Chapter 9: The Linen Closet

The orderly snapped off the lamp.

I shut the ledger and hugged it to my chest.

There was no time to put it back. There was no time to do anything but go.

She opened the office door a crack.

The hall was empty on our side. The footsteps were still around the corner, by the station.

"Closet," she whispered.

Three steps.

She pulled the linen closet door open and pushed me in ahead of her and pulled it shut behind us.

Dark.

The smell of bleach and warm cotton.

Shelves of folded sheets pressed into my back.

The footsteps came around the corner.

They came past the closet door, so close I heard the change jingle in his pocket.

They stopped at the office.

A key scraped in the lock.

Then stopped.

"Huh," the psychiatrist said.

He'd found the door already unlocked.

I stopped breathing.

Beside me in the dark, the orderly's hand found my wrist and held it.

The office door opened. The light clicked on. A strip of it glowed under the closet door.

Drawers.

Was he opening drawers?

No. A chair creaked. The click of a charger cord pulled out of a wall.

Then his voice, raised.

"Who's been in here?"

The night nurse's shoes came hurrying.

"Nobody, Doctor. We've had a disturbance in the dayroom."

"My door was unlocked."

"The cleaners were in at ten."

A silence.

"Tell them if it happens again, they're done." He came out. The door shut. The key turned, and this time it locked. "What disturbance?"

"Pudding," the nurse said. "Twelve and nine. Over pudding."

"Sedate twelve. She's going Thursday anyway."

The footsteps moved off toward the double doors.

"And bump fourteen to the higher dose in the morning. I don't like her eyes."

The double doors clunked shut behind him.

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