She was the girl who was afraid of love. Terrified of it. It isn't permanent, she believed, it leaves you and it leaves you broken.
He was the boy who desperately needed it. Love--the only thing that could've rooted him to this world.
Ophelia and...
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The next day, I accidentally slept in Mrs. Murphy's room while hearing her talk about the red tulips not going well with the white peonies. Very unprofessional of me, but Mrs. Murphy didn't wake me up so I think it was partially her fault too.
"You're cool, Lia." Jim playfully punched me on the shoulder as he dragged me out of Mrs. Murphy's room. "I've never seen any of us dozing off with one of the patients before, and that was a sight."
Us, I thought. "Can you not tell Luce about it?" I asked him, willing my cheeks and my ears and my neck to stop heating up in embarrassment. Even though I never really went red in the face, I could most definitely still feel the embarrassment. And feeling embarrassed right after waking up was unpleasant.
Jim laughed. "Sure I won't. But I think Lucy's in the security area. She must've seen you on the cameras already."
I rubbed my face, groaning a little when my ring--one of which I'd forgotten to take off earlier--scratched against my cheek.
"Tell me, Lia, how come you and Lucy look nothing alike?" He asked as we waited for the elevator. "Cousins, I could've understood, but sisters?"
I crossed my arms and closed my eyes, refraining from swaying. I didn't like waking up so early. Especially when I had slept so late the previous night.
"Do you want a day off? You can take a nap in the office if you want." He passed me a sympathetic look, almost as if he understood my pain. Maybe he did. "I can keep a watch out for you."
That was astonishingly sweet of him and I almost agreed too. But at the very end I shook my head. I was here to work. Work. And besides, everytime I thought about sleeping, whether it be last night or right now, a small part of me couldn't help but think about him. The boy in room 221.
I can't sleep, he had said. But why?
"Hey, Jim?" I spoke up as we entered the empty elevator. "Who's the patient in room 221?"
I tried ignoring the funny look he gave me at that question. "Not like you don't already know."
"I...don't."
"Don't you?"
I slumped against one corner of the elevator and exhaled heavily, waiting for it to reach the office. Maybe I should've taken him up on that offer he mentioned earlier. Sleep while he kept a watch out for me. Because a headache was slowly forming behind my eyes and I knew it wouldn't go away until I got some sleep.
"Griffin Hawthorne's son, that's who he is." Jim eventually replied. "Except that I'm not supposed to give out that information so easily."
