Page 14 of Writhe (Wellard Asylum)

M y hands won’t stop shaking. My teeth chatter, even though it isn’t cold.

My chest rises and falls too fast, like my lungs are trying to expel something that isn’t there.

I stare at the ceiling, counting the cracks in the plaster.

One. Two. Three. Breathe. Don’t think. Don’t feel.

But my skin is crawling. I can still feel them. Still feel him.

My throat is raw, every swallow a scrape of fire. My body aches, bruises blooming beneath my skin like rot. I feel hollowed out, gutted. There’s a gaping wound inside me where something used to be. I don’t know what it was, but it’s gone now.

I dig my nails into my palms, pressing until the skin splits—until warm blood wells up between my fingers. It’s the only way to silence the phantom touch still lingering on my body. My flesh still tingles where they— he— held me down.

I thought Theo would protect me.

That’s the part I can’t reconcile, the thought that loops in my head like a broken reel of film. He was supposed to be different.

I wanted him to be different.

But he wasn’t. He was just like the rest of them. Men always take. Their disgusting greed makes me surrender everything to them willingly or not.

When I close my eyes, I hear his voice, low and hungry, telling me what to do. I see the way he looked at me. God, the way he looked at me—like he liked it. Like he wanted it. Like I was nothing more than something to be used.

But then I remember Theo’s face after. The way his hands trembled when he reached for me. The way his expression twisted, like he was the one in pain. He looked at me and he was breaking. Was he disgusted? Did he hate me? Is that why he didn’t try to save me? Am I not enough for him?

My stomach lurches, the taste of acid rising in my throat. I swallow it down, curling into myself. My fingers twitch, aching to claw at my skin, to peel it off, to get rid of the feeling of him, but I don’t. I force myself to stay still, muscles locked.

The cell door creaks open. An orderly steps inside, carrying a tray of food.

I brace myself, every muscle in my body screaming.

I expect a blow. A kick. A hand around my throat.

But he doesn’t even look at me. He sets the tray down on the floor and walks out.

The door slams shut behind him. No threats. No pain. No punishment.

Why?

The silence is worse. Something is wrong.

I don’t know how long I stay in my room.

Time is slippery here, twisting around itself like a noose.

Seconds stretch into hours, hours into lifetimes.

The only thing I know is pain—dull, aching, settled deep in my bones.

The way he continually rammed his fat fucking dick inside of me with no care of the consequences of my body—I’m thankful there wasn’t a tear. But he came inside of me.

They don’t allow birth control at this facility. If I have that gross potato-looking motherfucker’s baby, I’m going to axe everyone over the head. Because I bet they don’t allow abortions. No. They’d probably make you have the baby, then run experiments on it. Disgusting.

I take back the potato comment. The Doctor isn’t particularly disgusting (except when he’s ramming his dick into me unwillingly), but he’s at least ten years older than me. His blond hair saves him as far as grays, but the crinkles on his face are something he can’t hide.

My muscles scream in protest as I push myself up, the thin mattress clinging to my skin like a second layer of sweat-soaked flesh. My limbs feel leaden, useless.

When the door groans open, I flinch once more.

“Rec time,” an orderly grunts. “Doc’s orders.”

He doesn’t touch me, just steps aside and waits. Weird. Usually, if we take any longer, then we are dragged out of our room. And it is even weirder considering they don’t usually come to our doors. They will just unlock them and wrench them open, silently signaling our need to come out.

I move slowly, testing the weight of my own body, half-expecting to collapse—I don’t.

But my core feels like I just did the best workout of my entire life and now I’m paying for the consequences.

I drag myself forward—one foot after the other—past the rows of identical doors, past the flickering fluorescent lights that stab into my skull like needles.

When I step into the rec room, that’s when I see him.

Theo.

He’s in the far corner, slouched in a plastic chair, his long legs sprawled out in front of him. His head is bowed, dark hair—greasy and messy—falling into his face, fingers clasped together like he’s holding onto something invisible. He doesn’t look up. Doesn’t acknowledge me.

Anger coils low in my stomach, twisting, writhing.

He knows what he did.

And he won’t even look at me.

I tear my gaze away before my body betrays me. Before something ugly and broken cracks through my carefully constructed numbness. I need to move and find a seat and try to act fucking normal. Am I normal? Not in the fucking slightest.

