Black Ink

First and last part

“What have you done?”
the headmaster bellowed, all eyes now turned to me as he stood over the lifeless body on the playground.
“I-it wasn’t me! I swear!” I said shakily, holding the blood dripping knife in my hand. Everyone’s eyes shifted to the knife, back to my blood stained shirt. I grabbed my backpack, dropped the knife on the ground, and jumped the poorly built fence that was supposed to keep anyone dangerous away. Running to the nearest bus stop, I tripped over non-existing pebbles, almost falling. I was lucky to have reached a bus, and threw my things before I stepped inside. I sat down on the nearest seat, and hid my face. I could feel hundreds of eyes on me, staring at the blood dripping from my hands. Trying to wipe off any blood I had on me, I reached for my backpack and carefully opened it. My heart was beating faster as I wrapped my fingers around the book, sending a cold feeling through my body. I opened it, scared of reading what was on the pages. Quickly, I decided to glance to glance at them.
“Well done.”
it had read. It sent a blood curdling shriek through my mouth, and passed out.
                                                              ◇◇◇
            “The heart monitor is on” said a woman, looking at a monitor. I couldn’t see anything around me. It was all so blurry.
                        “Excellent.” replied a much older man. I couldn’t tell if they were just talking relatively fast, or I was just being slow.
The woman glanced at me, and her eyes widened. “Sir, he’s awake.” she said, backing away slowly. I tried getting up, but soon learned that I had been chained down.
“Ah, but of course. He seems healthy… At least, body wise.” He mumbled. I tried laying back down, but the man that was speaking had the bed slowly stand up, leaving me in a sat-up position. “Mr. Stone, can I ask how you’re feeling? Do you know where you are?”
I stared at him for what seemed to have been the longest minute, “No.” I bluntly answered. Another long minute passed. “Who am I?”
He looked at me and hesitated, “Your name is Stone.” he said, looking at me for a reaction. I could see him messing with a paper. I started to skim the paper for anything important.
“Stone . . . 16 year old male in. . .” the school name was blurry. “Stabbed 17 year old female, Allison, killing her instantly . . . not mentally stable . . . found on bus . . . will be sent to. . .” The hospital name was blurry too. Whatever seemed important to me never showed up.
“Stone?” the man asked, looking at me.
“Can you untie me, please?” I asked, trying to look as innocent as possible.
“Of course. I’m going to walk out of this door,” he said as he indicated the door, “and press a button to untie you.” I watched him step out of the door and close it.
As promised, he had untied me. From far away, yes, but at least I was untied. Even though the walls were all closed, and there was no chance of someone looking at me, except the tiny bars on the door window, I could still sense eyes staring. I slowly got up, and noticed a notebook and a dull pencil next to my hospital bed. Forgetting what had happened to me, I picked it up and began to draw. First, a tree. The tree was supposed to be in a fall or winter kind of state. So it was leafless and dead. I smiled at the tree and began to draw a bird perched on it. While humming “The Twelve Days of Christmas”, I added more to the drawing. A happy snowman, holding his twig hand up. Children playing in the snow. It was all so happy in the drawing. I didn’t notice at first, but my white bird had turned to a black raven. I looked over the drawing, and everything I had drawn turned morbid. The children were lying dead, and the snowman was now frowning. The snowman had not been frowning at the children, or the black raven on the dead tree. He was frowning at me. Thoughts came rushing back to me. Inside me. I took the piece of paper, and turned it around. “I’ll just start again then,” I sighed, putting the pencil to paper. Words appeared right under my pencil.
“I have another task.” Read the black ink. I hesitated at first, not knowing what to do. My lips started quivering as my pencil came close to touching the paper. The pencil was shaking violently now, and it had decided to respond.
“No. I’m safe here.” I replied on the same sheet.
“Is that so?” the black ink scribbled.
“Yes. And I’m happy and safe. You can’t get me.” I wrote comfortably now. I had convinced myself I was safe.
Although, it didn’t look like the black ink enjoyed my last reply. The black ink erased what they had said, and my replies too. I flipped over the page again, and saw my happy drawing. I smiled at it, and sat it down. Crawling back into bed, I closed my eyes and slept.

