(no subject)
Title: Asylum [3/4]
Author: Gemma (five_by5)
Pairing: Gerard/Frank
POV: 1st, Gerards
Word count:11,333 in total
Rating: R (Swearing, adult themes, death, suicide, insanity)
Disclaimer: Don't own anybody. Plot is mine. Dont sue. I have £5.61 to my name!
Summary: . My converse squeak against the filthy tiles and I’m constantly dodging tables and wheelchairs. I can feel each patient standing at their doorway, watching me after I passed. Their eyes burn into me. And so do their thoughts.
A/N: My first MCR fic in a year. Written for blck_cherry. She asked for a Bert/Gerard but I changed it to make Bert a better character. Was 3 parts is now four due to cutting parts. Hope you enjoy. I'm sorry for all the mishaps and stupidness theres been while posting. I'm clearly very very rusty at posting. I was hoping this fic would be a success as well cause I worked so hard on it! Oh well. It's what I get for being smug I guess. So even though nobodies reading, I'll just post til it's done, may as well LOL! Again, enjoy!
Part 1
Part 2
I try to catch him after dinner. Calling after him as we make our way back up to our rooms. He ignores me for a while. Walking away as I call on him. When I get to my room. I stop. And I try to push into his mind. I’ve never had to do it before, but it’s like pushing against a brick wall. I close my eyes and visualize the wall, using some techniques I’ve seen on TV to try and break through. I start taking away some bricks in my mind, and suddenly some words come flying at me.
”Frank.” “Too close.” “Suicide.”
That’s when he comes up and pushes me back into my room. The force breaks my concentration and I feel the wall go back up. He’s clearly never had anyone in his mind for a while, because he seems disorientated.
“There’s a reason, I keep my thoughts BLOCKED!” He yells at me. I’m so stunned I just look up at him like a rabbit caught in headlights. He storms out my room and there’s a crash. He screams “George for fucks sake.” And runs down the corridor. I lean over a little. George is clawing at the floorboards again. His fingertips are bloody and a few of his fingernails lie are stuck in the floorboards. He’s grunting, almost sobbing. Desperately trying to rip them up. He looks up at me. “He told me it was here. But I can’t find it.”
“Gerard. Gerard!” I hear in my mind. It’s Frank. I don’t directly say anything to him, but I know he heard what just happened. “Just stay away from Bert. He’s a psycho.” He advises me. I watch the nurse take George away as Frank’s mind echoes in my brain. Trying to get my attention. Trying to calm me down.
I go and lay in my bed, breathing deeply. He’s still comforting me. I tell him thank you. Thank you for staying with me. Things just got weird. I don’t know if I can handle it. I just want him here. With me. Suddenly, I can almost feel him next to me. The heat of his skin warming mine, in a way I didn’t know I missed.
My eyes flutter closed and I smile. In my mind, he’s laying in front of me. We’re in a bed. I don’t know where. But Frank’s there. So it must be home. In his mind, is me. I can feel him smiling as he whispers “kiss me.”
I imagine myself slowly moving forward and our lips softly touching. He kisses me back and my scalp tingles when he imagines his fingers running through my hair. For once, all other thought is eliminated. No nonsense. No jokes. No worry. It’s just us. Us and the way I would run my tongue over his lips. He parts them and our tongues meet. Not in a frenzy. But softly. Slowly. Massaging together as we explore and memorize each other. His moans echo in my head. I start to pant slightly. The intensity of this private moment getting the better of me. I want him. I want him. And before I can stop myself, my arm is reaching out to pull him closer.
But it only finds air. He’s not there. He never was.
My eyes open and tears begin to fill them.
“Tell me where you are.” I beg.
“I don’t know.” He replies. Broken. “I don’t know.”
The strangeness of the day and the amount of grief and sadness that runs through me sends me to sleep right away. In my dreams. I hear someone. “Do it. Do it. You don’t belong here.” I hear arguing. “Please. I don’t want to.” I hear persuasion. “You’ll go to heaven I promise. You want to go to heaven right?” I hear surrender. “Okay.”
I feel pain.
I waken in the morning to a series of screams and commotion.
George is dead. The voice got him.
I stand and watch from the sidelines as they pick up the bloody body. The blood confuses me. We’re not supposed to have anything harmful. But I move forward and almost trip into the hole that’s been ripped in the floorboards. He finally got in.
Friends and acquaintances line the corridor. The body is taken out. I stare at the gurney with the body. He’s covered in a sheet. A light blue sheet. That and nothingness. That’s all that’s left of George. Just this big empty space. People cry. People hug.
