The House of Retreat
By Azure Sky
Chapter 1
Tannia’s Day
It was a lot colder today, than I thought it would be. The weather station had said it would be cloudy, but a warm wind from the south would make the drizzle bearable. No rain or even snow, thank God. But I’m here standing at the station and the wind stings me right in my eyes. I shiver a lot, actually I think I have the shakes. It’s an internal thing.
Sorry.
I’m thinking about the weather. That’s boring. Cripes, that’s boring.
I don’t know what to think about. I pace a lot. I try not to, because people will stare at me if I do it too much. But, the train should come every 20 minutes. At least. At least 20 minutes. I feel as though its been a bloody half hour. I know it has to come soon, but you know me. I wonder sometimes if it won’t ever come. What would I do?
I’d just lie on the sidewalk and die. Eventually. I wish I was home now. Or what passes as home now, such as it is. I don’t want to get on public transportation with unknown strangers who may or may not be nice. I know, I know when anyone stares at me, they aren’t paying attention to me. They are thinking about themselves. But I can’t help it when I go by them and they glance. I have to wonder, what are they thinking?
I’ve discussed this with Dr. Holden. I have an anxiety disorder. I fear public places. I fear ridicule and rejection to the point that I am paranoid. Afraid of the outside world. I’m so depressed now, I feel like “how many days can I go on”? This is something I’m working on and I’m getting help and I will get better. I guess.
I feel so bitter. I dunno, this should be an OK day, but it feels like a blah day. It’s just my mind making me think that. The medication and the therapy should, if all goes well, change that. I fear change, but part of me also strives for it. Desires it.
OK. I can hear the humming of the approaching carriage. This makes my heart skip a beat, because now I know I’m a few steps away from eventual sanctuary. But the hard part remains. I still have to get on the train. With them.
I look around, and pull my toque tighter down on my head. It doesn’t matter how much lower I can pull it down, I won’t disappear from the other commuters. I know I shouldn’t be so self-conscious about how I look. But I do. I think about it all the time. My black cap tries it’s best to cover my wispy blonde hair. Yep, I’m a blonde. But since its shoulder length it still tucks out, and you can see my bangs in all their glory. Girls can’t really hide their hair, even though some days we wish we could.
Why don’t I like people to view my hair? Because although I’m a natural blonde, the simple matter is that, I don’t take care of my hair properly. Like I should. I’m not a drop dead gorgeous bombshell. My hair is not platinum pretty. It’s frizzled, dull, and dry. I do just enough in the morning to get by, in the day to day world. I know, I know if I’m not satisfied with it, why don’t I just get a dye job and have a new hairstyle? Why? Because that would be fake. It wouldn’t be me. I’m Tannia and I will never be a Britney. I suffer for my principles.
Here I am, already a senior student, without one steady boyfriend. What is wrong with me? Everyone goes out and has sex with someone. Not me.
The train shuttle has arrived and its starting to slow down and open it’s doors, so everyone can make a mad dash for whatever seats are left. I continue to look down at the ground, shuffle my feet, every so often, waiting for the last few to go in. I prefer to wait behind in a lineup.
Here I am, blonde, blue eyed, young but old enough to know better, and average looking. I’m not ugly. God, even I know that. But I can’t shake the feeling that I’m not as feminine as I should be. I mean giving me the look over, I’m 5′9, not too tall and not too short. Height isn’t a concern, but I fear if I’m too tall, I’ll look butchy. Athletic build, with a bit of a stomach, that I use my jeans and belt to reign in. Breasts are average too. I keep telling myself they will grow bigger, but then I secretly fear maybe they will get too big, and then I’ll be a freak. No OK. I’m a Plain Jane. I can live with that. It’s coping that’s hard.
Maybe I should talk to Judice, or I mean Dr. Holden about how I feel. For the past weeks, every session, I just don’t say much. She asks questions, I blurt out answers, she tells me how I am feeling and why I am feeling. But I never get the answers I want to hear. Only the answers that I have to hear.