There’s an open spot at a table near the middle of the room .

Tobias, the tall, lanky guy who mutters to himself about government satellites, sits across from me, shifting a deck of warped playing cards between his fingers.

Next to him, Isla picks at her nails, scraping the polish off in jagged flakes.

I don’t bother asking her how she got polish.

Probably similar to the way Rina gets whatever she wants.

Neither of them acknowledged me at first.

But Isla’s eyes eventually flick up, scanning me. “Haven’t seen you in a couple days.”

I don’t respond.

Tobias keeps shuffling the cards. I stare past them, back at Theo.

I want him to look at me. I want him to feel the weight of what he’s done.

But he stays there, perfectly still, like a ghost. Like he’s already left his body.

How does he have any right to be distraught over what happened to my body?

And what’s worse is I’m not even sure if I completely hated it.

The truth is I liked being manhandled—treated like I was nothing more than a doll to be thrown around.

I came on the doctor’s dick multiple times.

But I still cried. I still wanted him to stop.

I wanted Theo—I wanted Theo to experience this with me.

But he looked at me like I was shattering pieces all over the floor.

And maybe I was. Maybe it’s the medicine that allows me to accept what happened to me.

It’s not like there’s any other choice. Accept what happens and move on.

Hope it doesn’t add to another fucking illness to add to my ever-growing roster .

The Doctor promised to cure me, but all he’s done is teach me how to crave the sickness. The sickness?

His fucking dick.

“Did you hear?” Isla tries again, flicking a torn piece of polish onto the table. “Some girls on the third floor bit a chunk out of one of the orderlies’ faces. Straight-up ripped it out with her teeth.”

Tobias lets out a breathy, amused chuckle. “Heh. Nice.”

I barely register their words. I’m still watching Theo.

I don’t know what I expected. Maybe I thought he’d be proud of himself—smug. Maybe I thought he’d look at the way the others do after they’ve done something to me. Satisfied. Triumphant. But he looks hollow. Like something inside him has rotted away.

I lean back in my chair, folding my arms across my chest, letting the silence stretch. Letting it choke him.

“You’re being weird,” Isla mutters, leaning in slightly. “Weirder than usual.”

I finally shifted my gaze to her. “And?”

She blinks, then shrugs, uninterested. “Nothing. Just an observation.”

Tobias places a single card face-up on the table. The Queen of Hearts. He isn’t playing cards with either Isla or me, and I’m not entirely sure he’s playing with himself. He just keeps shuffling the cards and randomly picking one out of his stack.

I stare at it. Something about it makes my stomach turn. I push back from the table, standing abruptly. My body protests—my legs are weak—but I don’t sit back down.

I turn away from the table, but I don’t look at Theo again—I won’t give him that satisfaction.

Or maybe it’s that I don’t want him to look at me like I’m something broken.

Not that he would even look at me at all.

Instead, I focus on putting one foot in front of the other, on the tile beneath me, on the distant hum of the overhead lights. I just need to keep moving.

The walls press in as I make my way toward the far side of the room. There’s a window near the exit—barred, smeared with grime, but still, a window. I don’t know what I expect to see beyond it. Maybe I just want to remind myself that a world exists outside of this place.

I barely register the sound of footsteps behind me until a voice cuts through the static in my head.

“You’re different.”

I freeze.

Clint is standing a few feet away, arms crossed over his bony chest. He’s another swirly thing, his fiery red hair can’t decide which way it wants to lay on top of his head so most if it just decides to be vertical. He cocks his head, studying me like a puzzle missing a piece.

I don’t answer.

“I mean, you were always fucked up.” He shrugs. “But now you look . . . I don’t know. Like someone gutted you and didn’t bother sewing you back up.”

A laugh sticks in my throat like a shard of glass. If only you knew. “You sure do know how to compliment a woman. Tell me, Clint, did you get a lot of pussy on the outside?”

I turn away, but he steps closer. Not close enough to touch, but close enough that I can hear his breath, smell the stale cigarettes clinging to his clothes. “I’d ask what happened,” he muses, “but I think I already know.”

My jaw clenches.

“Was it him?”

That makes me snap.

I whirl on him, “Shut up.”

He doesn’t flinch. “It’s funny,” he continues, unbothered. “I’ve been here the longest and didn’t picture you for one of his ‘pets.’”