“Why?”
“I didn’t know he was…”
“He never seemed suicidal.”
As he passes me, I try to push in. Find a clue. Anything to tell me why. Yes, George was insane. But he wasn’t suicidal. Anybody could see that. I keep pushing, trying to find his last thought. See a face. Something. Anything.
“You can’t hear it.” A girl says in a soft voice. She’s no older than 17. “The sound is gone. All gone.”
I squint at her. “Can you hear?” I ask her softly. I don’t want to scare her, so I come down to her level and talk in her tone. She seems fragile. Her hair looks as if she’s been pulling at it in desperation. She never looks directly at me. Her eyes never stay in the same spot for more than 2 seconds. She shakes. She nods.
”Georges voice is gone in his head. It’s in my head. He’s telling me where the knife is. He’s telling me where to look and that he’s waiting for me in heaven. And that it’s pretty and has marshmallow clouds and pretty horses…”
“Who’s telling you?” I interrupt, starting to internally freak out. I can feel her reading it. Her eyes dart faster, almost trying not to see it. I feel her ignoring it, shouting over it with her own daydreams..
“George. He wants me to go with him. Then he’s going to bring someone… else….” She trails off and squints at me, and I can feel soft pushing around my mind. “Frank.” She says suddenly. “You love him?”
I nod slowly and she starts to tell me something. She starts to tell me where he is, but Bert appears behind her and pulls her away. I desperately try to find the end of that sentence in her mind. I push and prod. But all I can find is her imaginations of heaven. Soft songs and lullabies as she skips from cloud to cloud.
“Freaks, huh?” Bert chuckles, snapping me out of her daydream. Our eyes meet for a moment, but he can’t hold the gaze. Leading her away, he looks back. I can’t help the shiver that runs up my spine. Something’s not right.
“We have to escape” I tell Frank that night. “We have to get out of here. Something’s going on.”
He agrees. But he doesn’t know how to get out. He doesn’t know where he is. How can he escape if he can’t get out? And if I can’t find him? I tell him that we’ll figure something out. I tell him just to try to time his routine so he can find a window of opportunity. Then we’ll meet. And we’ll make a break for it.
“What if we get caught?” He asks. I can only sigh.
“What can they do to us that’s worse than what they do now?”
“Gerard?” He thinks softly, the tone of his voice changing. “I love you too.”
We begin to pay close attention to the times people come into his room. We wait and we try to see any opportunities. Someone comes in around 10pm to give him a sedative. He says he doesn’t know why. He hardly even moves. But it makes him happy, and makes the pain stop. If he can get a hold of it and inject the doctor, he can run. Run. Run out the building and to me. To our new lives.
I write all the details down in my little book I keep stuck under my desk. But one afternoon, it’s gone. I know the only person who would know it was there, was Bert. I storm to his room and true enough; the worn notepad is on the table open. He lays on his bed smoking a cigarette. And I want to punch him. I want to hurt him. I want to wipe that fucking smile off his face.
“Why did you take it?”
The smoke from his cigarette floats up in small clouds and he takes a drag. Exhaling with a smile. Exhaling with torment.
“Why the fuck did you take it?!” I scream at him. Only this time, I do it through my mind. I know he’s listening. Any commotion would cause the nurse to come in and see what’s wrong. She’d see the book. She’d see the plans. She’d see the escape.
The flinch in Bert’s armor is apparent when I scream. His expression drops for a moment. Our eyes lock.
“I just want to help.”
I can’t help the “Ha” that escapes my throat. Why would he want to help? Not after that bad feeling he was sending my way. I grab the notebook and look at it. He’s marked another route out of the hospital. One with no cameras. No guards. No gates. Just… out
I look at him and he’s looking at the floor. Like I’ve offended him. Like I’ve hurt him.
“I think you and Frank will make a really nice couple. I hear your conversations. You really love each other. Just… follow that route and you’ll be out of here.”
I don’t know what to say. I think of all the possibilities and I know he hears them. So I just nod. One nod to show my gratitude. It’s all we need. He understands. I go back to my room and sit at my desk. The route is marked in a red pen and takes us under the canteen and out onto a main road. At the back of my mind, I know I shouldn’t be accepting help from Bert. But at this point I don’t care. I just want out of here.