After she told me that the answer to my problems would be medication, I was sceptical, but she assured me it was for the good of my “reasoning”. She told me that regardless if this did that to me or it’s the air I breathe or it’s all genetic, it didn’t matter. I remember being so out of it that day, that session particularly, but by the end I was in tears, asking her, to please help me. She said she would try.
So here I am, making the best of whatever life I have left. I shudder when I think about the day it could have all ended. I still wish inside I’d just fall off the face of the earth. But, to do so makes me quiver. The worst of it is, is that I put it behind me every waking hour, except every week, when I’m in her office. It all comes back to me there. It’s impossible not to go there. Judice has ways of knowing exactly what I am feeling, even what I am thinking. She diagnosed me from the get go, and knew where to go with her questioning. She may be the only person who knows who I am. She may know me more than I know myself.
That’s one reason I’m resigned to be treated by her. I have no doubts about her therapy. She knows me, I feel that personally, if she truly does know my soul, she will also know what’s best for me too. I’ve put myself in her hands. It’s the one choice so far in my life that I feel confident enough.
That’s the other reason too. Putting my complete self to her. By being under her in a session I feel the weight of the world off my shoulders. In fact after every session, it pains me even more to wait for the next one. Why?
Simple. She can invoke a state of my mind that only I can dare to daydream about. Other than mostly chatting, she uses relaxing techniques, NLP, and hypnosis. Yes, I too was wary. But when we tried it out, I found myself at first not really getting it. Then as sessions went on, I got more involved with the therapy, MY therapy. I was afraid about what I’ve heard about. The stories. But when I realized that I knew everything that was going on in the sessions, I was completely in the pilot seat, I felt more at ease. As weeks went on, after every session I would think to myself, “hey I’m still plain old miserable me”. I found no alterations that I could possibly surmise. There seemed to be no change in me at all. In fact it frustrated me to think that worse than maybe being taken advantage of, I would instead get no benefit at all.
But, as I thought about it, as I adapted to the road my life could have turned to on that day, as I felt better about leaving home and living in a new bedroom where I could live side by side with girls my age who have their own problems too, things didn’t seem that BAD.
Getting on the train, I notice there are of course no empty seats, and I have to stand up. I’m bundled up in my overcoat, again something I feel awkward about since I should have a nicer, in style jacket. But I don’t. I use this layer of clothing sort of as defence. As I hold on to the bar, as the train movers, I withdraw into my coat as a turtle goes into its shell.
I think of nothing. I drift. I pay no attention to the other passengers. I drift. I think about Judice, and her relaxing conversations. I think of nothing. I start to think about Jackie, my roommate. I think about the two of them. I feel kinda queer, like I have strange thoughts that run through my head. Like sappy thoughts. Like gee, it’s great that if I have no friends, at least I have Judice and Jackie. They’re the only ones now that resemble anything close to friends. I drift with my idle thoughts, thinking about what it’s like to be loved.
Abruptly the train stops at a station, and people load off and a few come aboard. I feel alert all of a sudden, since I just snapped out of the revelry of my new best “buddies”. God, I need a life.
I see a vacant seat, in fact I see two vacant seats. So I can sit by my lonesome.
I squat my ass down, and put my purse on my lap. Just taking it off my shoulders, I can feel the sting of weariness as if I shouldn’t have been standing up for all that time. I recline back with the luxury of knowing that there is no one to disturb my body with. I slump over, and already I feel seventy percent more relieved to have sat down, and not be standing up.
For once since I’ve walked onto the train, I survey the people that are my fellow travellers. Other than some older women, an old coughing man, a couple young boys, and a girl around my age(she’s fat and looks Hispanic?), I spy a punk with his cap ass-backward on his head. I try not to be obvious in my study of him since he is the only male specimen that I can see worth seeing.
