The Care System

Chapter Three

"Alice." Emmi gently tapped on Alice's ajar door, "There's food downstairs if you're hungry."

Alice smiled and put away the book she had been reading. She'd stuffed two books into her bag that morning, one for her English class and one for fun, and she'd already finished the book for her English class. She wished she'd brought more with her, but they had only given her thirty minutes to decide which of her belongings were most important. Hopefully, she'd be allowed to go home later in the week and pick up a few more of her things.

"How are you settling in?" Emmi asked as the pair headed down the stairs.

"Fine." Alice didn't know how to phrase the way she truly felt, and she wasn't sure Emmi would be interested anyway.

Emmi continued to ask Alice questions as they headed to the dinning-room. Alice was offered a chair at the table next to the adult's seats, who were busy placing an array of food on the table. The other residents stared with varying amounts of curiosity at Alice as she poured herself a glass of orange juice. There were nine other children around the table, the youngest looked around thirteen years old. There were four girls including Faith and Alice and five boys – three of whom Alice had seen in the television room earlier, the other two boys looked slightly older and were obviously twins. They nodded at her and told her their names were Jack and Ryan but didn't ask her for any information in return. When Alice attempted to ask the two younger girls' names they giggled and hid behind a magazine.

"What's your name?" one of the TV room teenagers asked her.

"Alice."

"What are you in for?" the boy asked a second later.

Alice scratched her temple. She'd seen enough TV shows to understand what the kid was asking her; she didn't want to lie but she wanted to bring up her mother even less. Then again, she didn't want to offend her new housemates with silence.

"Alice isn't like the rest of us," a voice chimed in from across the table. It was Faith, who had been watching Alice since she'd arrived at the table. "She's got a family and shit. Her mum's in the hospital so we've gotta be nice to her."

Alice didn't know whether to find Faith's answer sweet or not.

"I've got a family!" the younger boy protested, his voice rising.

"You've got a dad in prison and a mum on the streets," Faith shot back.

Alice resisted the urge to push her chair away from the table. The boy was shouting at Faith, who shouted back just as loudly. The other residents seemed undisturbed by the argument breaking loose at the dinner table. Alice, who didn't have any siblings, had never seen anything like it. It was like a game of tennis with both parties aiming venomous words at the other. Eventually, Faith said something particularly nasty that caused the younger boy to burst into tears. This only seemed to entertain the red-headed girl even more.

"How old are you Peter?" she asked incredulously, "Crying like a little girl."

"Leave him alone." It took Alice and the rest of the table a moment to realise that she had spoken. There was a collective intake of breath. From this, Alice realised that Faith wasn't usually interrupted.

"Oh, shut up," said Faith, "I'm only messing with him. You don't know what you're talking about."

Despite Faith's macho behaviour, she stopped pestering the younger boy and settled into a childish sulk. Shortly after, Mrs Murphy and Emmi entered the room, carrying the dinner.

There was a startling amount of food on the table, none of which looked particularly appetising to Alice. The red sauce covering the main dish in the centre of the table did little to hide the fact that the chicken legs underneath were burnt. The piece of bread that sat next to Alice's plate was dry to the touch.

"Mrs Murphy," Alice said when the plate of chicken legs reached her, "I'm vegetarian."

"Oh." Mrs Murphy looked up.

"It's okay! I'll just eat vegetables," Alice said hastily when she saw the look on Mrs Murphy's face. The prickling on Alice's cheeks reminded her that everyone at the table was staring at her. The last thing she wanted to do was cause a scene.

"All the better to avoid Mrs Murphy's cooking," one of the other teenagers giggled.

Faith speared her burnt chicken leg with her knife, "Yeah. I think I'm vegetarian too."

Mrs Murphy ignored her, "I'm sorry Alice. Nobody told me."

Mrs Murphy took Alice's plate and piled a hefty lump of vegetables on top of it, overcompensating for the lack of meat. The vegetables on her plate looked just as unappetising as the chicken legs. The greens had been put in a steamer for far too long and had turned to mush. The mashed potato wasn't much better, it had an unpleasant grainy texture to it. At least the hospital food Alice had been eating recently had texture.

"When's Ralph going to cook for us again?" Faith asked.

"Ralph's kitchen privileges will be restored tomorrow," Mrs Murphy replied.

"Thank fu- "

"Faith!" Mrs Murphy interrupted the girl before she could curse. Faith raised her eyebrows innocently.

Once all the food had been served, the group settled down into their regular routine and Alice turned invisible. Mr Murphy entered the room a few moments later, kissed his wife on the forehead and picked up a plate whilst Mrs Murphy asked each of the children about their days. Alice noticed the way that she probed into the resident's lives and pushed for them to discuss how the events of the day made them feel. When Mrs Murphy's attention wasn't on them, the teenagers would talk amongst themselves. The second voice that Alice had heard through the dividing wall between her room and Faith's was missing from the table; whoever Faith had been talking to hadn't joined the group for dinner.

"Mrs Murphy, may I be excused from the table?" Alice had grown tired of the noisy dining-room and had put her knife and fork down.

Mrs Murphy paused to think about it, "Yes, you may."

This seemed to cause quite a stir as several voices piped up to complain.

"How come she gets to leave the table?" one of the girls moaned.

"Because she's new here," Mrs Murphy replied kindly, "I think we can bend the rules for once."

"Oh, no," Alice said, realising she was rocking the boat, "I can stay if that's the way you usually do things."

"Nonsense," Mrs Murphy replied, "You can go."

Alice stood, everyone's eyes were fixed on her. She felt the eyes follow her as she gathered her plate and placed it into the serving hatch.

"Alice. Could you also take Ralph's dinner up for him?" Mr Murphy asked, "I saw him on the stairs, and he says he won't be joining us. His room is the first door on the left on the second floor."

Alice nodded and took the extra plate from the counter.