I tell Frank about the new route and tell him it’s out biggest chance of escape. I don’t know where to meet him, so I tell him I’ll meet him in the tunnel. Over and over he goes through what he has to do. Forcing the doctor down and injecting him with the drug before running off to meet me. At ten pm I’ll go out for some air and break into the canteen to get to the route. I’ll leave the trap door open for Frank. He has to be quick and he has to be accurate. But he’ll be there.
The plan is set.
“Are you sure?” he asks me the night before our escape.
”I can’t explain it, but I know something’s going on. And I have a feeling they’re going to hurt you. I’m not going to let that happen. I’ll die before I let that happen.”
Nerves shake my whole body on the day of the escape. I feel everyone looking at me. I feel everyone knows. And they’re all condemning me. The time ticks slowly by and all I hear from Frank is the plan of escape over and over. He knows it. But the thought of getting caught is so terrifying every scenario ends up wrong. Every scenario ends up with us being pulled apart. But we’ll never lose each other. Not while we’re connected. And that soothes him a little.
At dinner I take my notepad down and look for the pace where the trap door is meant to be. It’s in the kitchen, and I can see it clearly when I go up for my serving of spaghetti. Now I know where I’m going, it all seems so much more real. Not just a plan. Not just a daydream. But a possibility. A reality.
As I sit and try to eat, the girl from Georges tragedy comes and sits in front of me. She tells me they know. She tells me to be careful because not everything is as it seems.
“There’s a complication.” She tells me. “But George says I can’t tell you what.”
By that point the little of my appetite has gone and I’m looking straight into her eyes. She seems almost like a puppet. Reflective buttons where her eyes should be. The illusion of life in an empty shell.
“But surely George would want us to know.” I ask softly. But she shakes her head and leans closer. “George says this is the end. George says you’re trouble.”
“What do you say?” I ask her. She shrugs. “I don’t say anything. George tells me what to do now.”
I tell her, her opinion counts too. That her opinion matters above anyone else’s here. But then Bert comes and sits beside us. “You’re not bothering Gerard, are you Anna?” She shakes her head and slips away, her mind filled with thoughts for me and Frank.. Worrying about what will happen to us. She sees me running down the tunnel and waiting for Frank. Frank’s lying in bed… hooked up to machines. It’s blurry but it’s what I see. Does she think we’ll be attacked, or run over?
“Don’t worry about her.” Bert says, biting into his meal. “She’s crazy.”
I nod slightly and take a drink of my water. The glass shakes in my hand and Bert notices. But I don’t feel sympathy from him. I don’t feel pity. I feel resentment. I feel anger. And that suddenly makes me question all our perfectly thought out plans.
I feel the soft push in my head again and I strain to keep it out. Closing my eyes ad putting a wall around my mind. I hear Bert chuckle “very good.” And he starts to eat again.
When I try to convey my concerns to Frank later that night, he dismisses them. He tells me that I’m just being paranoid. That the nervousness is taking over. I agree mildly, but he doesn’t understand just how bad that feeling was. I try to convey it to him. I try to bring up the memory. But it doesn’t even compare. It’s like trying to compare a Harry Potter book to a Harry Potter Movie. Everything important is there. But it’s still missing that edge. He keeps dismissing it and the time ticks closer and closer to ten PM.
“Are you ready for this?” I ask. He tell me he is. “Are you sure?” He tells me yes.
I warn him that once I get to the canteen I won’t be able to hear him until he gets closer. I tell him just to do what he needs to, to get away. I’ll be there. I’ll be waiting.
The alarm on my watch hits ten o’clock and I freeze. My whole body goes numb from head to toe and I have to force myself off the bed. Bert stands in the corridor, smiling at me as I turn towards the stairs.
“Good luck.” He calls after me.
When I get to the stairs I can’t walk down them. I fell my knees will buckle. But then I hear the nurse and I run. I run as fast as I can.
Outside my sneakers batter off the concrete so loud I’m sure I’ve woken every patient. My breath is loud. My heart beats in my ears. I’m still shaking. I crash into the canteen door and it flies open despite it being locked. My body is working on pure adrenaline. I run to the trap door and see that it’s unlocked. I thank God for small miracles and step down into the tunnel. I curse when I realize I have no Flashlight and bring out my lighter.
The tunnel is just a burrow underneath the hospital. The walls are made of mud and I’m surprised it hasn’t caved in yet. Very few footprints go down the trail and they all stop at various points as I walk down towards the wooden doors at the end of the tunnel.
But the footprints don’t turn back.
The doors bang loudly through the tunnel and startle me and I realize that I have to stay quiet. I have to be able to hear Frank. I switch the lighter off,. Safer to stand in the dark. If anyone looks down without a Flashlight they won’t see me. Not caring about my clothes I lean against the wall and pull out my cigarettes. But I stop.
