#findthetruthbook

Chapter 1: Psych

15 years later

“Autumn, wake up!”

I shoot up out of bed, gasping for breath and looking around my sparse room. Nobody but me in here, it was just as bare as when I fell asleep, with a bed, nightstand and a folded pair of clothes. I groggily rub my eyes and yawn. Here’s to yet another day in this looney bin.

I hear a knock at my door and before I could answer, a nurse came in carrying a tray with a cup of water and a cup of pills. He bends down and hands me both, watching me take them. He wraps his fingers around my hair slowly while watching me, to see what I would do. I do nothing and just stare at the wall as he sets the tray on the side table and leans toward me while unbuttoning his scrub bottoms. “Please don’t,” I whisper. He grabs the back of my head roughly with his other hand and pulls me towards where his pants were just barely lowering on his hips, when all of a sudden, we hear a loud alarm. He curses and buttons his pants again and rushes out.

I lay back down and contemplate my life here, waiting for the pills to kick in so I didn’t have to feel anything. The same non-feeling I have felt for the past however many years since coming here.

The alarm outside of my open door is still blaring. My curiosity got the better of me so I get up to investigate what is going on. As soon as I get to my door, a bunch of workers run by yelling to get back into my room and close the door. They don’t stop. I look both ways and slide out of my door in the opposite direction. The first cross section is deserted except for one lone person moaning and rocking back and forth against the wall.

“What’s going on?” I ask. She just keeps moaning and rocking but now she is pulling at her hair.

“Psycho,” I mutter.

I keep walking around, trying to figure out what is going on. I don’t see anybody in the dining room, the entertainment room, or the hallways. All of a sudden, I get dizzy and sway towards the wall. My medication was finally kicking in. That is when I see a lone figure in the middle of the hallway some thirty yards away.

“Damn Haldol.” I mutter, thinking of how realistic this mirage was but he wasn’t moving. He was looking at me funny actually.

“What the hell are you looking at?” I slur loudly.

“Autumn?” He asks, while walking fast towards me,

I stumble backwards while saying, “N-no, I’m felicity. You got the wrong person. It happens man, I have got to meet this Autumn person-“

He gets close enough for me to make out more of his features instead of the hazy outline before. He’s tall! I could climb him like a tree, or a mountain. I’ve never seen the mountains. I start grinning because I am dreaming of hiking when he stops right in front of me. His green eyes flashing with jade fire.

“This is you right here, is it not?” He says, holding up a picture of me taken just a few months ago against the sterile wall of my room. I had nothing to say to this, just stared at the picture. They do not allow mirrors in the building, so I have not seen myself since I was admitted here years ago. I was fascinated with the picture; of my outrageous curly auburn hair, freckles, cerulean blue eyes, and pale, almost translucent skin.

“Are you done? We need to go now!” He says, grabbing my arm.

That is what broke my trance, “What do you mean go? We? I don’t know you asshole!” I try to shake him off but he tightens his grip on me, dragging me behind him while looking around us.

He stops and turns towards me. He stares right into my eyes and says something that will change the course of the rest of my life.

Before

“Autumn. Wake up.”

Someone is shaking me awake. I open my eyes and see my trusted friends, the ones only I could see with my nine year old self, the Shadow People. They talk to me, warn me of dangers, like now.

They are worked up, twitching and fading in and out right next to my bed. “What is it?” I ask of them. They start tugging at my arms and legs, trying to pull me up and out of bed, and that is when I hear the pounding at the door downstairs. “Someone is here to take you!” They rasped out, rushing to get me somewhere safe. I hear the front door slam open and boots stomping up the steps. The Shadows successfully pull me under the bed just in time for my door to burst open. I look out and see a pair of big boots walking slowly toward me. I hold my breath, hoping he does not hear me, whoever he is.

I hear my mom crying and screaming downstairs and my dad whispering to her. I must have made a sound because all of a sudden the man leans down and yanks me out from under the bed, kicking and screaming. He drags me down the stairs, past my parents, who I hear saying, “We’re so sorry” and “you’ll be in a better place.” The man took me outside, where it was creeping towards twilight, the very last time I will see this setting as a child.

I can hear the man talking to my parents, telling them they will take care of me where I was going. “She won’t believe in the lies she tells people anymore.” He tells them.

My father responds with, “She won’t be a freak as long as she is there and under medications.”

I shiver. The shadows wrap themselves around me, a cold and comfortable blanket in my confused mind.