But already my assessment isn’t going to be good. See I may have a low opinion of myself, but that doesn’t mean I also don’t hold others up to high standards too. As I can see with my first glances his face is acne ridden, not in a severe way, but a dermatologist would have a field day with him. Actually, if I had zit scars, I would probably have to see a cosmetic surgeon. I take in his clothes and I’m again not impressed, his white boy wannabe gangsta style is a total turnoff for me. Ugh. His body, too boney and lanky. Well I guess he’s decent, but he’s no prize to me.
I think about my comments about him, and wonder to myself, what’s with me. No wonder, I don’t have a steady guy. I do this on purpose. Every male I see, regardless of who they are, I do two things. First I either say they are not good for me or I say even if they are, they wouldn’t be interested in me in the first place. Girl, no wonder why I’m fucking single. I can’t get past reality. I’m freshman age and already I’ve resigned myself to being an old maid.
I give up trying and slump over my right arm against the window, and close my eyes. The drifting of the train helps with the drifting of my thoughts. Since I have nothing better to occupy my mind, I go back to thinking about Dr. Judice Holden. I think about the way she smiles, her pink tinted wire-rimmed glasses, her very nice looking and expensive suit jacket, her near model make-up, her jet black hair, that’s nicely tied up in a professional but enticing manner.
Enticing? I stir again, when the train reaches the next stop. I again am drowsy, and disoriented when I open my eyes. The punk-ass boy leaves the shuttle when the doors open, and a “I shit you not” vision of loveliness enters the train. I glance at her with my half open eyes, my curiosity pulls at me, making me wonder where she will plant herself. She looks around for a half second, and my heart skips for the second time today. I know she will sit down here next to me in the vacant seat. As she walks up the row, I slowly close my eyes as if I am nodding off. It’s all I can do from looking at her. Her beauty and style are so intimidating, I can’t bear to look at her.
My eyes are tightly clenched, but I am all too aware of my surroundings. I feel her shimmy up close to me and sit down next to me. I feel her slight weight, on my side that then shifts forward. I can tell she is looking through her purse, for what I do not know, but as the doors close and the train begins to move, I silently curse myself that I have to be so inept even around another girl. Although I can’t see her, in my minds eye, I remember what she looks like from the quick glance that I shot at her. She’s Caucasian, brunette with red highlights streaking her shoulder length hair, about my approximate height, although she is wearing high heals. She is slimmer than me by at least ten pounds, and is for sure wearing more trendier clothes than me. She is not as bundled up for the weather as I am. She wears a tan leather jacket with an obvious tight top that shows her ample tits underneath. And I can feel from the way her leg rubs against mine she is in tight denim jeans. All in all what many would consider a knockout.
I know, because even with the microseconds of a snapshot I got of her I can tell her face is model perfect as opposed to my rounder, more common face. Her foundation, eyeliner, and the works show she takes great stride in the detail of her profile as opposed to my slapped on face paint.
As I go over her details, I suddenly realize something else that doesn’t make me feel any more comfortable. Her weight, her presence, it’s almost as if she purposefully leans in to me to get my attention. As the train rocks and rolls along, so do I as I fake nodding off, and as she sinks her body into mine, we both rock with the train like babies in a cradle.
I expect that she will probably get off on the next stop, but she doesn’t. As time passes I also begin to notice that I can feel her heat. The heat of her weight on my weight, gives off an aura of radiation. I already feel stifled in my big overcoat, and I again curse that, I should have brought a lighter more fashionable jacket with me to school today. But it can’t be helped now.
I know I have several stops to go before I get to my current “home”. The girls shelter for girls who “just need a place to relax and sort their minds out so they can go on with their life’s journey”. I dreaded the place more than my home when my parents insisted I be sent there as per Dr. Holden’s wishes. After the accident, after that day I shudder when I think about it. I’d think I would be relieved to be away from my house, away from that bitch who only pretends to be my parent, but as I said I can dread change, but recently I’ve begun to form into it.