The doors at the end of the tunnel should be locked.
The footprints don’t turn back. And if they don’t turn back, and they don’t reach the exit. Where do they go?
I slowly back down the tunnel, keeping my eyes on the door. My hands shake as I try ti flick the lighter back on. It takes me a few tries, but suddenly the flame is there, and it’s lighting the tunnel. And the man standing in front of me with a knife.
I gasp and he lunges for me. My feet wont seem to work so I just move to the side and he goes right past me, Seizing my chance I run towards the wooden doors. They seem forever away. No matter how fast I run. No matter how loud I scream. The doors don’t seem to get closer. I hear breathing behind me as the man catches up and lunges for me again. But we slam into the doors and the knife stick in just beside my neck. I almost throw up when I see how close it got to killing me.
I run through the door and close it behind me. He pushes hard the other way and we struggle for a few minutes. My hands shaking., My brow sweating. I feel cold with fear and hot with adrenalin. I want to pass out. I want to throw up. I want to die. All at once.
The man slips and I slam the wooden door shut, and lock the padlock I find on the floor. I take ea few steps back as he bangs and yells at me for getting away. I feel tears begin to well in my eyes. I hear a horn screeching at me then an aching bump on my side. Suddenly I’m looking up at the stars and I hear someone getting out the car “Oh God. Please don’t be dead. Please. My insurance doesn’t cover death of strangers.”
But I hear the banging on the door and I don’t care about the pain in my side or my leg. I just have to get up. I just have to get out of here. And then I remember Frank. I remember he’s supposed to meet me in the tunnel.
The woman driving the car screams at me to come back. I could be seriously injured. The ambulance is on it’s way. But I run up towards the entrance of the hospital. Frank needs to know. He has to.
I burst through the doors and the woman behind the desk jumps in surprise. The look in her eyes tell me she recognizes me, but she doesn’t know from where. It’s been three months since she last saw me. I was checking in.
“Frank…. Frank…” I pant. I can’t manage to breathe properly. My lungs are burning. Piercing with cold and heat and emotion and everything that’s just happened. She tried to calm me down.
”Frank.. Iero.” I manage to spit out. “He’s… tunnel… canteen… man… knife… oh God.”
She just looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. Frank Iero? She thinks. The guy in the drug trials? My heart stops. Drug trials.
I fall to the floor, clutching at my chest to catch my breath.
“Are you a patient?” She asks me in her annoying high-pitched voice.
“Yes.” I pant. “Look,” I stand in front of her and take a deep breath. My voice is still breathless, but I manage to string sentences together. “Frank Iero and I are patients. We planned to escape through the tunnel under the canteen. I went down there and there’s a man, with a knife, and Frank’s on his way down to that tunnel.”
The woman just stares blankly at me. “Okay,” she says, “I’m just going to call the doctor.”
When she picks up the phone I slam it down. “Don’t you understand?” I scream at her. “That man will kill Frank when he goes down to that tunnel. You need to tell me where he is so I can find him and stop him!”
“Room 507.” She says, her voice shaking. She presses a small red button and the door to the wards clicks loudly. I run through it and down the corridor, hearing her explain what just happened to the doctor on duty tonight.
I search through the wards frantically. 507… 507… 507… I can’t find it anywhere. The only bit of hope for me is the directions board. Room 501-516, fifth floor. ICU.
I can feel my heart hit the floor when I read those three letters. I. C. U. I don’t understand what’s been going on. But it all starts to click into place. Frank being drugged. Frank not knowing where he is. Frank not moving. Frank constantly trying to amuse himself. A sob escapes my throat, but I only allow one moment of confusion and sadness.
The stairs flew beneath me two by two. I finally get to the fifth floor only to find the door locked. I’ve had enough. I kick and kick and scream until my throat hurts. I need answers I DESERVE answers.
“Gerard?” I hear softly amongst my rage.
The soft voice brings me to tears. All my energy collapses and leaves me deflated and empty. He asks what’s wrong. His voice comforting and frantic at the same time.
My mind can’t even form words.
Footsteps echo around me. Slow and uncaring. “Can I help you.” A nurse asks me through an intercom. I beg her “Room 507.” Please. I just need to get into room 507. Just for a minute.
She takes one look at my battered clothes. My tearstained face and opens the door for me. Clearly the news of my little outburst hasn’t reached this ward yet.
I count down the rooms until I find it. 507.
