Chapter Three

The pain was agonizing. He couldn’t seem to rid the unwelcome feeling the voices imprinted in his mind. It was demented, having your own mind be violated by someone else. And impossible. He tried to wrap his head around it, but could not. Sleep did not come to him, instead, he stared hopelessly at the ceiling, in fear that the voices would return. And they would eventually. Rhett knew it would be impossible to pretend. It was not a fluke or a dream. He could hear people thinking. He could not hide. He could not keep it a secret.

“I can hear them.”

Leon looked at Rhett in alarm.

“What did you just say?”

They were sitting in the office, the clock on the wall ticking away softly behind them. He rapped his foot nervously on the floor as he spoke.

“Look, I know it sounds crazy, but hear me out.”

Rhett grabbed his friend’s arm desperately, searching for understanding in those sad brown cow eyes.

“I can’t control it. I have no clue when it’s going to happen or how it works. But sometimes, I can hear what people are thinking. It’s wild.”

He saw the look of concern on his friend’s face.

“Come on man, you’ve gotta trust me here.”

It was quiet for a long minute, just the two of them sitting in that white room with the air-conditioner blowing on them relentlessly. Finally, Leon tapped his fingers three times on the table.

“Please tell me you’re joking.”

“No, I’m being serious, okay?”

Leon shook his head, and sighs.

“Okay. Okay, Rhett.”

He walked slowly to the door behind him and knocks softly. Security guards rush in, many with familiar faces.

“I’m sorry, Rhett I really am. They told me to do a check-up on you, that you were acting up again. I guess they were right.”

“What?”

The guards in the room put their hands on his back and shoulders dominantly. Panic began to well in his chest, like someone was in there pumping up a balloon that was too large.

“What are you talking about?”

“Rhett. Look around. That is impossible. You’re imagining things.”

And he looked. There, wrapped tightly around his wrist was a startling green bracelet. He stared at it, dumbfounded. Those were for the patients. The patients only. Then it dawned on him. He was a patient.

In that moment, he became something terrifying. He screamed obscenities at them, clawing at the air as the guards struggle to hold him. Rhett viciously jerked, trying to escape their iron grasp, but it was no use and he knew it. As the sedatives entered his bloodstream, he crumpled to the ground. He cried, voice hoarse,

“I hear them.”

He was hysterical, gripping his friend’s shirt with an unnatural strength. Through the haze of drugs threatening to pull him under, he could make out Leon’s sad expression.

“I can hear all of them.”

His voice sounded raw, as if he had been crying for days. Then he realized, he had. Along with all of the voices in his head. Leon said something unrecognizable, and a world of utter darkness seized him.

“What happened this time?”

The security guards stood together, oddly close in the empty hallway. Maybe it was because of the chill that set over the place at night, the chill that snuck in and froze over the hearts of the people forced to be there. Or perhaps, they were afraid. His partner shrugged limply.

“He was hearing voices again.”

Jack glanced inside the cell. There the patient was huddled desperately in the corner of the room. His hair, usually groomed to perfection, was wild and sticking out every which way. Sobs racked the lean figure. Jack looked away, shuffling uncomfortably.

“Again?”

Leon Callaway nods, exhaustion exuding from his presence.

“Yeah. It’s what got him here in the first place. The nurses gave him some meds.”

Callaway looked at the cell, then back at Jack.

“It seemed to help for a while. I really thought he’d turned a corner.”

There was an uneasy silence that sat between them, the two security guards, each invested in their own thoughts. It was quiet in the hall, as it usually was. The place was lonely, especially at night.

“It’s really too bad.”

“What is?”

Jack looked over at Callaway in confusion and his new partner gestures at the cell.

“He was going places. I think he was majoring in engineering in college when he started hearing the thoughts of his classmates, or so he said. His parents had him institutionalized here after he attacked a guy on the street, accusing him of horrible crimes.”

“Why do you think he went off the rails? What caused it?”

Callaway thought for a moment before meeting Jack’s eyes. In the haunting lights, he looked much older than he really was. His face seemed pale and ghostly.

“There was too much going on up there.”

Callaway tapped his temple softly,

“Too smart for his own good.”

Jack nodded, though not fully understanding.

“Why are you so close to him? I mean, I’ve seen you with him. It’s different than how you treat the other patients.”

“He thought he was a guard. He wanted to help us all the time. He actually did help, on quite a few occasions. He has a charisma about him that most of the patients adore.”

Callaway shrugged.

“It’s nonsense though. Being a guard, hearing people. All of it. He’s just crazy.”

Jack tried for a joke,

“I guess we should be glad we’re on this side of the glass.”

Rather than amusement, his comment was met with a disapproving stare.

“Rhett Winters may be out of his mind, but he’s a good guy.”

Callaway stopped for a minute, looking at the patient in cell 46. Then he shrugged.

“I’m gonna go check the other hallways. I’ll meet up with you after and we can grab a coke.”

Suddenly, Jack was alone in that nightmarish hallway, with nothing but the dancing shadows to keep him company. He looked around at the bleak hall and shivered. It was eerie, the idea of being around so many people but still being utterly alone. He glanced back at the cell. Rhett was still in the corner, muttering something. He spoke, but his voice was small, and it bounced off the walls with a ghoulish echo,

“Rhett?”

The figure immediately stopped shaking. A beat. Two. Then,

“What do you want, kid?”

Jack pauses for a moment, thinking about the vending machine two hallways down calling his name. He desperately wanted to turn tail and leave, as he always did. Instead, Jack planted his feet and pressed his hand against the glass.

“I want to help you.”

A noise came from him, a startling, crazed sound. Laughter. Rhett laughed at him in a taunting tone.

“Go for it, Jack.”

Poor guy, Jack thought to himself, he’s probably just lonely.

“I think you’re a good person, or so I’ve heard. I think you could easily recover from your incident. There’s- wait. How did you know my name?”

He shouldn’t have known it. No one called him by it at the hospital. He had no name tag. For the first time, Rhett met his eyes, and Jack wished he hadn’t. They were endless pools of petrifying blue.

“I think you know the answer to that.”

It was impossible. Absolutely impossible. Rhett sauntered up to the glass and pressed his hand in the same place Jack’s was.

“And no, I’m not lonely at all.”