House of Insanity

Chapter 4: Lillies

Purple, violet essences in his eyes. They were rare. A birth defect probably. The black pupils contrasting beautifully.

"I need to blink." Gregg said. I was looking at his eyes. My thumb and forefinger pushed back his eyelids so I could have more access. They were beautiful. Better than mine.

"You have pretty eyes." I said as I let go of his eyelids. "Mine are just a dull grey."

"I think they're nice. It matches your face."

"Thanks." I looked away bored.

"We should do something."

"We could go to the cafeteria and eat lunch early." I looked at him. That wasn't a bad idea, plus I could see the others.

"Sure, only got my skinnyness to lose." We lazily got up and dragged our bodies out the door and into the cafeteria.

"Can you go any faster?"

"Shut up, murderer." He looked at me, then smirked.

"Takes one to know one."

"Whatever. What are you gonna get?"

"Huh?" I rolled my eyes.

"For lunch, dumbnut."

"Oh, I don't k-" He paused and I looked at him. "Alice, why is she at are table?"

I looked over towards the table at the back of the cafeteria. Setting at the dull, round picnic table was a girl. Though she was strange, she wasn't wearing the uniform. Instead she had a white, thin dress on. The gloves she wore reached her elbows and even though she was inside, on the top of her head sat a lavender sun hat. She looked fancy, like the outfit was a costume. Her brunette hair ran down her back, pooling at her waist.

"Gregg, who is that?"

"Lily Nowell."

"Why isn't she wearing the uniform?"

"She's a schizophrenic, if they try to take her things away, she goes crazy."

"Schizophrenic?"

"Yeah, apparently she was running around pretending to be on a 'magical adventure'. They found her when she broke into a school and pretended to talk to her dead dad." I frowned and looked at her. She didn't seem to deserve that. No one did.

"That's sad." I stood there for a moment, wondering if I should go over to her. She seemed alone, maybe not in her mind but she was. Maybe deep down in her, she knew life wasn't what she saw. In a way, I felt the same.

I walked towards the strange girl, leaving Gregg confused for a moment before he started to follow. She looked up at us and her eyes brightened, like all she needed was a friend or two.

"Hey! Can we sit here?"

"Of course! No one ever comes to sit with me. You're new, right?" I smiled.

"Yeah, I just came in a few days ago." She returned the smile before her face morphed into shock, like she forgot something.

"Oh! You HAVE to meet my best friend!" I looked at her confused. I didn't know she had a friend, I thought she was completely alone. Gregg wasn't fazed, he just sat there, staring. I noticed that she wasn't terrified of Gregg, looking at him normally.

She turned around and grabbed something from the other side of her. She whipped back towards us, holding a stuffed bear with a little black bowtie.

"This is Plush-plush! He's my bestfriend, he's a little shy though." My smile almost faded when she uttered those words. All I felt was more pity for her, the girl didn't even have a real best friend. She didn't even have a friend.

"O-h, hi Plush-plush!" I forced a smile and I hated myself for it. I don't like to pretend that things are find when there not. Gregg starred at the object with an unimpressed face, like he knew of this even befor it happened. He seemed to know a lot of things. Maybe that's why everyone was scared of him.

"You're an angel."

"What?"

"You're an angel, a dark one." She smiled with those words, like she ment everything she said. A dark angle. I couldn't fathom why she would say that. Not with what I done to be here. Gregg was still unfazed.

"An.... angel?"

"Yes! A dark one. Though, you're probably confused. The doctors say what I see isn't real. They say I'm sick and that's why I'm here. But maybe I'm seeing it in a different way."

"Like metaphorical?" She looked away.

"Maybe," she paused and whispered quietly. "But I know it's real."

"Maybe it is."

"There are other angels here, dark or pure. I like to hide in one of the angel's sanctuary sometimes. She doesn't mind."

"Angel? Who?"

"I could show you." She said it like a statement, her somehow cold, dead eyes boring into mine. She was friendly yet frightening. I nodded my head a little too fast.

"O.....okay." And with my answer she stood, grabbing her stuffed bear with her small, bony hands. Her dress flowed around her skeleton-like frame, pooling at her feet. The dress was too big for her narrow body, it was probably from her mother's or grandmother's closet. She moved towards the hallway and we followed. She practically floated when she walked, as though she was a ghost. Yeah, a ghost was the perfect way to describe her. A ghost of a girl who died years ago, forever stuck in this strange place, talking to angels and seeing things that weren't there. But she wasn't a ghost. She was a poor little girl with a condition that ruined her future. And that could go for anyone here.

I was silent for the whole walk.

___________________

We stopped at a door of a patient's room. It was rotten and old, just like all the others. Without even knocking, Lily opened the door. Inside was the standard set up of two hospital beds with nightstands. On one of the beds was a girl, her face painted with shock and confusion. She was a brunette like Lily, her hair pulled up into a set of pigtails. She was thin, malnourished. Her uniform was a tad too large. She stood, blue piercing eyes search our bodies.

"An- Debbie!!!" Lily corrected herself, she seemed delighted to see the "angel" again. Debbie was silent, only pointing towards me and Gregg.

"Oh! They're my new friends. Uh..." Lily turned towards us, an awkward smile on her face. "What was your name?"

"I'm Gregg and she is Alice." Gregg spoke up for the first time since this morning. But I wasn't worried about that, Debbie was staring at him, her face showed fear. She looked away nervously, shuffling her feet.

"H-hi..... I'm Debbie Novak and that is my roommate Zander." Roommate. I looked towards the other bed and on it sat a blue haired boy. He was staring at me, blush staining his cheeks. I waved nervously and he looked away.

"Hi."