It Lays

1

Large footsteps lead Dean to the reception counter of the hospital. A psychiatric hospital, as his boss had told him to go and investigate. The nurse asked him a series of questions, before leading him to his room down the hall.

His roommate- Mason- was nice. Too nice. He smiled, laughed and made silly jokes, it made Dean question his behavior, all the way til' dinner. Walking out of the cafeteria, the 16 year old nudged Dean and tilted his head towards the opposite direction of their corridor.

"Want a tour?" he smiled. "It hasn't passed curfew yet..."

"Why not?" Dean chuckled, walking beside him. He listened to Mason chatter on about the building and the"wise choices of nurses". Dean stayed silent throughout most of it, but observed the rooms, which had little sketches discreetly drawn on the walls or on the floor.

"And the drawings?" he had asked, noting how Mason's face paled at the mention of it.

"We don't talk about that," he fiddled with the string on his sleeve. "They're by it."

"It? What do you mean?"

"It," Mason whispered harshly. "can hear us. Everywhere. It watches us, stalking us."

"Why? Is this a person?"

"I don't know man, I've never seen. Nobody has. And if they did, they died. Or went missing. Nobody knows. But you can feel their presence," Mason looked around warily, his eyes darting between every dark corner. "It, is always here."

~*~*~*~

The next morning after breakfast Dean talked to one of the nurses. Lacy, was somewhere around his age, had green hair and plump lips that would lift into a beautiful smile. He told her about last night, wondering if it was true.

Lacy only laughed, covering her mouth with her hand as she did so. "Man, the things they make up in here, it's quite interesting actually," she shook her head nonchalantly. "Dean, you have nothing to worry about. It was a scaring tactic we used decades ago to scare patients into submission. I'm guessing it worked, because soon after they started spreading word around the entire hospital."

She sipped her coffee and continued. "It was one of our staff, who dressed up in silly costumes to creep out patients. From what senior nurses told me, he spent most of his free time alone, reading books or jotting down things on his notepad. He had no friends," she frowned. "And the room Mason mentioned is just one of our many storage rooms; in fact, that room in particular is where we kept all the old costumes and old patient files. I'd take you there, but we lost the key a long time ago- the door's locked."

Dean sat there; he felt glad to know that he could take Mason's words lightly. From where he was sitting, he felt a sort of calmness around Lacy. When they started straying off the topic of it, he found himself enjoying his conversations with her.

Every breakfast thereafter, he'd find Lacy sitting by the common room area, cup in hand. They'd sit there, talking to each other. He'd pitch in every now and then, listening to her speak about her life, and how- in her words- ridiculous it was.

This went on for the next week or so, all while Dean juggled between acting as a patient here, to doing what he actually came here for: to investigate. As his boss instructed, he was to find out inhumane treatments psychiatric hospitals used on patients. He was yet to find any, but he was hoping he might discover some through Lacy, if not from his own digging. Regardless, he was genuinely enjoying his time here. Aside from the mysterious thumping or gushes of cold air he would experience every night.