Hexad: The Ward (16 page)

"I'm listening." Amanda nodded her head eagerly.

"If you begin to believe in this time travel nonsense, or that the other women look like you, or anything else that you know is a sure sign of a relapse, then I will expect you to ask to see me immediately. Is that understood?" Amanda nodded her head, foul smelling hair stinging her eyes as it dropped in front of her face. "Good girl. We all want you to get better, but you have to help too, you have to keep reminding yourself that you are still delusional. But I don't think you are a risk to yourself or others any longer, so let's see how it goes, shall we?"

"Yes, thank you."

Hector walked across the plush carpet to the door and opened it, called quietly for Nurse Emily, who seemed to have nothing better to do than wait for her.

"In a few days I'll see you again, but remember what I said: the first sign of a relapse you ask to see me."

"I'll remember, and thank you again, Hector."

I'm free. No, Amanda, you aren't. No, I suppose not, but I'm more free than I have been in months, and that's a good start, isn't it? Maybe, just be careful. Oh, I will.

"What was that?" asked Hector, staring at her intensely.

Did I say that out loud. Don't ruin it now, Amanda, not when you are so close.

"Nothing, just saying thank you again. Goodbye."

"Goodbye, Amanda. Be well."

You can count on it, dickhead. Did I say that out loud?
Amanda glanced nervously at Hector, but he had already returned to his desk and was busy shuffling papers.

"Come on, it's a big day for you, Amanda," said Nurse Emily, running back in to grab the straitjacket, looking at Amanda's bare arms and the curve of her chest now she was down to her white vest.

She must have known I was going back into gen pop,
thought Amanda, worrying slightly as Nurse Emily rushed past her then glanced back, eyes drawn down from her face to her torso.
This is why I'm never allowed to shower myself, nothing to do with self-harm.

Amanda shook her lank hair — she was thinking too much, letting bad thoughts enter her head. This was what Hector had warned her about.

Be good. Be good.

New Friends

37 Years Future

Amanda settled into life mixing with the other women better than she would have imagined — they all seemed really nice. Nice, but loopy. For the first few days she walked around in a drug-stupor, unable to think about anything apart from shuffling one foot in front of another, hitching up the white institutional clothes so she didn't trip over her own feet.

She was lost inside herself, unable to bring thoughts to the surface and hold them, just a bystander waving as the fluffy clouds drifted by languidly, listening to the background noise of the seagulls she slowly came to realize was the chatter of the other women.

Some of them were in worse shape than her, but clearly still allowed their freedom, whilst others seemed rather animated at certain times of the day — usually before it was time to top up on their medications which were now dispensed to them individually by Nurse Emily as they lined up orderly to get their meals.

What a revelation and a treat that was: to use a plastic fork and even a spoon, move her own arm from the plate to her mouth, chew whilst sat on a chair like an almost normal human being. She kept her head down, literally, for a few days and her few moments of lucidity allowed her to understand that she was on a higher dose of medication and being watched carefully to ensure she behaved. There was nothing to worry about, she couldn't have done anything even if she'd wanted to.

In fact, all she wanted to do as the days wore on and her head cleared because of the lowered dosage, was to shower.

Ah, the luxury of standing in the stall, letting the isolation of the dividing walls allow her to feel free for a few minutes, let the steaming water spray over her pale skin, touch her tight belly and tickle her breasts like a lover she felt she would never have again, if she ever had. She would think of Dale, the man she loved, and question if it was him that had committed her, maybe for her own good, and couldn't help but wonder if she would ever see him again.

Hector had told her that her past was not to be discussed, not until she was properly well and her delusional state was well behind her. He had said it could cause a serious relapse to think about such things, let alone to talk about them. There would be time enough later, first she had to get well.

So the thoughts of Dale faded each time the water washed away the dirt of the day, and Amanda focused on shampooing and conditioning her hair, scrubbing her skin until it glowed pink and shone. It was her time, doing what she loved, some peace from the madness of The Ward that sometimes threatened to overwhelm her even though it was still better than the solitude of her cell.

It was no easy thing to cope with. Without the daily showers where she could gather her thoughts, summon up courage and mental fortitude, tell herself to just do what was expected and ignore the glaring contradictions of The Ward, then she knew she would have gone haywire very quickly. But the water scalded her skin and brought her alive, and making herself look pretty, if a little angular around the face and hip, gave her enough to cope — just.

They could roam the communal areas of The Ward from after breakfast until it was time to retire for the evening, and even then you were never alone. The women were housed in one large room, bunk beds lining either side of the narrow but long space, reminding Amanda of army barracks she had seen in movies. When she first saw it she burst out laughing and got a stern look from Nurse Emily and a deep scowl from Laffer, who was always there at morning call and lights out, just in case.

"What's so funny?" asked Nurse Emily.

"Oh, nothing, I'm just so happy," lied Amanda, when secretly she was imagining what must have been at least fifty women being told to "Get down and give me ten" and maybe have to polish their boots. One thing was for certain, these soldiers most definitely would not be given guns.

On it went, day after day. Slowly, her mind returned, but it was changed. She was a different woman and she knew it. Her past felt so distant, like it genuinely hadn't happened, and a large part of her supposed that it hadn't. After all, time travel? Factories, The Chamber, taking her spinal fluid to power such devices, of course it was a hallucination, a breakdown.

Hector had explained it to her, saying that when she arrived she was a gibbering wreck, and that after her lumbar puncture she further constructed her story, only now it included an endless procession of Amandas to power these things called Hexads. She had simply allowed her mind to embellish her story to accommodate what was an unfortunate but necessary procedure.

