105:
Diary

Seven minutes past three in the morning.

I lie awake.

The girl two doors down is crying again, she is crying something fierce.

I’m staring at the ceiling.

My knife no doubt back in Dr. Oglesby’s desk drawer.

With the picture?

I wasn’t sure about this. I imagined Dr. Oglesby would keep the picture close. I wanted to see it. If I closed my eyes, I saw the photograph in perfect detail. I had no trouble recalling Mrs. Carter’s body wrapped in the sheets, lying with Mother. I remembered this as easily as I remembered the day I saw her at the lake, then back in her kitchen—

She was shaking. “I think I wanted you to see. I watched you walk out there with your fishing pole. I knew you’d be there.”

“Why would you . . .”

“Sometimes a woman wants to be desired, is all.” She took another drink. “Do you think I’m pretty?”

I did think she was pretty.

I wanted the photograph back. The idea of Dr. Oglesby holding my picture, studying it, soaking in that image, this churned my stomach. He wasn’t meant to see that picture. That wasn’t meant for him at all.

A loud cry. A choked cry.

Nurse Gilman’s shoes tapping down the tile floor.

She would comfort the girl. This was becoming the pattern. An extended cry, the sound of Nurse Gilman, the click of the girl’s door, then eventually muffled sobs and silence.

I rolled the paper clip between my fingers beneath my sheets, mindful of the camera I was certain watched me from the air vent.

I had picked the paper clip up off the tile floor when I bent down to adjust my slipper earlier. I don’t know who dropped it, I didn’t care—all that mattered was that I had it now. I knew I could pick my lock with it, and I would do exactly that, when it was time to go. It was not time to go yet.

Another muffled sob from the room two doors down, then nothing.

What did she look like?

How old was she?

What happened to her?

I could almost picture her. Nurse Gilman’s arms around this frail thing wrapped in sheets, the two of them—

I couldn’t leave without the picture. I couldn’t leave without my knife.

I would have to go at night.

The staff was thinnest at night.

I never heard more than two nurses in the halls at night, sometimes only one, and of course there was the guard at the end of the hall to consider. I would need to escape my room, get down the hall, past the nurses’ station to the doctor’s office, pick his lock (a Kwikset, much easier to pick than the one on my door). Inside, I could retrieve my knife.

I needed my knife.

Without my knife, the guard and nurses would be a problem.

I couldn’t get to my knife without passing the guard and the nurses, though, and this was also a problem. This was a serious problem for sure.

There were also the cameras.

Father would know what to do. Father always knew what to do.

The rain had not stopped, a steady patter against my window.

The power was flickering.

If the power went out, would there be a backup generator?

I imagined there was.

Or maybe there wasn’t.

Or maybe there was.

Nurse Gilman had a nice smile.

I wondered if the girl two doors down ever smiled. What was her smile like?

I closed my eyes again and thought about the hallway.

Father would puzzle it out.

I would puzzle it out.