The Psychopath Maker

Chapter Four

A loud earth-shattering burst of thunder roared striking the ground. The walls of the hospital shook quieting everyone in the playroom. The white lightning burned in the sky blinding the eyes of those that dared to look upon it. Mother Nature's forceful voice brought Miss. Simpson back to earth. She stopped flirting with the middle-aged single doctor in the hallway and returned to the job at hand. All the students loved volunteering with Miss Simpson because she wasn't a stickler like, Ms. Ross; who lived to make their lives hell. Miss Simpson trotted in the room seductively aware that her doctor was watching her.

Miss Simpson clapped loudly and all the chattering voices hushed and heads turned to her quickly. She clasped her dainty fingers together, "Due to the storm, we are ending this session early."

"We signed up for eight hours." Malachi closed the book of fairy tales as he stood. "It's only been three. Are we still going to earn all eight because we didn't make it rain?" He pointed to the massive window behind him.

"Yeah, I'll sign off on everyone's log that we clocked in the full hours." Miss Simpson proclaimed. Miss Simpson and the students had an agreement. They wouldn't tell the dean about her flirtatious nature and she would cut them some slack. Like the free hours being given out today. "For those that rode the bus, we're leaving in ten minutes." She walked off in search of her boo who hadn't gone that far.

 Isabeth picked up the puzzle pieces that hadn't been connected and tossed them into the box that rested between her arm and her hip.

"You don't have to do that." Harper insisted. "They're just going to take them back out tomorrow." She stood watching with her cold hands resting in her orange sheer raincoat pockets.

Isabeth tossed the last piece in the box, "If you're not using it you put it up and when you want to use it again you take it back out."

"You sound like my mom. Act eighteen for a chance. How about that." Harper kicked her chair under the table. That was all the tidying she was going to do. If they wanted the puzzle pieces picked up they'll have to do it themselves. Like they always do because every time she came back everything was magically away like little fairies put them up. Well, nurses.

"I act eighteen." Isabeth put the top on the box.

"You talk like you're forty-five." Harper followed Isabeth to the wicker cabinet in the corner of the playroom. "You never cut loose or be spontaneous; you calculate everything. Like, Chi. I swear you two are middle-aged souls trapped in teenager's bodies." She rested her hand on her bony hip as she propped her arm against the cabinet door.

"We're just responsible. Someone has to be with you, Gavin, Kevin, Fiona, Faith, and Troy. Who'll clean up the messes if we all get in trouble." Isabeth rose to her tiptoes, slid the box on the top shelf and closed the door. She quickly pulled down her gray shirt covering up her pancake-flat stomach that she worked hard to maintain. She had too; she was blessed and cursed with a coke-bottle body. But if she lay off on physical activity she would end up an apple-like her great-aunt Tina and that wasn't going to happen.

"What the hell are ya'll doing?" Gavin shouted at the door with his hands up in the air. "Come on! We're leaving!"

 "We're coming!" Harper shouted back walking toward him as the soles of her orange rain boots slapped against the white tile floor.

 "If you two wait any longer we'll need a boat to get back to campus." Gavin grabbed Harper's hand and pulled her into the hallway like a child. "You know how this place floods."

 Harper gripped his tepid had and swung their arms, "Maybe if you drove a Dodge Ram instead of a Ferrari you wouldn't have to worry about being lifted off the road." Harper steered away from the nurses ushering the children to their rooms and dispensing medication.

 "It's a Maserati." Gavin released Harper's hand to flick a lock of Harper's wavy brunette hair in her face.

Harper slapped his hand away, "Never touch a black woman's hair."

Gavin tsked as a grip grew on his ecru face, "Isabeth's black. You're far from it." Gavin laughed at the fury on her blushing face, "Speak Norwegian for me, baby."

 "Don't insult her blackness, please." Isabeth begged, stepping between them." Let's not go there. Not tonight. I don't want to hear her recite Still I Rise."

"Help him, Isa." Harper dragged up the zipper of the translucent raincoat. "I may be Norwegian but I'll give you full Zulu right here, right in this hallway."

"You're not Zulu, though." Isabeth shook her head with a smile to her tinted lips.

 "Please. No poetry," Gavin rolled his eyes. "Remember what happen last time."

 Pitter-patter of little feet ran behind them but couldn't be heard over the voices of Gavin, Harper and the various other students evacuating the facility. But a soft warm touch of a little hand attracted Isabeth's attention. She turned around quickly to see the little girl whom she had spent hours with all day.

"Why aren't you in your room?" Isabeth looked down at the little girl in a purple polka-dotted gown. It reminded Isabeth of a gown she had when she was six but hers was silky, not rough polyester.

 "I wanted to show you my room." The little girl stared up at Isabeth like a loveless puppy in the window of a pet store. "You said you would come to see my room."

Isabeth wanted to say I can't and run out of the hospital, through the rain, and into her car with Harper heading back to campus. Where they would relax salvaging some of this Sunday for themselves but she couldn't resist the big brown eyes this little girl was showing. "Okay, lead the way," Isabeth went against her better judgment.

 "Where are you going?" Gavin yelled.

"It's okay. Just go." Isabeth shouted looking back as the little girl lead her down the now clear hallway. "Harper, ride with Gavin."    

Should Isabeth go see the girl's room or follow Miss Simpson's instructions?