Author: Gemma (five_by5)
Pairing: Gerard/Frank
POV: 1st, Gerards
Word count:11,333 in total
Rating: R (Swearing, adult themes, death, suicide, insanity)
Disclaimer: Don't own anybody. Plot is mine. Dont sue. I have £5.61 to my name!
Summary: . My converse squeak against the filthy tiles and I’m constantly dodging tables and wheelchairs. I can feel each patient standing at their doorway, watching me after I passed. Their eyes burn into me. And so do their thoughts.
A/N: My first MCR fic in a year. Written for blck_cherry. She asked for a Bert/Gerard but I changed it to make Bert a better character. Was 3 parts is now four due to cutting parts. Hope you enjoy. I'm sorry for all the mishaps and stupidness theres been while posting. I'm clearly very very rusty at posting. I was hoping this fic would be a success as well cause I worked so hard on it! Oh well. It's what I get for being smug I guess. So even though nobodies reading, I'll just post til it's done, may as well LOL! Again, enjoy!
Part 1
Part 2
I try to catch him after dinner. Calling after him as we make our way back up to our rooms. He ignores me for a while. Walking away as I call on him. When I get to my room. I stop. And I try to push into his mind. I’ve never had to do it before, but it’s like pushing against a brick wall. I close my eyes and visualize the wall, using some techniques I’ve seen on TV to try and break through. I start taking away some bricks in my mind, and suddenly some words come flying at me.
”Frank.” “Too close.” “Suicide.”
That’s when he comes up and pushes me back into my room. The force breaks my concentration and I feel the wall go back up. He’s clearly never had anyone in his mind for a while, because he seems disorientated.
“There’s a reason, I keep my thoughts BLOCKED!” He yells at me. I’m so stunned I just look up at him like a rabbit caught in headlights. He storms out my room and there’s a crash. He screams “George for fucks sake.” And runs down the corridor. I lean over a little. George is clawing at the floorboards again. His fingertips are bloody and a few of his fingernails lie are stuck in the floorboards. He’s grunting, almost sobbing. Desperately trying to rip them up. He looks up at me. “He told me it was here. But I can’t find it.”
“Gerard. Gerard!” I hear in my mind. It’s Frank. I don’t directly say anything to him, but I know he heard what just happened. “Just stay away from Bert. He’s a psycho.” He advises me. I watch the nurse take George away as Frank’s mind echoes in my brain. Trying to get my attention. Trying to calm me down.
I go and lay in my bed, breathing deeply. He’s still comforting me. I tell him thank you. Thank you for staying with me. Things just got weird. I don’t know if I can handle it. I just want him here. With me. Suddenly, I can almost feel him next to me. The heat of his skin warming mine, in a way I didn’t know I missed.
My eyes flutter closed and I smile. In my mind, he’s laying in front of me. We’re in a bed. I don’t know where. But Frank’s there. So it must be home. In his mind, is me. I can feel him smiling as he whispers “kiss me.”
I imagine myself slowly moving forward and our lips softly touching. He kisses me back and my scalp tingles when he imagines his fingers running through my hair. For once, all other thought is eliminated. No nonsense. No jokes. No worry. It’s just us. Us and the way I would run my tongue over his lips. He parts them and our tongues meet. Not in a frenzy. But softly. Slowly. Massaging together as we explore and memorize each other. His moans echo in my head. I start to pant slightly. The intensity of this private moment getting the better of me. I want him. I want him. And before I can stop myself, my arm is reaching out to pull him closer.
But it only finds air. He’s not there. He never was.
My eyes open and tears begin to fill them.
“Tell me where you are.” I beg.
“I don’t know.” He replies. Broken. “I don’t know.”
The strangeness of the day and the amount of grief and sadness that runs through me sends me to sleep right away. In my dreams. I hear someone. “Do it. Do it. You don’t belong here.” I hear arguing. “Please. I don’t want to.” I hear persuasion. “You’ll go to heaven I promise. You want to go to heaven right?” I hear surrender. “Okay.”
I feel pain.
I waken in the morning to a series of screams and commotion.
George is dead. The voice got him.
I stand and watch from the sidelines as they pick up the bloody body. The blood confuses me. We’re not supposed to have anything harmful. But I move forward and almost trip into the hole that’s been ripped in the floorboards. He finally got in.
Friends and acquaintances line the corridor. The body is taken out. I stare at the gurney with the body. He’s covered in a sheet. A light blue sheet. That and nothingness. That’s all that’s left of George. Just this big empty space. People cry. People hug.
