Redemption

Chapter 10: Reality Check (Part II)

Chapter 10: Reality Check (Part II)

The crippling sensation of desperation and loss rained down on John’s psyche like a hail storm as his gaze went from the young psychiatrist’s face to the smooth, black and white, tiled flooring. John’s mouth opened and closed like a distraught fish; trying to find the words that could possibly make sense of what was going on. As he sifted through his own beliefs, general notions, and discarded truths he realized it had all already been said. Everything he knew to be true was being thrown in his face as lies. He didn’t know what to believe anymore. All he could do now was sit quietly in his chair, staring down at his feet.

“Are you okay, John?” Dr. Hopper questioned, tapping at the edge of his desk with a pen.

John stayed silent not knowing what response he could say that would suitably answer the question. It wasn’t so much confusion as it was anger that kept his mouth sealed; anger stemming from his own inability to see that everything prior to him waking up in Dr. Hopper’s office was a facade. A brilliantly elaborate hoax his mind had set up and for what? What was the reason? So many questions yet, so few answers now found themselves jumbled up in John’s head and he didn’t know exactly how to process it all.

“I understand this maybe a lot for you to digest at the moment, but I’m sure once you’re back on your regularly scheduled medication you should be able to straighten everything out in time,” said Dr. Hopper, trying to ease some of John’s tension. “If it means anything at all, I‘m still considering you for a parole hearing next month.”

No sign of visible emotion passed from John’s eyes as he looked up at the young practitioner.

“I just want to go back to my cell,” John muttered, turning his head toward the guard behind him.

“But, John I thought we could just….”

“I just want to go back to my cell…please,” John said, rising to his feet.

The guard firmly grabbed John by his shoulder and held him securely in place, looking past John at Dr. Hopper.

“You done with him, doc?”

Dr. Hopper issued a reluctant nod of his head as he watched the pair leave his office; John’s visibly shaken face becoming more and more apparent.

The entire walk back to John’s cell was riddled with questions; questions that only led to even more questions. Things were beginning to not only make less sense than before, but it seemed the more John began to accept Dr. Hopper’s explanations as fact the more confused he became. It was as if these new manufactured explanations were pushing out the old and leaving little to interpretation. As much as he wanted to believe everything he had been told, he still held an unsettling feeling toward it all. He knew if he could just remember what had happened after the security gate opened back in the industrial district it would all make sense.

“Hey, I’m not going to tell you again, Cramer! I said get in the damn cell!” the guard ordered.

John’s thoughts melted away as he stared out in front of him at the guard pointing the end of his nightstick toward the inside of the open cell behind him.

John obeyed the order, walking into the cell and nearly getting his back heel taken off by the slamming of the iron door behind him. He stood alone in his cell staring around at the dark cemented walls and the spider web of cracks that extended from the floor to the low hanging ceiling. Everything in his cell was exactly as he last remembered it; well, not exactly. Everything in his cell was the same, yet somehow different. John didn’t know how he could see it, but he could see his room had been tampered with. Whether it was the way his bed sheets were now just a shade darker or the fact that his cell window was now a few inches too far to the right he knew something was wrong.