The Boy in the Gray Hoodie

14...

And the dedication goes to @SeanKelsie for the 100th comment!! Thank you!!!

14…

As soon as the blood started to flow from the cut on my neck, a sick feeling clawed at my stomach. I took a step away from the mirror and fell. I dropped the razor next to me, and when I picked it up, I saw myself again, in my old room, in my old clothes, the first time James had given me the medicine—the medicine that set my whole body on fire on the inside.

            I tried to stand up, to get rid of the sight of my body in so much pain. I managed to drop the razor in the sink, not realizing until then how hard I had been clutching it. The blade cut into the skin of my hand and now that was bleeding too. That’s when the pain came back.

            It was as though I was in my room again, that excruciating pain slicing through my body like a thousand needles at once, each one twisting and pulling against some part of me. I couldn’t think or speak or see. For a moment—an agonizing, horrible moment—I was that boy. When it became impossible to breathe, I fell again, hitting my head against the wall.

            That’s when Lisa came in.

            She took one look at me and her eyes filled with fear. But that fear only lasted for a moment. Suddenly she was by my side, pressing a cloth to my neck, holding my hand. I didn’t want to let her go. No one had ever held my hand like that before.

            When she spoke to me, her words were lost. Every sound other than my own heartbeat was muffled and distant. Finally, her voice broke through when she said my name.

Her voice was so soft and gentle. It made me want to stop being afraid. But I still was—I was still afraid. I was terrified of what was happening, of what I was seeing. I didn’t understand it and I didn’t want it to be happening. I just wanted it to stop—the images and the pain.

Her next words caught me off guard and sent another wave of panic rushing over me. Disinfection—that’s what I’d heard.

As she ran from the room, I looked down at my hands and the rest of the room. There was blood everywhere. She meant to clean it all up.

But only the orderlies had ever disinfected me. No one else had ever seen me undressed. Those were the rules. Lisa wasn’t an orderly. She didn’t wear a white suit or a mask. But she was coming back and I had to do what I was supposed to do. I didn’t want to get into trouble.

In spite of the pain coursing through me, I got up from the floor and pulled off my clothes as quickly as I could. I had to be undressed by the time she came back. The orderlies always got mad at me if I wasn’t ready for them. I didn’t want Lisa to be mad at me too.

I managed to undress completely when I heard her climbing up the stairs. Fighting my sore muscles, I raised my arms and placed my palms against the wall, just as I always did for disinfection. My whole body was trembling as I stood there, but it wasn’t just from the pain. The thought of Lisa seeing me like this was more than I could handle. I started to cry before she came in, but I didn’t let it show. I wasn’t supposed to.

When she saw me, she got angry. I was confused and embarrassed, even more so when she picked up my clothes and threw them at me. I tried to understand, but I couldn’t. I didn’t know what she had wanted me to do.

She tried to talk to me through the door, but the only thing I understood was that I had done the wrong thing, and she was mad at me.

Her anger hadn’t lasted long though. When she came back in and bandaged my cuts, she was so careful with me—more so than even Marley had been. The medicine she sprayed on my skin hurt a lot, but the pain quickly went away with the coolness of her breath on my skin.