Pleasure Unbound

Lunch.

I felt as though I was being fattened for the Easter feast. It was

Asian today. Dumpling soup, fried rice, Korean beef, some lightly sauteed green leafy vegetable with a name I couldn’t recall.

“It’s low-sodium soy sauce,” said Karen from the seat across from me. She’d had her face buried in her journal while her soup got cold. “I guess they figure you’re on so many meds the sodium might spike your pressure?” She dumped a stream of soy sauce on her fried rice. Her hair was twisted up in a quick knot, and her swan-length neck had a fresh hickey blossoming on its base.

“You wanna cover up the suck stain?” I touched my neck.

She looked shocked then tried to look at her own neck, as if that was possible.

“There’s a mirror right over there,” I suggested.

“No, I got it.” She took her hair down.

Seeing her hair against her face and her forearms up, I realized how thin she was. Jesus, I must have been stoned on scrips yesterday. She fiddled with her fork and glanced at Mark, the orderly who moonlit as a nose-ring-wearing punk. I noticed from that he had a tattoo creeping onto his neck from under his collar. He looked at her and spun his finger as if telling her to get to it. She picked up her fork. I knew from the way she handled it that no food was landing in her mouth. I’d seen that particular twirl before.

“I’m sorry I didn’t make Amanda’s funeral,” she said. “There was so much going on. My sister was there. Tanya. She went. Said it rained. Like a movie.” She rolled her eyes.

“It’s all right. Nothing really happened. You know. Closed casket from the accident. She didn’t zombie.” I raised my arm and curled it at the wrist, making an ugly zombie face, because what better way to pretend I didn’t give a shit?

“I heard about the party after,” Karen said.

“Yeah.” I cleared my throat. “Wow. Days. It was the best sendoff I could have given her.” I felt bad scooping food into my face in front of someone who was obviously anorexic, but I was hungry. “We had a line of

limos up the hill. Man, there was so much flake.”

I stopped chewing and pushed my tray away. The flake had been the problem. At that point, Deacon didn’t care that I’d had multiple partners. He cared that he didn’t know them. He cared that there had been drugs on Maundy Street, where he wanted things quiet and unimpeachable, and he cared that I’d taken them. He wouldn’t knot me until it was out of my system and then some. That week had been torture. Amanda’s death had weighed on me fully, and Deacon withheld every coping mechanism I had.

“I spent a week in the corner drooling after that,” I said as if it was a joke.

But it hadn’t been. I’d felt like the bottom was going to fall out of me until Deacon picked me up and knotted me from the ceiling. Things had changed after Amanda died. It was as if we needed each other, he and I. As if it pained him to see me take such poor care of myself. It wasn’t too long after that we decided to own each other.

“Hey,” Warren said, sitting across from me. “Rain just stopped.

Creek’s flooding up to the bench.”

“There’s a creek?”

Warren and Karen glanced at each other.

She pushed her tray forward and shot a look at Mark before standing. “Let’s give Fiona a tour. Our tour.”

Warren looked me up and down, as if seeing my body through the light blue cotton uniform. “Can I trust you?”

“You can take your tour and stick it.”

“You want this tour,” Karen said. “It’s worth it. Almost as good as freedom.”

“I don’t need to prove I’m trustworthy. I ate you out in Ojai, and you”-I turned to Warren-“licked flake off my tits. That was my coke,

and you never gave me shit in return but numb nipples.”

“Point taken,” Warren said as he guided me out the door.

The outside had been designed, manicured, and planted to the teeth. The verdant garden was dotted with wood benches-places to reflect on your mental sickness, eat yourself with regret, and chew on your shortcomings. Jack crouched over a bed of wildflowers, rubbing the yellow petals.

“Hey, Jack,” Warren said as he slapped the not totally unfuckable nerd so hard on the ass he nearly fell over.

“Ow!”

“Not cool, Warren,” I said, helping Jack up. “You all right?” “I’m fine.” He glared at Warren.

I brushed Jack’s shoulders even though there was nothing there.

“Sorry, man.” Warren made a fist as if to punch Jack in the arm.

Jack flinched. I liked Warren less and less with each passing second.

“We’re checking out the holes. You coming?” Warren asked.

“Nah. I’m good.”

“Can we go?” Karen asked, walking backward toward the gardens. “I have a session in fifteen minutes.” She indicated the clock on the highest part of the common building.

Our personal effects had been taken, including watches. The clocks dotting the facility were the only way we had to keep time.

“Me too,” I said.

Warren jogged ahead of us and spread his arms. He looked handsome in the deep foliage, like a Greek god of abundance. “There are cameras everywhere.” He pointed upward.

I didn’t look directly, but with a sidelong glance, I saw the shiny glass at the crook of a tree branch.

“But there are some corners they don’t get to. Holes in their vision matrix.” Even in his silly mental ward uniform, Warren carried himself as if he was entitled to the known universe. He stood with his back to an old oak. “Like here. Hole. Right here. They might find you if they’re walking around, but the cameras can’t see shit until they prune this shit back. Follow me.” Like the docent of sneaky spaces, he pointed out three more places where a patient couldn’t be seen by the cameras.

“But they know where the holes are, too,” Karen interjected. “If they see you go out of range, and don’t see you come out, they come and check.” “If they’re paying attention,” Warren said. “Which is a crap shoot. Let’s go to the creek.”

We walked down a winding path. I heard cars speeding somewhere past a hedge, but it didn’t sound like a major road. The sound of moving water added to the white noise, and past a line of trees, we came to a swelling creek. A chain-link fence separated us from it.

“Is that PCH?” I asked, referring to the water. I followed them along the fence to a hole cut into it.

“Not even close.” Warren pulled the cut fence open. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

We crept through. Karen put her journal on a fallen tree trunk and kicked off her shoes. She rolled up her pants.

“Go on, sweetheart,” Warren said as Karen stepped into the water.

“I’m sitting this out.”

“Why?” I followed Karen’s lead, rolling up my pants.

“The thing with my kid brother.”

“What thing?” I put my toe in. The water was ice cold, even in the sun, and the bed was made up of small, rounded rocks.

“I waterboarded him.” He said it as if he’d helped the kid color or taught him how to play a video game. “They catch me in water, and my dad’s gonna kill me.”

“If it’s morning, they can’t see much once you’re in the water. The lenses get condensation on them, and the cameras get wet. If it’s just rained, the leaves are heavy and block the cameras.” Karen held her hands out and put her face to the sky. “I love the holes.”

“If you’re ever looking for Karen,” Warren called from the edge, “check the holes.”

There was something freeing about not being seen by the hospital staff, but with Warren’s eyes on me, I didn’t feel safe.

“What are you looking at?” I said.Text © 2024 NôvelDrama.Org.

“You got Chapman?”

“Yeah.”

Warren craned his neck to see the clock at the top of the common building. “Next set of sessions starts in five.”

Fuck. I hopped out of the water and got my cold feet back into my shoes.

“You know how to get back?” Karen shouted, but I was already past the chain link.