I'm Not Crazy (American Horror Story)

Eyes Between the Bars

(a/n: new POV woohoo!)

k a t i

The floor was impossibly damp. The only thing she had heard for days was the steady drip, drip, drip of a leaky pipe somewhere in the room, the same pipe that had created all the dampness. She hated it. The straight jacket that bound her arms to her sides - keeping all aids safe from her hands that itched to scratch their eyeballs out - made her warm. She was either stifling hot or hypothermically cold in this damn solitary cell. She had forgotten what it was like to have sight, to not have this dark blindness all around her. She wondered how many days had gone by.

Her story was just like anyone else's. Ever since she walked in on her mother and the paper boy, nothing had been the same. And, well, it was unfair to say he was a boy, really. Kati had seen him around school before - she was sure he was older than her - but seeing him around school and seeing him banging your mom were two totally different things. Her mother begged her not to tell. If Kati's father ever found out, he would beat them both. You wouldn't do that to your mommy, would you, Kathleen?, her mother had said, falling onto her knees (which Kati had already seen enough of her mom doing). In the end, she decided it wasn't worth squealing to her father. In a couple of months, it would all be forgotten.

That was, until, when a different person was in her parents' bedroom when she came home from school for lunch. This time, it was a grown man, who happened to look just like Mr. Fratelli the milkman. And it was. Kati always thought he brought them very good quality milk, and she always made sure to leave him a nice tip, but even she thought this was a little too much. She didn't really do much thinking in the next few minutes, though. She finally came to her senses when she looked down and saw she was sitting on her mother's chest, blood and gunk under her fingernails. She finally came to her senses when she noticed the lack of eyes in her mother's head. It wasn't hard to fool the police, once she cleaned herself up. She hunted down Mr. Fratelli quick enough. He was her only witness. The fuzz didn't catch her until four years later, when they ambushed her graduation day and dragged her away to the asylum. She never did get that diploma.

Ever since then, and ever since she had been put in the looney bin, ripping out eyes was kind of her thing. She didn't like to brag, but she could do it with great finesse. Oh, screw being humble. She was damn incredible. Some might even call her an artist.

"Alright, this way, Bloody Face," she heard a guard speak, the familiar name causing her to listen in. She remembered when it was released in all the papers, and she was angry at her mother for giving her a curfew because of it. She remembered her daddy sitting beside the radio at night, a glass of whiskey in his hand and a cigarette between his fingers, listening closely to men with crackly voices talk about the serial killer named Bloody Face. She would creep out of bed to listen in. She admired his work. He was a, dare she say, role model?

Kati mustered all her strength to pick herself up from the floor, a task made difficult when restrained in a straight jacket, and walked as close to the door as the chains on her ankles would allow her. Something scurried over her bare feet. Dim light, so dim it was nearly still dark, flickered through the bars in the door of her cell. She saw the guards leading a man with messy hair and a tight jaw to the cell across from hers. This whole hall had been empty ever since she got in here. Would she have company?

Just before the guards threw the man into his new home, she locked eyes with him. Somehow he had seen her. His eyes were cold and dark, almost empty, but she didn't see the malice of a killer. This wasn't Bloody Face. It couldn't be. The stupid guards had gotten her hopes up. She couldn't wait to get her hands on them.

She listened closely for their footsteps to fade away before she spoke. Her tongue felt like sandpaper, and her lips were deeply cracked and caked in dead skin flakes. Her throat felt as if she had swallowed glass. Her voice croaked beyond belief when she finally found the right words.

"Hello." Okay, not the right words, but they were still words nonetheless. There was no reply from the stranger. She tried again. "I'm Kati." Still no answer. "You can only ignore me for so long."

Silence followed. Kati shrugged, and feeling her legs become weak after not standing for weeks, she collapsed on the floor, right in front of the door. She knew she would be woken up the following day from a guard throwing her breakfast on her face, but she didn't care. She felt closer to the new guy this way.

"I'm Kit." His voice startled her. "And I can ignore you as long as I want. After all, we are here for... forever."

"And ever."

"Yes. And ever."