The Psychopath Maker

Chapter Fifty-Three

The sanatorium was a maze with lights but now it was a labyrinth. Maya cursed her bladder. She was going to just stay in the waiting room until everyone else came back. Unfortunately, three beers and pouring rain weren't a good mixture.

The hinges of the bathroom door cried as he swung behind her. The light mirrors over the sink helped her navigate her way to the stalls. The first stall had toilet paper on the floor. The second stall had a crooked seat but the third stall was just right. Empty of all the unneeded liquid she flushed, washed her hands, and went back to the hallway.

She stood in the middle of the hallway with her hands around the base of her neck. She looked to the left and then to the right. She couldn't remember which way would take her back to the waiting room.

Maya sighed and went with a hunch, going right had to be right. She trod down the hallway for what seemed like minutes and she was nowhere near the waiting room, given it only to a couple of seconds to get from the waiting room to the restroom.

The only thing her ears picked up for a while was her own footsteps until it wasn't. Little strikes hit the tiles generating a disturbing tension in the pit of her stomach. Maya jolted around. A little brown-haired girl, in a yellow dress, stood like a mannequin a few feet down the hallway.

"Hey, little girl." Maya waved at the child. "Do you know how to get back to the waiting room?"

The little girl took a small step back.

"Little girl." Maya took a big step forward. "Do you—" The additional step Maya took made the little girl scurry away.

Maya ran after the girl. She chased after the pitter-patter of little feet. Maya turned down a hallway. No little girl. She ran down a hall to her left, no little girl. She turned back and run down a hallway she passed. Alas, the little barefooted girl.

"It's okay," Maya said holding up her hands, taking minuscule steps to the wide-eyed child standing in the middle of the dark hallway. "I won't hurt you...I just need—" Maya's watch beep and the girl jumped. "It's okay. It's okay that's just my watch." Maya held up her wrist so the little girl could see the digital timepiece.

"Watch." The little girl spoke like it was a foreign word.

"Yes. Watch." Maya said only an inch away from the girl. She held out her arm and angled the watch toward the girl. "Look." She pushed the button on the side and the watches' face lit up. "It's 9:40."

"9: 40." The little girl repeated.

"Yeah, 9:40," Maya said kneeling down on one knee.

"9: 40." The little girl's eyes widened, her pupils dilated. "9: 40.... 40. 40. 40." She spoke like a robot stuck on a command.

Maya held her hands up but this time it wasn't to appease the girl. The girl repeated the number in a trio then let out a glass-breaking scream. Maya clutched her ears and ran. The tables had turned as the little girl chased Maya down every hall the teen turned down.

The little girl leaped in the arm like a gazelle then landed on Maya's back, latching her unfiled, pediatric nails into Maya's naked shoulders. Maya elevated her body system from panic mode to lusting for survival.

Maya wrenched at the girl's tiny wrist but it only made the child dig in deeper. Maya bammed her back against the wall, the little girl's bestial scream morphed to broken whelps. Maya wrapped her hands around the girl's matted hair and hurled her off. The child thrashed on the floor the bashed against the hallway's corner, then a crack cut through the slice. The little girl lay there unmoved. Maya leaned over, studying the little girl. Her chest wasn't moving either.

"Oh, God." Maya backed up. "Oh, God." She ran.