I have several stops so I have at least a half hour to doze off. Since I’m not going anywhere, I continue to lay inert on my seat, as the girl continues to almost snuggle against me. In almost an intimate way I feel I am connected to her, I find that thinking about her image and then thinking about Judice makes me feel for the first time that all the spiel that Judice gave to me about womanhood, it starts to make sense to me now. Maybe I do have to get in touch with my inner side, the one that I refuse to let out. Thinking about the doctor, relaxes me, and then the girl no matter how radiantly beautiful, is now no longer so intimidating.
I wonder to myself if I should open my eyes and introduce myself to her, chit chat. I feel it would be rude to totally sluff her off since she hasn’t done me any harm at all and she seems possibly nice and not like the stuck up girls I had to deal with in high school. I feel any minute now I will get the courage and stir to get her attention, but something holds me back. No, I feel that the girl doesn’t care about me taking a nap, she is content with reclining against me while I relax, in fact I begin to feel that although we haven’t spoken a single word, she is urging me to take my rest. Yes, in fact I feel like I have her permission to drift off, so I don’t argue and I do.
I close my eyes tighter, I breathe deeply and let out a contented sigh. I finally have found my haven today, I can feel pure relaxation drift over me, much like the sensations I get from Dr. Judice.
Judice.
Somehow like a mother to me. Somehow like a friend to me. A special friend.
I tell myself she is a good friend in a world where I can’t trust anyone.
I tell myself this, and even though I yawn I can feel the stretches of the first smile I have taken today on my weary face.
I’m so tired now. “Must be the medication”, I grumble to myself, although I have spoken my words aloud, so that anyone can hear me.
Although I spoke to no one in particular, and even though I don’t see her with my eyes, I know the redhead heard me and she smiled. She smiled at my comment, and she seems to tell me that I should rest then because the medication is making me a sleepyhead. Rest, and I will look after you while we drift and rock.
I drift, slump, rock, and go down into complete solitude.
I don’t know when it was that I actually went to sleep.
Actually as far as I know I never went to sleep. For when I am under, it’s like I’m in the pilot’s seat. It’s like a video game. You are not really awake, not really asleep. That’s the.... words escape me, then come back to me. It’s the trance. I smile again. Because I know that the trance isn’t really awake, hence not really alive. I am not in the real world. I’m wherever I want to go and Judice is my guide.
Through her therapy, her pills, her talks, her hypnosis, her sweet trances, where I don’t have to feel like a Plain Jane. Here in trance, I am Tannia, and that’s all I need to be, because Judice tells me so.
Judice is in my thoughts, as always. I never really realize how much I think about her until I see her. In fact, when I rest my eyes, I can think about Judice whenever I feel like it. I think of her, and therefore she appears to guide me in the dreams I have. All dreams. The good ones the bad ones.
I think about the girl. I wonder what her name is.
April.
Of course. It makes so much sense. Of course she is April. I know it to be true because not only does April tell me so does the doctor.
I see both of them. We are in Judice’s office. No, not her office. Our home. The place where I live now.
I never recall April being at the house, but so many girls pass through there, from what I understand. I think about the girls. I’m fairly new here, so I try to put names to faces. It’s difficult to remember because I feel like I am drifting and while I am relaxing, I’m talking to Judice and staring at April’s nice body.
It comes to me in waves. There’s Jackie of course, my roomie, my friend. Fiona, she’s so nice, but ever so quiet.
Rhea.
Louise.
I shudder again, when I think of Alex.
But Judice speaks again, I fall silent because I want to hear her.
What she says, so soothes me. It soothes me so.
Somehow I notice that April, silly girl, has a tattoo on her belly by her bush. I chuckle, because I think it’s funny that I can see her body. All her body. I don’t feel afraid to see her body.
No, girls bodies are not to be feared. Judice told me she knows I am shy around girls but Judice also knows that I like to look at girls.
She knows I like to look at pictures of girls.
She tells me that April is just like a picture, that I’m to look at April, and I can touch her too, if I want.
I think can I? But before I can decide April takes my hand in hers. It’s cold to the touch, but she begins to gently glide her hand up and down till it feels warm.
Judice knows my mind, my body, my soul.
