I sag back against the table, every inch of me aching, buzzing, alive.
They think they’ve won something.
But here’s what they don’t understand yet: I don’t need to escape to fight them. I just need to make myself expensive.
I close my eyes, breathing through the pain, already cataloguing how long it will really take to heal.
And how much it will cost them next time.
MY FAN CLUB
Glitter & Gold - Barns Courtney
Kookaburra
The room doesn’t change.
That’s how they get you – same four walls, same flickering light, same hum in the vents. Day melts into night until you can’t tell which is which. The clock on the wall doesn’t tick today, though sometimes it does, and the second hand just drifts, a slow, steady loop like it’s mocking me.
Day one, I screamed until my throat bled. Not rage – boredom. A performance. Let them think I’m losing it. They’ll expect that. They want it. They keep upping the dosage, but someone obviously warned them anything stronger could ‘compromise the foetus,’ so they’re stuck sedating me with sugar water. They’ll note it down on their little clipboards:Patient exhibiting distress. Regression consistent with prior behaviour.
And while they’re writing, I’m watching.
Day two, they sent a nurse. Kind eyes, soft voice, hands that shook when she brought my tray in. She kept glancing at my stomach like it was a ticking clock; shame it’s not keeping time yet.
Chicken soup, white bread, a glass of water that tasted faintly of metal. She said her name was Maggie. She told me she was here to help.
I told her I was here to kill…time.
She didn’t come back.
Now it’s day three – at least, I think it is. My sense of time is a corpse already halfway to dust. The vents hum louder, or maybe that’s just my brain trying to fill the silence. The red light above the door blinks every few seconds, a heartbeat for a building with none of its own.
There are twelve staff on rotation today. Three guards worth a damn, two orderlies who can’t find their own dicks without GPS and spoken instructions, and seven others who treat protocols like optional reading. I counted their meds trolley too – sedatives strong enough to down a horse, but watered just weak enough so that whoever’sreallyin charge thinks it won’t incapacitate me.
The security system reboots every twenty-two minutes; the cameras lag three seconds on the west wing and six on the upper corridor. If I ever wanted to end this place, I already know exactly how long it would take.
There’s a soft click and the door unlocks. Doctor Callaway walks in like she owns the air. Perfect posture, hair pulled so tight once again that it looks like it hurts. Clipboard, pen, neutral smile. The sort of woman who says “I understand” when she doesn’t and “I’m listening” when she isn’t.
“Morning, Kayla,” she says.
I grin from the bed, sheets tangled around my legs. “Morning, sunshine. How’s the incarceration business? Still pretending it’s therapy?”
She glances at the monitor by the wall, where my vitals blink like a lie detector. “How are you feeling?”
“Enlightened,” I say. “Got any more of those little pills that make me forget what day it is?”
She doesn’t rise to the bait. That’s her thing – calm, patient, endlessly professional. It makes me want to peel the calm off her face just to see what’s underneath.
She writes something on her clipboard. “You’ve been sleeping better.”
“Define better,” I say. “If you mean unconscious, sure. If you mean peaceful, not so much. Had a dream I drowned in bleach. Very cleansing.”
“You said yesterday you were hearing laughter,” she says, still writing.
“Did I? Still am,” I tell her. “Maybe it’s the pipes. Or maybe it’s my fan club.”
“Is it distressing?”