“Why?”
“I didn’t know he was…”
“He never seemed suicidal.”
As he passes me, I try to push in. Find a clue. Anything to tell me why. Yes, George was insane. But he wasn’t suicidal. Anybody could see that. I keep pushing, trying to find his last thought. See a face. Something. Anything.
“You can’t hear it.” A girl says in a soft voice. She’s no older than 17. “The sound is gone. All gone.”
I squint at her. “Can you hear?” I ask her softly. I don’t want to scare her, so I come down to her level and talk in her tone. She seems fragile. Her hair looks as if she’s been pulling at it in desperation. She never looks directly at me. Her eyes never stay in the same spot for more than 2 seconds. She shakes. She nods.
”Georges voice is gone in his head. It’s in my head. He’s telling me where the knife is. He’s telling me where to look and that he’s waiting for me in heaven. And that it’s pretty and has marshmallow clouds and pretty horses…”
“Who’s telling you?” I interrupt, starting to internally freak out. I can feel her reading it. Her eyes dart faster, almost trying not to see it. I feel her ignoring it, shouting over it with her own daydreams..
“George. He wants me to go with him. Then he’s going to bring someone… else….” She trails off and squints at me, and I can feel soft pushing around my mind. “Frank.” She says suddenly. “You love him?”
I nod slowly and she starts to tell me something. She starts to tell me where he is, but Bert appears behind her and pulls her away. I desperately try to find the end of that sentence in her mind. I push and prod. But all I can find is her imaginations of heaven. Soft songs and lullabies as she skips from cloud to cloud.
“Freaks, huh?” Bert chuckles, snapping me out of her daydream. Our eyes meet for a moment, but he can’t hold the gaze. Leading her away, he looks back. I can’t help the shiver that runs up my spine. Something’s not right.
“We have to escape” I tell Frank that night. “We have to get out of here. Something’s going on.”
He agrees. But he doesn’t know how to get out. He doesn’t know where he is. How can he escape if he can’t get out? And if I can’t find him? I tell him that we’ll figure something out. I tell him just to try to time his routine so he can find a window of opportunity. Then we’ll meet. And we’ll make a break for it.
“What if we get caught?” He asks. I can only sigh.
“What can they do to us that’s worse than what they do now?”
“Gerard?” He thinks softly, the tone of his voice changing. “I love you too.”
We begin to pay close attention to the times people come into his room. We wait and we try to see any opportunities. Someone comes in around 10pm to give him a sedative. He says he doesn’t know why. He hardly even moves. But it makes him happy, and makes the pain stop. If he can get a hold of it and inject the doctor, he can run. Run. Run out the building and to me. To our new lives.
I write all the details down in my little book I keep stuck under my desk. But one afternoon, it’s gone. I know the only person who would know it was there, was Bert. I storm to his room and true enough; the worn notepad is on the table open. He lays on his bed smoking a cigarette. And I want to punch him. I want to hurt him. I want to wipe that fucking smile off his face.
“Why did you take it?”
The smoke from his cigarette floats up in small clouds and he takes a drag. Exhaling with a smile. Exhaling with torment.
“Why the fuck did you take it?!” I scream at him. Only this time, I do it through my mind. I know he’s listening. Any commotion would cause the nurse to come in and see what’s wrong. She’d see the book. She’d see the plans. She’d see the escape.
The flinch in Bert’s armor is apparent when I scream. His expression drops for a moment. Our eyes lock.
“I just want to help.”
I can’t help the “Ha” that escapes my throat. Why would he want to help? Not after that bad feeling he was sending my way. I grab the notebook and look at it. He’s marked another route out of the hospital. One with no cameras. No guards. No gates. Just… out
I look at him and he’s looking at the floor. Like I’ve offended him. Like I’ve hurt him.
“I think you and Frank will make a really nice couple. I hear your conversations. You really love each other. Just… follow that route and you’ll be out of here.”
I don’t know what to say. I think of all the possibilities and I know he hears them. So I just nod. One nod to show my gratitude. It’s all we need. He understands. I go back to my room and sit at my desk. The route is marked in a red pen and takes us under the canteen and out onto a main road. At the back of my mind, I know I shouldn’t be accepting help from Bert. But at this point I don’t care. I just want out of here.
I tell Frank about the new route and tell him it’s out biggest chance of escape. I don’t know where to meet him, so I tell him I’ll meet him in the tunnel. Over and over he goes through what he has to do. Forcing the doctor down and injecting him with the drug before running off to meet me. At ten pm I’ll go out for some air and break into the canteen to get to the route. I’ll leave the trap door open for Frank. He has to be quick and he has to be accurate. But he’ll be there.