She tells me that she knows that I think I’m not pretty, but she tells me that I am.
April says yes, too. They both say I am pretty. I don’t know what to say. So I say nothing.
April looks me in the eyes. I feel their warmth.
She does what I wish she would. She reaches for my back, pulls me in, and kisses me on the lips as she embraces me, pulls me in to her, guides my hands on her cold, ivory tits, that my hands start to warm.
I see nothing. It’s dark, but I can see myself and April. Together. But, I realize now.
I am pretty. I feel pretty. I know I am pretty.
As I drift on. I feel warmth. The warmth of April’s body pressed to mine, chest to chest, tits to tits. The warmth of the tears that stream down my eyes and fall on to my breasts. The warmth of the words that Judice whispers hotly in my ears. The warmth that I feel below me as more drops run down my leg from my thigh to my ankle.
I hear myself smiling as I start to count down, my tears still running knowing I must return back to the awakeness.
Back to sleep.
As I drift and I think of nothing. Nothing but Judice.
I jump up with a start, my eyes bug out, and I realize that I nodded off. I got that nap that I wanted. For a few seconds, I can’t remember where I am. But when I hear the train call out the stop and hear the doors open with a swish, it comes back to me swiftly. And I notice that the redhead isn’t beside me.
Almost reluctantly I sit up, gather my things and start to shuffle off. I’m so sluggish that I nearly miss the doors as they start to close, and with a startle I quickly dart out of the train. I keep the momentum and go up the steps, not paying any attention with what any of the other passengers are staring at. At me hopefully not. My legs feel like lead, and I mumble to myself about the medication and how damn drowsy it’s making me feel. I remember her, the girl, and suddenly pivot around to see if she’s still in the station, but from what I can tell, she’s not.
It’s only a few short blocks from the station to the house, and with that thought, my mind is hellbent on getting to the house ASAP It seems like miles though, and the agonizing 15 minutes seem to go on, until finally I make it to my street.
The house is more like an apartment complex, a condo building actually. When I reach the place, my new place of residence, my home away from home, it dawns on me, that I may actually have seen the redhead on the train before. My memory escapes me as to where, and I knot my face up in a frown thinking hard about it. But I suddenly realize how tired I am, and move towards the door. I pull out my electronic swipe card that’s used as a key to get inside. With a few swipes since it doesn’t always connect right away, the door buzzes and I walk in.
I feel so overwhelmed. Coming into the foyer, something strange hits me, I get a feeling of dread. Once again, I can’t place my feelings. Just like Dr. Holden tells me, I have high anxiety and for no feasible reason, I have to feel awful, even though nothing is wrong. I tell myself nothing is wrong, its only my head.
I shout hello several times, but I don’t get an answer.
Without doing anything else I head straight to my room. Upstairs as I reach to unlock my door I realize that I hadn’t locked it in the first place. I curse myself for being stupid, as I don’t know the girls very well, there can be very much a good chance things can go missing in my room. I slam my door shut and begin to take off my coat and clothes.
I suddenly hear stirring in one of the other girl’s rooms. As quickly as the muffled sound came, it quickly exited too as I don’t hear anything else. It’s almost like the girls don’t want me to know if they are here or not. Figures. As I start to pull off my boots, I configure in my head where the rest of my girls are that I share this shack with, would be. Jackie works during in the day and goes out constantly at night, returning in the early hours. Although I get along with Jackie in a sort of big sister little sister way, its pretty evident why she is here. From what I understand, to put it bluntly she is something of a whore and has had tons of problems with men in the past. Drugs probably too. The other girls I hardly have spoken too since I got here.
I opened my door, to put my boots outside in the hall, and I could hear the gentle strumming of guitar licks coming from Fiona the hippie chick’s room. So she was here all this time. I guess she pretty much kept to herself, and other than being maybe a little strange, I found her pleasant enough to deal with. I had no idea why she came here, but it was probably drug related too. It didn’t strike me odd that Rhea and Louise were not here, since Rhea was the grease monkey who worked at the garage during the day, and Louise was a student like myself.
