"Come with me," he says. Something in his voice has changed.
I follow him toward the building. The faces in the windows are still there. More of them now.
I feel warmth in my wrist. I press my hands into my jacket pockets and try to ignore it. Probably bruised from the cuffs.
I look back at the fences — the two layers. I look at the buildings with their too-small windows. I look at Sven's rigid posture.
This isn't a school and it doesn’t look like a detention center either.
Where in the hell am I?
Chapter two
Bleach. That's the first thing. And underneath it, copper — old, scrubbed, not quite gone.
Sven walks ahead of me.
The hallway is narrow. Fluorescent lights, half of them buzzing. Concrete floor with a rubber coating that squeaks under my shoes.
Every door in this hallway is reinforced. Not wood with a lock — metal, heavy gauge, bolts on the outside. Steel frames. Recessed hinges, which means they can't be popped. I know this because I've popped non-recessed hinges in two facilities and a group home in Tacoma.
These doors are designed to keep something in rooms that's trying very hard to get out.
And the scratch marks.
Long, deep grooves in the metal, clustered around the bolt plates. Not fingernail scratches — something harder, sharper, dragged with force. Some painted over. Some not. The unpainted ones are newer.
I stop walking.
"Keep moving," Sven says without turning.
"What made those marks?"
"Keep moving."
I keep moving. I also keep looking. The scratches aren't just on the doors. They're on the walls near the floor, on the rubber baseboards, on the edge of a window frame.
We pass an open door. Small room. Single bed, bolted to the floor. No sheets. A mattress that looks new, and underneath the new-mattress smell, that copper tang again. Stronger. A stain on the wall near the headboard.
"That's not yours," Sven says. He's stopped at a door at the end of the hall. "This is."
Same layout. Bed, bolted. Desk, bolted. A narrow window set high — too high to see out of from the bed.
On the bed: folded clothes. Dark red. Shirt, pants, socks. Heavy fabric — not comfortable, functional. Next to them, black rubber-soled boots. Next to that, a clear plastic bag with a toothbrush, soap, and a comb.
That's it.
"Change," Sven says. "Leave your current clothing on the bed. It will be collected."
I've been stripped of my clothes in intake before. Every facility does it. Take away what someone came in with, give them what you want them to wear, and you've already won the first negotiation without saying a word.
"Turn around," I say.
His expression doesn't change. "You have four minutes. I'll be outside the door." He steps out. The door stays cracked. Enough to hear me.
I change fast. The red clothes fit close enough. Long-sleeved shirt, high-necked, thick. Pants with no pockets, no drawstring — elastic waist. Nothing I could use as a weapon. These were designed by someone who spent time thinking about what a person in crisis might do with a drawstring.
The boots are good. Sturdy. Warm. The only piece of this that was chosen for my benefit.
