Red Cave

Judith (Judy)

1979

Judith strolls down the hall, her room door open behind her. A long, dingy white gown with faded blue sailboats drapes down her body like a potato sack against her frail frame.

She passes a few patients but glances at one who's heading in the direction of her room. He's tall and lanky, donning blue jeans and an orange shirt that reaches his thighs.

His attire, though different from hers and the patients like her, isn't unusual. He's among the ones with family either close by and willing to send clothes to the hospital or family who love them enough to drive care packages to the facility.

Unfortunately for her, that's not the case. On the night of her suicide attempt, Sheryl and Walter accompanied her to the hospital, but the next day, they were gone. She hadn't heard from them, though she called and wrote enough letters to fill a journal. To her, it's as if they'd washed their hands of her.

But on his first day, he met Judith in the female day room, where she sat mermaid-style, sketching in a tattered book. She was alone before he sat near her, and her peaceful solitude instantly shifted to discomfort.

He was calm, though. Contrary to what she was used to and what caused her to be there, he looks almost identical to David.

Where David has dark brown eyes, Eddie's are hazel. Freckles dot his heart-shaped face, and his nostrils flare wider than her beau's. His style is sometimes different, but turtlenecks are his favorite too.

Judith stops in front of the rotary phone mounted on the wall, and with her hand against it, she watches him continue down the female residents' corridor.

The section of the Asylum they reside in is reserved for adult men and women, but they're separated. At night, men are to stay on one side and women remain on the other end of the watch desk.

Each side has their own telephone and day room, but theirs has better books and VHS tapes than their female counterparts.

Eddie stops at the end of the hall, in front of the last door on the left. He raises his fist to knock, glancing out of his peripheral at Judith before turning his head to her.

When he meets her gaze, she whips her attention forward and lifts the headset to her right ear. He knocks three times without taking his eyes off her, and she dials David's number.

The door swings open after the ring-back tone buzzes in her ear, and Eddie rips his gaze off her to smile at the pale brunette in front of him. Her dark brown eyes flicker horizontally as they always do, and she steps aside, clearing a path for him to enter her room.

Judith peeks out of her periphery as he walks past the young-looking woman, who made it easy for rumors to spread in her name.

Compared to everyone else, she was odd, even more so than Judith. Unlike the others, who were either coming off drugs, or dealing with schizophrenia, her parents placed her there because of her childlike behavior.

Louise often talked about her family's farm and the animals living there. She even mentioned the night her father found her drawing on the barn doors but everyone other than Eddie and Judy didn't believe that's why she was institutionalized.

No one knew who, but someone started a rumor that Louise was indecent with an animal, and because of her depravity, her parents were so revolted and humiliated that they sent her away. But Judith spoke to her long enough to know it was a lie.

Whether Eddie believed it or not is a mystery, but only a fool would believe him when he denied his love for her being because of the rumor and his assumption that she was easy.

The phone buzzes in two-second intervals, signaling that the other caller hasn't picked up. Judith returns the headset to the hook switch, and her gaze lifts above the phone, past the wood paneling, onto a portrait of a babbling brook in a green forest.

"Miss. Jefferson." She turns to the brash voice on her right and sees a tall, overweight man in police uniform. He's dark-skinned and has irises that match his complexion. "The van is running outside. Get changed and follow me."