But speak of the devil, just as I gingerly walked over to the communal bathroom we all shared upstairs, Louise’s bedroom door opened and out walked Rhea. She closed the door behind her and briskly put on her boots and then began to trample downstairs without even a glance in my direction. I wasn’t sure what that was meant to mean, but I gathered when I hollered out if anyone was home, I guess Rhea was and was keeping quiet. I began to brush my teeth, and even though I was super tired, the thought occurred to me that maybe Louise was home too. She may have been in her room with Rhea. It didn’t really shock me as it was pretty obvious that Rhea was very butch, but Louise I couldn’t place. She was actually quite the attractive one in the house, with long dark wavy hair, and beauty queen looks. But she always seemed to rub me the wrong way and she came off as snotty, well to me at least.
When I came back to my room, my bed looked very inviting, and suddenly the day seemed so long in comparison. Although I felt I was sent to this clinic house by mistake at first, I had to admit I did at least like the fact there was no bitchy mother, always on my ass about everything. I looked forward to having an early night. After changing into my night gown and lying down, I realized that something was missing. It looked as though my body was telling me that I would have to do my usual routine before I got any shuteye.
Although I really hate to dwell on it, without having a steady boyfriend since high school, the reality has set in that a woman still has needs. The problem is, what outlet do I need to use in order to release those needs? I found that I actually had someone to listen to me in the form of Dr. Holden. Judice although very frank about a girl’s sexual needs and she would talk on end about safe sex and masturbation, she also had a very simple real world slant to it. When talking with her nothing seemed dirty. True, she was a doctor, but when she talked about sex she told me in a manner that seemed down to earth for me and not just some technical medical jargon.
I’ve probably done this hundreds of times, but even when I go to pull out my magazines from my mattress, the guilt still comes over me. Looking at my stack of mags, the thought has never escaped me that this is the sort of thing that adolescent boys would do, not women who would eventually get college educations, get married, have kids. In my head I could hear the echoing of my mother telling me over and over what’s proper for a girl to do. When that happens and I think about my mom, I know how to counteract it, by thinking about Judice, my alternative mom as I’ve coined her to be. Her knowledge about the female body, and how sex is important to empower the female self.
I know the magazines that I look at have mostly women in them, but I don’t find that really gay. Really in a sense it’s what’s being portrayed in the pictures, especially the bondage one that I have that I find tantalizing. It’s women showing off their unabashed beauty, and I used to not really be all that in favour of women flaunting their bodies as it were. But lately, ever since the last year of high school to the sessions with Judice, my sex drive and outlook on life have since been jump started into a whole new direction. One that certainly will eventually I hope make me immune to guilt and ridicule. I hope never to go down the path I once considered ever again, and if staying here while I’m “ill” may cure me, I will try my best to give it a shot.
The hardships of the day at college and having to go out into the public that I so feared, began to melt away as I scanned the dirty images of women being in pleasure. Pleasure. It was such an alien word to me. My depression allowed very little in my life to make me feel alive, but there was no denying that sex could very well open myself to happiness. Looking at a feisty redhead in handcuffs kneeling before a sultry brunette, conjured up images of the girl I saw on the train today, and for some reason Dr. Holden.
Actually it was no surprise maybe about Judice, entering a bit of my fantasies. Like I said before regardless if she used hypnosis on me in our sessions together, she showed me just how much I can take control of my own life and use sex to enhance it.
After realizing I could be deeply hypnotized, I was no longer reluctant when I knew that Judice could in no way change me to someone I didn’t want to be. So when she asked if I wanted to not only experience trance without the use of a hypnotist but also sex without the use of a partner, I willingly agreed.
