Insanity ➳ Ashton Irwin

Chapter 2 | Insanity

Chapter 2 | Insanity

Insanity comes in all different forms.

Pennhurst is where they all went.

No, that's wrong. Because there are still insane people in this world. Sociopaths, who are hiding the darkness they have in them with smiles and human feelings. You will never know who those people are, and that kills.

For the rest of the day, I looked around in files of the asylum patients. I looked into Christine Munoz's, into Lesley Martino's, Liam Payne's, a lot into Michael Clifford's, but mostly into Kimberly Cherry's.

I wasn't even exactly sure who to believe.

Lacey Valentine, the girl deemed insane who claims to know so much, or the asylum who I already know is extremely sketchy?

There was hardly anything in Kimberly's file. There was one note on the main paper saying she is mentally insane, and on the paper behind it is a list of times she has had a mental breakdown and even failed suicide attempts.

But something in Michael Clifford's file caught my eye even more.

I wasn't sure to believe Lacey on her full story about why he did kill his step father and mother, but the fact that the only thing it said in his file was 'killed parents' was a little sketchy.

"How many times have you been able to work with Michael Clifford?" I ask Wendy the next day. She looks up from writing something in a file to me.

"Uh... Like once or twice? Why?"

"His file isn't very thorough." I point out, holding up the singular paper from his file.

"Yeah, he's pretty good behaved." She goes back down to writing in the file.

"Have you ever thought that maybe not everyone here is insane?"

Wendy puts her pen back down on the table and looks to me, frustration evident in her features. "Ashton, I'm telling you this for your own good. Don't dig into Pennhurst. There's too much in here you don't want to know about."

"Wendy-"

"No. Don't let Lacey Valentine get to your head, alright? Letting her affect you is the worst thing you could do."

"Did she get to your head?" I ask. I shouldn't have though, because the hurt on her face made me feel super bad. Wendy is so nice, and I felt like a dick when her eyes become glassy. "Wendy, I'm sorry-"

But she softly shakes her head and politely hands me a piece of paper. When I look to it, it has different medicine names on it. "Do you mind gathering these for me?"

I wanted to say more, but I also didn't want to push her so I just take the paper and leave the room.

She needed time to sort her thoughts, and if Lacey was right, she needed a lot of time. More time then it will take to go to the medicine room and get a few supplies.

So I went to the common room. I was trying to find an excuse to go in there anyway, so it wasn't a huge deal at all. I searched the room until I found who I needed and I walked to them.

"Hi, Michael." I say calmly and sit in the chair across the table from him. He has a pile of cards in front of him, and another in front of the chair I'm sitting in now. He was playing with himself.

"I wasn't playing by myself, I swear." He laughs. "Luke was playing with me until his guard took him away to get sedated."

"Mind if I fill in for him?"

He looked surprised for a second. "Uh, yeah, sure." But he takes the cards in front of me and begins to shuffle them with his. "Is war okay?" I nod in agreement. "Luke sucked at it. So I wanted to make it fair."