The Room is empty.
Well, except for me. I’m still here. Kind of. I don’t know how long I’ve been in here, wherever here is. I don’t know where I am. I’ve sat, I’ve stood, I’ve twiddled my thumbs, and whistled until I ran out of breath. Nothing has echoed. I think that’s what has set me off the most, made me one step closer to losing my mind. I can’t hear a single bloody echo. I mean, the Room is large enough, it has the feeling of a big belly, all round and empty.
I slouch against the curved wall, sighing, and stand up again. I’ve paced, and paced the Room, so many times that the bright white linoleum has faded to a grey.
I look down, at my white nightgown and tights. I try not to think of Mum. Her red hair, and perfect smile. The way she was always there with a hug after a bad day at school. As you might have noticed, that plan hasn’t worked out too well.
I don’t remember much before Here, but my Mum is a perfectly clear image in my head that I can’t quite shake out. I’ve tried plenty of times, of course, shaking my head until my brain feels fizzy, and about to pop. That happens sometimes. The fizzy feeling, I mean. When I get mad, or sad, or generally a lot of any emotion, my head gets fizzy and I feel sick. Patricia told me I was special, because I feel so much, it’s hard for me to hold it in. That’s okay too though, I like being special.
I s’pose you might want to know my name. Most people do introduce themselves, don’t they? Well, I’m not going to tell you. You can picture me however you want, I won’t give you any guidelines or genders. Do what you want with my image, twist it and shape it, make it a gorgeous model, or a grotesque beast.
I don’t know why I chose to talk to You of all people, but I guess I wanted to talk to someone who would listen, even just half-listening. Listening with your ears, but not letting the words soak into that little head of yours, letting my words tiptoe away, so that all is left is an imprint of me. But an imprint is all I need. I just need a little bit of that empty organ for what I use it for.
My mum used to call me “her sweet little angel”. Now, I don’t know if that’s quite accurate, but it made me feel all warm and cozy inside. I had always fancied angels, with their shining wings and ultimately good personalities. I used to believe that I could be an angel in disguise, that Someone Up There wanted me for some reason I didn’t know yet. That idea flew out the window, as if with angel wings of its own, flying and flying away from me.
I blink.
In that tenth of a second, I find a letter placed on my lap. I look around the empty Room, seeing nothing yet again. Is it a bomb? A love letter? I pick it up and inspect it thoroughly. It’s one of those expensive envelopes, thick and creamy. Embossed on the back of the envelope is an inky letter “M”, with the ink still wet.
I carefully slide my finger under the flap, and tear it open, astonished as black ash pours out, and up. I jump back immediately, startled, and let out a shriek. The ash surrounds me holding me up, and suddenly it’s not ash anymore, and its feathers, holding me up, and then not just holding me up, lifting me, until my feet aren’t on the floor and my vision swims as we soar up and up, past where the ceiling was just a few moments previously. I hear a chorus of whispers in my head. Not even a whisper. Less than that, as if the words were already in my head and just waiting to be called out. The Mind-Whispers tell me to close my eyes, that I was waking now, that I might feel a little disoriented. I do as they command and shut my eyes.
I wake in a new setting with sunshine playing across emerald grass. I feel horrid, my stomach wrenching all over the place. If this is disorienting, I don’t want to see nauseating. I take a few yoga fire breaths and manage to stand and look at my surroundings.
I wiggle my bare toes into grass, loving the feeling of dirt once I reach it. There is a looming willow tree to my right, and what looks like a whole tree orchard stretched to my left. I hear birds singing, and can almost taste the summer breeze, cool against my skin, accustomed to the regulated temperature of the Room. It all seems familiar, as if I should know where I am.
I wonder about the envelope, with it’s black M on the back. I wonder how I got here, how the ash became ravens and carried me here. I wonder where I am now, this place that is so familiar and so new, and why I was taken here. I once believed that everything happened for a reason. I don’t know how I feel about that logic anymore. Not since the Room. The Room can do that to you, I suppose. Change you. But how would I know?
It happens again and again.
I blink and an envelope with an M in fancy script appears. I open it, the Ash takes me somewhere new, always vaguely familiar. It keeps repeating.
I walk down the sloping hill towards the orchard and feel something shift. The trees are moving, but I haven’t felt the breeze since I landed. The trees move more ferociously now, whipping their branches through the air.
A black cloud blots out the sun, racing straight for me. I let out a breath and close my eyes in preparation for the dizzying feeling I receive after every flight.
Instead, they attack me the creatures I once took as my friends, my guardians. They’re skeletal creatures, they are. Flying at me, thrashing and writhing in the air, clawing at my face. I’m shocked to see blood on my hands, pouring now, a constant stream, and I finally start to scream.
I wake in the Room once more, with faces hovering over me, all in white coats with a scripted M on the vest. I see blood, and writhe away from the metallic scent.
“No, no, no, no,” I shriek, as they continue to feed me my meds. They shove them down my throat, not letting me breathe. They wait until I settle to leave, one of them sporting a bite from me and another with a slight concussion from where I slammed my head into his.
Do you remember when I said I didn’t know where I was? Well, I lied.
They said I needed help. That’s okay though. Patricia says it’s because I’m special. She’s right here, sitting next to me holding my hand, the only person who understands.
As the doctors leave the room, they just see the girl, talking to the air next to her bed, not a care in the world.
Nobody sees the Ash slipping through the ceiling, looking for another mind to prey on, with the Mind-Whisperer creeping up behind him.