Amanda didn't understand why the lumbar punctures were necessary, she thought they were more to test for things like meningitis, but Hector had explained that the procedure was quite common and a lot of the women had it performed regularly — it was often the root cause of mental illness, namely that they had abnormal production of cerebrospinal fluid that was way too high and the increased pressure on the brain caused by the elevated fluid levels resulted in mental confusion in some cases, or more serious mental breakdown, hallucinations and sometimes even complete loss of consciousness and a vegetative state. In severe cases even death.

So, hard as it was, she accepted that the procedure must be performed weekly, and the more times she underwent it the more likely she was to regain her true memories and become the person she once was. Hector had smiled and said that he would very much like to meet that woman, and that he could tell she was very happy and energetic really.

It all made perfect sense, and now that Amanda could think about it then it did sound plausible.

The one thing that held her back from accepting what she was told, and what was done to her, was that she was living her life surrounded by other women who all looked exactly the same.

However hard she tried to perform the mental exercises that Hector made her promise to practice every morning and evening, she couldn't shake off the lack of different facial features. She lied to Hector, told him that of course the women didn't all look the same, but he'd caught her out easily when Nurse Emily had brought in a number of women to his office and she was asked to describe them.

Inevitably, she'd got it totally wrong — how could she possibly know what they really looked like when all she saw was dark sunken eyes, the blue barely visible under the stress of mental illness, and blond hair, a pale, freckled face and fear. Always fear.

Hector had told her to keep practicing, to imagine they looked different, even if that meant just making facial features up, and soon enough the true faces of the others would reveal themselves to her.

Weeks later, it was working. Amanda made certain to practice as often as she could, giving the different women a specific set of imaginary features, and every time she looked at one she would paint that composite face in her mind, until it became second nature and the vision of herself staring back at her in various states of depression, mania, happiness or preoccupation, was replaced by nothing but smiling brunettes with nice makeup, or pale redheads, or gorgeous, dark-skinned African ladies, or slender Japanese women with perfect features straight out of Manga.

It made such a difference to how she interacted with the women. As she sat there talking about nothing much to the few women that would talk to her, she could have a conversation as long as she kept up the pretense, until it was no longer a pretense and it became second nature. She was talking to women that looked different to herself. They were from some far-flung corner of the country or another one entirely, they absolutely did not look exactly like her, just maybe a little fatter or thinner with shorter or longer hair and a better or worse complexion.

The only thing really missing was conversation with any real depth. They were absolutely not allowed to use their names, this was a strict rule and if anyone was caught using their name then they were sent immediately back to isolation — Amanda had it drummed into her and she never heard a name mentioned, the fear of being alone for months at a time, strapped up tight and eating like an animal was enough of a motivator for even the most seemingly lost of the patients.

There was to be no talk of their past. For many it would seriously endanger their recovery, and there was to be no talk of personal matters of any kind. The women obeyed, policing themselves rather strictly, but always watched over by Nurse Emily and Laffer. If that wasn't enough, then there was the constant reminder that they were being observed as the cameras dotted around the various rooms moved and followed them. It meant talk was superficial, often brief, but at least there was a sense of freedom of sorts.

Amanda read books, the choices heavily censored, watched documentaries on their TV — there was no remote and no choice in what was viewed — and every week the women were taken away and given their lumbar punctures, as this was an institution where women were sent that suffered from the condition brought on by the excess fluid.

Apart from this weekly degradation, along with the meetings with Hector, they were mostly left to their own devices during the daytime. There were chores to be done, of course: floors to be mopped, showers stalls to be cleaned, meals to be prepared and dishes to be washed, but the jobs rotated often unless somebody showed real aptitude for one or the other, and much of the day was theirs to do with as they wished.

As time passed, Amanda had no idea how long she had been in either isolation or the general population, so the meds were lowered until one day Amanda woke to find she could think clearly for the first time since she didn't know when. Maybe it was the first time.

She lay on her top bunk listening to the sounds of fifty women waking and going about their normal morning business, getting ready to walk off single file to the bathroom in shifts, then for breakfast, and it was as if she heard the clatter, the moans, the groans, the manic laughter and the crying for the first time since she'd arrived.

It was the stuff of nightmares.

How had she not heard such sorrow, such pain, before? How had she blocked out the cries for help, the quiet mutterings, the stink? The place smelled really bad, or was it just her own body? Amanda sniffed an arm. Nope, it was fine, but sniffing the air she thought she detected the overpowering smell — it was cabbage. Of course, they ate it a lot. It was the kind of institutional cooking that would never win any awards, and the whole place stank of badly cooked food.

Amanda lay still for as long as she could, dreading what would greet her when she finally got up. She felt alive, whole, like she could think if she were given time to do so, not that she would be that lucky now for the rest of the day.

Amanda shuffled onto her belly on the itchy top blanket and peered cautiously over the edge of the bunk, battling between inquisitiveness and dread at what she would see. She stared at the brown tiles for what felt like the longest time, until finally she summoned up reserves of courage and raised her head to take in the room as a whole.

She gripped the edge of the bed to stop herself falling off the bunk, her worst fears come to life. She looked again, she had to, to be sure, to know she wasn't just imagining it.

Amanda stared at a roomful of Amandas. Same features, same hair color, same eyes and freckles, the only difference between them was how far gone into themselves they actually were. Some were smiling, lost in their own worlds, others stared at the floor, limp hair hiding their features for the most part. Some whistled tunelessly, happily getting dressed, but most were simply broken, as if they too knew what they would see if they raised their gaze from the floor or the walls, most performing their morning rituals without ever once looking at the other women they shared their lives with.