What Lies Beneath

Within the Depths

I look up to the clock in the far left corner of the room. 9:30. My scheduled morning shower. I walk towards the station and am interrupted by a familiar face.

"Well hello Ms. Reighlyn. You're looking rather, crazy, today." The boy smirks and grabs a short strand of brown hair from out of my face and twirls it between his fingers.

I scoff and move my head away from his hand.

"You're looking rather dickish today, Aeryn." I respond holding my head up to let him know he has nothing over me.

He laughs. I can't help but remember the last time I heard a laugh. I shake my head in hopes of getting the thought out of my head.

I look at Aeryn. He's been here as long as I have. I must admit though, his two years in this hell hole have done nothing to him. He is still built like he used to be the captain of the football team. He has a rare appearance, his light tan skin shines in the fluorescent lighting of the room. He's about six or seven inches taller than me, making him a little under six feet tall. He has light brown hair that reminds me of the soft sand on the beach. And looking at him now, smiling at me like he is triumphant to whatever it is he continuously tries to win, I realize he has light brown eyes with a lovely tint of an emerald color surrounding his irises.

"Maybe you should loosen up a bit, you won't make it here much longer if you keep acting like you have a stick up your ass." He claims as I push my way past him.

I make my way to the nurses station.

"You're late." Betty, the assistant nurse points out as if I hadn't noticed.

"I realized this Betty, but Aeryn keeps trying to make his way under my skin like a bloodsucking bug." I explain as I reach out for the cup with my medication in it.

"I'll let it pass, only because I hear you have been having that dream again." She implies, hoping she'll actually get information out of me to report to the doctor.

I ignore her and look in the small cup, "Valium, Paroxetine, Clorazepam, and Lorazepam. Where is the Risperidone?" I ask, swallowing the four pills.

"We took you off because we believe that you weren't in need of it anymore. Now, how about we go off to the showers before the head nurse gets upset?" She motions for me to follow her petit frame into the showers.

***********************

Once I get situated in the showers, I begin to undress myself. I make the mistake of looking in the mirror because all I see staring back at me is empty blue eyes. I look over my body, my short brown hair is the result of my kidnapper disliking the length and thickness. My pale skin glistens under the cold water of the shower. Covering my body are pink scars, some from burns, some from ropes, and some from bare hands. I flinch at this image and finish my shower. I dress myself into clean clothes that Betty has supplied to me and walk back towards my room.

On my path back to the nurses station, Betty catches my attention and waves me over to her.

I walk in her direction only to get interrupted by one of the more unstable patients. Mumbling some sort of gibberish, he grabs me and starts to shake. This causes me to bite my lip hard enough to the point where blood has been drawn.

Two of the nurses, they're new I suppose, because I do not recognize them, get him off of me and escorts him away.

Betty walks over to me with her brown eyes widened.

"Are you okay, Reighlyn?"

"Yeah, I'm fine, I think I need to go into my room to relax for a little while." I nod.

"Okay well before you do that, I got a small package from your parents that I thought you should see." She hands me a small parcel tied closed with a dark string.

I sigh. My parents, the people who stopped trying to find me three months after I was taken.

I open the package to find a small duck stuffed animal. I let out a small smile. I got this from my uncle Tomas before he was murdered by the local gang. I pull the duck close to me and close my eyes, remembering his smiling face. He was always my favorite out of the family. He told the funniest jokes and never had a problem with making me feel better.

A small tear falls from the corner of my eye causing Betty to speak up from her prolonged silence, "are you okay?"

I nod, opening my eyes. I look to see there was also a small letter from my parents in the contents of the package. I pick it up with my free hand and open it with my slim fingers.

"Reighlyn, we are so sorry we couldn't deliver this to you ourselves, but your father has just been diagnosed with stage four Lymphoma. We hope you are doing all right and will try to visit as soon as we can.
Lots of love,
Mom and Dad"

I crumple the paper in my hands and throw it away, storming off into my room.

****************************

"So they didn't even come down to see how you were doing? Even after two years they haven't come to see you once!?" Alyx yells with a caged fire.

"My dad has stage four Lymphoma, of course they can't see me. He's dying." I choke out barely able to hold my grasp on what was happening.

"Still, Reigh, couldn't they have come to see you once, within the last two years?" She says less angrily.

"Well yes, but they are also out of the country, they moved to San Diego after what happened, remember?" I explained.

"Very true," she sighs "I'm sorry for your dad."

"Yeah," I say clutching my duck in my arms, "so am I."

***********************

It's the middle of the night and I can't sleep. I don't know if it is because I am scared of having the dream again, or if it is because of Alyx's endless humming in her sleep. But all I know, is that if I don't go to sleep now, I won't be ready for my first psychologist visit tomorrow morning.

I turn over and close my eyes to try to fall asleep for the hundredth time tonight. Slowly exhaustion creeps up on me and I fall into a deep state of sleep.

************************

I wake up to find three nurses staring at me.

"Reighlyn, you're okay, you wouldn't wake up after we tried a countless amount of times. Even Alyx couldn't wake you up. You almost missed your morning shower." One of the nurses tells me.

I get up and follow them into the shower after I take my medication.

***********************

After I finish nurse Tony takes me into a room and tells me to sit and wait until he arrives.

I'm sitting for about twenty minutes when a short dark man walks into the room.

"Hello Reighlyn Michaels, I am Dr. Blackthorne."