The plan is set.
“Are you sure?” he asks me the night before our escape.
”I can’t explain it, but I know something’s going on. And I have a feeling they’re going to hurt you. I’m not going to let that happen. I’ll die before I let that happen.”
Nerves shake my whole body on the day of the escape. I feel everyone looking at me. I feel everyone knows. And they’re all condemning me. The time ticks slowly by and all I hear from Frank is the plan of escape over and over. He knows it. But the thought of getting caught is so terrifying every scenario ends up wrong. Every scenario ends up with us being pulled apart. But we’ll never lose each other. Not while we’re connected. And that soothes him a little.
At dinner I take my notepad down and look for the pace where the trap door is meant to be. It’s in the kitchen, and I can see it clearly when I go up for my serving of spaghetti. Now I know where I’m going, it all seems so much more real. Not just a plan. Not just a daydream. But a possibility. A reality.
As I sit and try to eat, the girl from Georges tragedy comes and sits in front of me. She tells me they know. She tells me to be careful because not everything is as it seems.
“There’s a complication.” She tells me. “But George says I can’t tell you what.”
By that point the little of my appetite has gone and I’m looking straight into her eyes. She seems almost like a puppet. Reflective buttons where her eyes should be. The illusion of life in an empty shell.
“But surely George would want us to know.” I ask softly. But she shakes her head and leans closer. “George says this is the end. George says you’re trouble.”
“What do you say?” I ask her. She shrugs. “I don’t say anything. George tells me what to do now.”
I tell her, her opinion counts too. That her opinion matters above anyone else’s here. But then Bert comes and sits beside us. “You’re not bothering Gerard, are you Anna?” She shakes her head and slips away, her mind filled with thoughts for me and Frank.. Worrying about what will happen to us. She sees me running down the tunnel and waiting for Frank. Frank’s lying in bed… hooked up to machines. It’s blurry but it’s what I see. Does she think we’ll be attacked, or run over?
“Don’t worry about her.” Bert says, biting into his meal. “She’s crazy.”
I nod slightly and take a drink of my water. The glass shakes in my hand and Bert notices. But I don’t feel sympathy from him. I don’t feel pity. I feel resentment. I feel anger. And that suddenly makes me question all our perfectly thought out plans.
I feel the soft push in my head again and I strain to keep it out. Closing my eyes ad putting a wall around my mind. I hear Bert chuckle “very good.” And he starts to eat again.
When I try to convey my concerns to Frank later that night, he dismisses them. He tells me that I’m just being paranoid. That the nervousness is taking over. I agree mildly, but he doesn’t understand just how bad that feeling was. I try to convey it to him. I try to bring up the memory. But it doesn’t even compare. It’s like trying to compare a Harry Potter book to a Harry Potter Movie. Everything important is there. But it’s still missing that edge. He keeps dismissing it and the time ticks closer and closer to ten PM.
“Are you ready for this?” I ask. He tell me he is. “Are you sure?” He tells me yes.
I warn him that once I get to the canteen I won’t be able to hear him until he gets closer. I tell him just to do what he needs to, to get away. I’ll be there. I’ll be waiting.
The alarm on my watch hits ten o’clock and I freeze. My whole body goes numb from head to toe and I have to force myself off the bed. Bert stands in the corridor, smiling at me as I turn towards the stairs.
“Good luck.” He calls after me.
When I get to the stairs I can’t walk down them. I fell my knees will buckle. But then I hear the nurse and I run. I run as fast as I can.
Outside my sneakers batter off the concrete so loud I’m sure I’ve woken every patient. My breath is loud. My heart beats in my ears. I’m still shaking. I crash into the canteen door and it flies open despite it being locked. My body is working on pure adrenaline. I run to the trap door and see that it’s unlocked. I thank God for small miracles and step down into the tunnel. I curse when I realize I have no Flashlight and bring out my lighter.
The tunnel is just a burrow underneath the hospital. The walls are made of mud and I’m surprised it hasn’t caved in yet. Very few footprints go down the trail and they all stop at various points as I walk down towards the wooden doors at the end of the tunnel.
But the footprints don’t turn back.
The doors bang loudly through the tunnel and startle me and I realize that I have to stay quiet. I have to be able to hear Frank. I switch the lighter off,. Safer to stand in the dark. If anyone looks down without a Flashlight they won’t see me. Not caring about my clothes I lean against the wall and pull out my cigarettes. But I stop.