“I’m sorry, did I wake you up?” a lady in a white coat asked me as I opened my eyes. She had my drawing in her hand, and was seated at the foot of my bed.
“No, it’s okay.” I answered politely, sitting up. My eyes fixed on my drawing.
“Did you draw this?” She asked, indicating the piece of paper in her hand. I nodded my head in response. “It’s adorable,” she said. “You can put it up in your new room, Stone.” She smiled. I gave a confused look, and she giggled. “We think you’re ready to move into another room with a stable patient.”
“That can’t be right. I was just here for one day. Isn’t there more to observe?!” I said, taken back. She ignored what I had to say and smiled. Out of the corner of her eye, I could see black ink. It was slowly bleeding out, almost like a black tear. “W-where is it?” I asked, scared by the black ink. She gripped my wrist and dragged me through a white hall. We stopped at the 19th identical door to my old room, and everyone else’s room.
“Here we are!” She smiled with a toothy grin.          
“Thank you.” I looked down at the ground. She handed me my drawing, a piece of tape, and pushed me into the room.
“Hi,” I shyly said, staring at the person hiding in the corner. He was talking to someone, staring at the wall.
“Right. Of course. Yes.” he turned to face me now. “I’m terribly sorry. I was talking to an old friend.” he looked back at the wall. “Not now Clarence,” and turned back to me. “My name is Lance. How do you do?” he reached his hand out for ten seconds, and pulled back. His black hair swept over his eyes, a pale blue that was almost a gray. His long white shirt was too big, and made him look skinnier than he had already been. Lance didn’t wear any shoes or socks, but he did wear baggy jeans that was scraping against the floor.
“Clarence, don’t you know it’s rude to interrupt someone?” he asked the wall.
“How did you and Clarence meet?” I asked Lance.
“You see him too?!” he said happily. “They put me here because Clarence was misbehaving, but I forgive him.” he looked at the wall, smiling. “We met at a party, the last one I had gone to. Allison said she got this new thing… a junkie, that one… and then I met him.” He smiled again, and faced me. “They think I’m nuts, but it’s only because they can’t see him. I bet they’re jealous. But you can.” he hugged me while I stood awkwardly. “I bet you two will get along just fine!” he let go of me, and sat on his lumpy mattress that was on top of a metal frame. “Want to play a game?” he asked five minutes later after we had been sitting in silence.
                                                            ◇◇◇
“Cold…” Lance mumbled from his sleep. “N-no Cl-...” he said seconds later. I sat up in bed and stared at him. He twitched for a second, and rolled back over. Unable to go back to sleep, I grabbed the small yellow legal pad on the desk along with the small dull pencil they handed out to me and began to draw. I sketched the outline of Lance’s body, and his hair that stuck out of the blanket. Besides him, I drew Clarence, a tiny shadow watching over Lance. I signed my name under it, and ripped a small piece of tape from which my picture was hanging from. Putting it on his side of the wall, the picture transformed. I took the picture off the wall immediately, and turned to the back.
“It’s rude to not thank people, you know. Anyways, you’re welcome. Got you out of that horrible hospital room, and saved you from going to the idiotic mental hospital. You’re in a hospital where it’s less looney.” the black ink read.
“Listen, that was a mistake. Or you possessed me. But I didn’t do it. Now leave me alone.” I scribbled back.
            “But it was you. You did it.” and with that, hundreds of thousand memories came rushing back. My head stung. I could see myself outside of her dorm room. Staring at her window, night after night. I remembered the log I kept on her. “Day 27: stayed home all day. Wasn’t feeling well.” one read. I saw the plans of her murder in my head. Tracing with chalk where I wanted to kill her on the campus.
            “I was just your partner.” The black ink read. I could feel a presence around me, it was circling me. “You did all that planning. I just chose the person. But you did the dirty work.” the black ink said. I felt my head spinning again, and this time I couldn’t make it stop.
“I still don’t remember killing her.” I stubbornly wrote back. Frustrated by that response, the black ink left again. With no traces of the black ink, I hung it up on Lance’s wall again, and fell asleep.
◇◇◇
“Hey! I don’t even know your name! But guess what?!” Lance jumped ontop of me. Startled by this, I turned on my back and Lance fell on top of me. “Oh… wait. Your name is right here! On the bottom of the page!” He fumbled on top of me. “S-stone…” he tried out my name.  “I like it. Oh! Almost got distracted… Did you draw this?” he held up the piece of paper up to my face.
“Yes. I’m sorry.” I looked at him.
“Why are you sorry? It’s amazing!” he gleamed at the photo. “And you even got Clarence in it too!” he wrapped his arms around me, and I messed with his hair.
“Didn’t think you’d like it that much…” I mumbled as he got off of me.
“I love it! You should draw more often!” He looked up at the picture of the tree, “I like that one too!” He marveled at the piece of paper. After a minute or so, he looked back at me. “I think it’s time for breakfast…” he said as the mechanical doors clicked open, and hundreds of mental patients were dragged out of their rooms to the main cafeteria.
“Cold or hot?” a grumpy woman asked me. She was standing behind the counter, who hadn’t even bothered to put on a hair net.
“Excuse me?” I asked. She looked at me, rolled her eyes, and handed me a ladleful of Gump.
“You chose the hot one, huh? I usually go for cold…” Lance said over my shoulder. We sat down at a gray metallic table, and poked at the food.
“I thought this was supposed to be hot…” I mumbled, trying to swallow the disgusting goo that was now in my mouth. Lance laughed at this.
“You’re just like Allison.” he mentioned as he stuffed his face with what was supposed to be food. This name rang a bell, and memories came back.
“But it was you. You did it.” “Stabbed 17 year old Allison, killing her instantly” thoughts came rushing back to me. “T-tell me more about her?” I asked shakily.
“Well, she was a junkie, but a real character, that one.” He began.
“Her appearance.  What did she look like?” I asked, now remembering the crime scene. I could see her blond bloody hair across her pale face. Her mouth gaped open, like she was still in shock after being stabbed.
“She was blond actually… Pretty hair, before she got into business. You’ll see her tomorrow, she’s coming to visit!” he said happily.
I took his wrist firmly, “We have to go back now.” I said like a robot.
“Is this a part of a game?”  Lance went along happily.
                                                 ◇◇◇
“Once you shut that door, it won’t open until dinner, you know.” Lance couldn’t stop talking.  A half of me wanted him to shut up, and the other half wanted to tell him to run away. Something bad was going to happen, I sensed it… Or knew it.  I grabbed my pencil and slammed the door shut. He was now startled, and mentioned something about Clarence not being in here with us. I raised the pencil above my head, and made an attempt to stab him in his neck.
I managed to land the piece of lead in his throat, and then pencil dropped to the floor. Blood started to drip from his neck. He gasped for air, looking at me with wide eyes. He clamped his throat with one hand, and slammed at the metal door.
            “It wasn’t me.” I gasped and took the pencil and backed away to the corner where the toilet stood. I kneed over the bowl, and stared at my reflection. I started to sob, but all that came out was black tears.
My head started spinning, and wouldn’t stop. Everything, for a while, went black.
And then I woke up to a booming voice over me.  
“What have you done?”