I know although I resented at first being sent here, just because I thought I knew what was best for me, and that happened to be nothing, I eventually came to realize at least some potential. I remember that session vividly. Instead of talking me through the usual relaxation technique, I was told by Judice I could experience both trance and orgasm by looking into the flame of a candle. That was it, it was that simple. I didn’t believe her at first, but she had me concentrate on the flame and spoke to me in a more suggestive way than ever before. Before it was more technical, but now it was erotic. I don’t remember much, other than finally I could see literally in the flame the women from the magazines I used to masturbate with. After an intense display of what I perceived as women from my deepest imagination being pleasured, I awoke to find myself in the midst of an orgasm.
I normally would have been creeped out by cuming in front of someone else. But after all that Judice and I had gone through together, I was able to compose myself and just go on as though it was natural. Because in the end it did feel natural and that’s what really matters to me in the long run.
Thinking about Judice and the sessions, I had absently slipped my hand up my gown slip and began working on myself. I had gotten so excited I practically frigged myself without even knowing. In some odd way I had reached a light trance of my own, and only the sudden thump downstairs, brought me out of it. I whimpered a slight moan as I experienced a small climax, but it was not to be a pent-up volcanic one that I was leaning towards. Being sopping wet, I quickly wiped myself, and hid the magazines in their place. Getting off my bed, I could hear more bumping coming from the downstairs kitchen, and I feared I already knew what the noise meant.
Rushing out of my room I came downstairs to find Rhea in the hallway, who had come in from outside since smoking wasn’t permitted inside the complex. Her angry expression on her face confirmed my expectations.
Alex had come back to the roost.
What can I say about Alex. When you are sent here to Dr. Holden’s retreat house, although it’s stipulated that we must remain here to live until we get permission to be released, we can however leave the premises to go to school or work during the day, and a strict curfew is enforced the during the evening. The problem with Alex is that out of all of us, she is no doubt the one crazy fucked up chick of the bunch. I have no clue what Alex’s story is since even if she told you she probably wouldn’t be true. But suffice to say Alex can pretty much be summed up as a street person, a screwed up bitch, who has no grip on reality. Some of the other girls find her good for a laugh, but her behaviour is so erratic, I find her unnerving.
So even though we are not supposed to be out at all hours of the night and we are supposed to not only gain permission from Dr. Holden on where we will be at all times but also make sure we follow the rules of the curfew, or we can be forced to stay in the complex. I believe most girls follow that mandate, the exception of course is Jackie who tends to party a lot, but Judice is cool with Jackie and lets her get away with shit. The other offender is Alex, who can disappear for long periods of time and basically comes and goes as she pleases. We sometimes complain about Alex since she has damaged property at the house before, but Judice pretty much says that mostly Alex is harmless, and that given time she will heal like the rest of us.
I’m just not convinced of that. I mean I may have an anxiety disorder, but I’m not fucking fruit loops like she is. To be grouped together with her pisses me off to no end. Looking downstairs I saw Rhea bitching at Alex because she was dancing around the dining room table like a freak. I believe Alex used to be a dancer of some sort, before she went ape shit, but now all she can do is be a carnival sideshow. It looked as though Alex was pretty out of it, she was prancing around in what looked like a soiled teddy much to the displeasure of the on-site nurse Hilda. Alex had obviously been off her meds and it looked like Hilda was on the phone to Dr. Holden. Although Judice ran the house, she didn’t actually live here. The fact that she may come over tonight to handle the situation and she may check in on me, made me slightly glad in the face of this disaster.
Weary, I slumped back to my room, and went for my medication bottles. Seeing the labels that said “Caution May Cause Drowsiness”, caused a little chuckle from me since that ever since I had taken any of the pills, my days went by so fast and life seemed like a blur. I lit a candle beside my dresser that glowed a bright blue. I turned off the lights and as I lay down did my best to block out the banter coming from downstairs. Using a hypnosis technique that Judice gave me to help me with insomnia, I concentrated intensely on the flame and began taking deep breaths in and out. I told myself repeatedly that I was growing completely relaxed and would eventually on the count of 10 fall into a deep sleep. Thinking back on the day as I began the countdown, I caught a flash of the redhead from the train in my thoughts. As I reached one, my eyes snapped shut and my lips formed a blissful smile.