The doors at the end of the tunnel should be locked.
The footprints don’t turn back. And if they don’t turn back, and they don’t reach the exit. Where do they go?
I slowly back down the tunnel, keeping my eyes on the door. My hands shake as I try ti flick the lighter back on. It takes me a few tries, but suddenly the flame is there, and it’s lighting the tunnel. And the man standing in front of me with a knife.
I gasp and he lunges for me. My feet wont seem to work so I just move to the side and he goes right past me, Seizing my chance I run towards the wooden doors. They seem forever away. No matter how fast I run. No matter how loud I scream. The doors don’t seem to get closer. I hear breathing behind me as the man catches up and lunges for me again. But we slam into the doors and the knife stick in just beside my neck. I almost throw up when I see how close it got to killing me.
I run through the door and close it behind me. He pushes hard the other way and we struggle for a few minutes. My hands shaking., My brow sweating. I feel cold with fear and hot with adrenalin. I want to pass out. I want to throw up. I want to die. All at once.
The man slips and I slam the wooden door shut, and lock the padlock I find on the floor. I take ea few steps back as he bangs and yells at me for getting away. I feel tears begin to well in my eyes. I hear a horn screeching at me then an aching bump on my side. Suddenly I’m looking up at the stars and I hear someone getting out the car “Oh God. Please don’t be dead. Please. My insurance doesn’t cover death of strangers.”
But I hear the banging on the door and I don’t care about the pain in my side or my leg. I just have to get up. I just have to get out of here. And then I remember Frank. I remember he’s supposed to meet me in the tunnel.
The woman driving the car screams at me to come back. I could be seriously injured. The ambulance is on it’s way. But I run up towards the entrance of the hospital. Frank needs to know. He has to.
I burst through the doors and the woman behind the desk jumps in surprise. The look in her eyes tell me she recognizes me, but she doesn’t know from where. It’s been three months since she last saw me. I was checking in.
“Frank…. Frank…” I pant. I can’t manage to breathe properly. My lungs are burning. Piercing with cold and heat and emotion and everything that’s just happened. She tried to calm me down.
”Frank.. Iero.” I manage to spit out. “He’s… tunnel… canteen… man… knife… oh God.”
She just looks at me as if I’ve lost my mind. Frank Iero? She thinks. The guy in the drug trials? My heart stops. Drug trials.
I fall to the floor, clutching at my chest to catch my breath.
“Are you a patient?” She asks me in her annoying high-pitched voice.
“Yes.” I pant. “Look,” I stand in front of her and take a deep breath. My voice is still breathless, but I manage to string sentences together. “Frank Iero and I are patients. We planned to escape through the tunnel under the canteen. I went down there and there’s a man, with a knife, and Frank’s on his way down to that tunnel.”
The woman just stares blankly at me. “Okay,” she says, “I’m just going to call the doctor.”
When she picks up the phone I slam it down. “Don’t you understand?” I scream at her. “That man will kill Frank when he goes down to that tunnel. You need to tell me where he is so I can find him and stop him!”
“Room 507.” She says, her voice shaking. She presses a small red button and the door to the wards clicks loudly. I run through it and down the corridor, hearing her explain what just happened to the doctor on duty tonight.
I search through the wards frantically. 507… 507… 507… I can’t find it anywhere. The only bit of hope for me is the directions board. Room 501-516, fifth floor. ICU.
I can feel my heart hit the floor when I read those three letters. I. C. U. I don’t understand what’s been going on. But it all starts to click into place. Frank being drugged. Frank not knowing where he is. Frank not moving. Frank constantly trying to amuse himself. A sob escapes my throat, but I only allow one moment of confusion and sadness.
The stairs flew beneath me two by two. I finally get to the fifth floor only to find the door locked. I’ve had enough. I kick and kick and scream until my throat hurts. I need answers I DESERVE answers.
“Gerard?” I hear softly amongst my rage.
The soft voice brings me to tears. All my energy collapses and leaves me deflated and empty. He asks what’s wrong. His voice comforting and frantic at the same time.
My mind can’t even form words.
Footsteps echo around me. Slow and uncaring. “Can I help you.” A nurse asks me through an intercom. I beg her “Room 507.” Please. I just need to get into room 507. Just for a minute.
She takes one look at my battered clothes. My tearstained face and opens the door for me. Clearly the news of my little outburst hasn’t reached this ward yet.
I count down the rooms until I find it. 507.