hugging Kaylee and Henry in, the comforting feeling of people finally understanding how she feels like it's slowly being un-sewing from her body. Her moms are halfway to the car with her backpack of clothes, but Diana turns around to stop and look at her while tears fill her eyes. The woman just gives a comforting nod, smiling at Arina in a way she never has. The way a mother should.