They lined us up like cattle.
Ten beds. Ten girls. Ten paper-thin gowns. The room smelled like bleach and that fake lemony scent hospitals always use, like they're trying too hard to prove they're clean. But underneath, it still stank of something sick. Something sour.
I sat on bed number one. Lucky me.
Everyone was quiet except for the occasional cough or muttered whisper. I recognized most of them from the mess hall or the classes they forced us into. But I'd never really talked to them. Not like friends. Not like anything close to that.
We were all that were left out of the girls. The last ten standing.
I leaned back against the pillow and stared at the ceiling, trying not to think. But of course, that's all I've been doing since we got here. Thinking. Feeling. Remembering. Drowning.
A voice broke the silence.
"You think they're gonna drug us?"
I turned my head. A girl with short curls and a mess of freckles—Sasha, I think—was biting her lip, glancing around like she expected someone to jump out from behind the curtains.
"They don't need to drug us," another girl muttered. Tall, dark braid, cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass. Lydia. "We're already brainwashed."
Sasha scoffed. "Speak for yourself."
Lydia didn't reply. Just stared at the corner like she could burn a hole through it if she tried hard enough.
I didn't say anything.Everything we said here just bounced off the walls like a joke nobody wanted to laugh at.
Then: footsteps. Clipboard snap. A pause.
"Elena."
My name cracked through the room like a slap. Everyone stilled. I stood slowly, legs stiff. My heart wasn't racing, but it wasn't calm either. Just… bracing.
The hallway outside was colder.
The examiner waited for me—mid-forties, maybe. Her hair pulled back so tight it looked painful. Thin glasses. A clipboard she kept glancing at like it held the meaning of life—or maybe just the diagnosis she'd already decided on.
"Sit," she said, motioning to a plastic chair in a stark white room.
I sat. The chair squeaked beneath me.
She flipped a page. Didn't even look up. "How are you feeling today, Elena?"
I stared at her. "Fine."
"Mhm." Scribble. "Any nightmares?"
"No more than usual."
"Headaches? Disorientation?"
I shrugged. "Just the existential kind."
Finally, she looked up. "Are you eating?"
I rolled my eyes. "Define eating."
"Elena," she said, tone crisp but fake-calm, "I'm just here to help you."
That phrase.That stupid, useless phrase.
I laughed—dry, bitter. Something inside me snapped.
"I've been trying not to think or feel," I said, voice tight. "But ever since we got here, that's all I've been doing. Thinking about how disgusting everything tastes. How much I want to punch someone in the face. And God, I am so tired. Tired of feeling like the world is just this worthless ball of existence, and I'm one of the unlucky souls cursed to experience it."
She didn't flinch. Just kept writing.
The frustration burned hotter. My voice rose, sharper. She still didn't look at me—just kept jotting things down like I was a test subject, not a person unraveling in front of her.
This was her job.But this was my life.
I stood up. Slammed my hands down on the table. My voice cracked into a shout.
"I'm thinking about why anyone would look at me and think I'm worth protecting. Worth befriending. I'm thinking about how the only chance I ever had at a real family was taken from me—" my breath caught, "and it was all my fault."
Her pen paused.
She finally looked up—like I'd suddenly become worth acknowledging. Like this was the moment she'd been waiting for all along. The real show. The crack in the mask.
A single tear slid down my cheek before I even felt it.
My legs gave out a little, and I sank back into the chair, eyes stinging, my whole body folding in on itself like something hollowed out.
"It was all my fault…" I whispered, barely even hearing myself as I stared off into the distance, the memory clawing its way back in—loud, vivid, sharp.
But she didn't ask about it. She didn't care. She just clicked her pen again like that was the climax she needed.
A smile tugged at the corner of her lips—small. Satisfied.
She flipped the page. "One final question," she said, pen hovering. "Do you wish to continue?"
I blinked slowly. "You say that like I have a choice. But we both know there's nowhere else for me."She jotted something down. "Thank you, Elena."
I stared at her. My throat scraped raw, but I kept my voice steady.
"Don't thank me."
When I walked back into the room, no one looked at me.
Not Sasha. Not Lydia. Not even the ones who'd been whispering earlier.
They just stared straight ahead like none of this was real. If only it wasn't.
I refused to climb back into bed and lay down like a ghost slipping back into its grave.
No. Not this time.
I stood there for a second, heart pounding like it was trying to punch its way out of my chest.
Then I kicked the metal leg of the bed. Hard. The crash echoed through the room like a gunshot.
The girls jumped. One let out a quiet gasp.
I kicked it again. And again. Until the whole bed scraped sideways and the frame groaned.
I grabbed the thin plastic chair in the corner and hurled it against the wall. It bounced off with a loud crack and clattered to the floor.
Someone yelled for help.
"This is what you want, right?" I screamed, voice cracking. "This is what you've been waiting for! To watch me fall apart like I'm some project! Like I'm just a puzzle you can dissect and label!"
My hands flew without thinking—swiping the tray stand to the ground with a deafening crash, yanking the pillow from the bed and hurling it across the room like it had personally betrayed me.
I didn't care. Not about the noise. Not about the girls frozen around me. Not about the clipboard lady probably jotting down every second of it like it was the breakthrough she'd been hoping for.
Tears blurred my vision, hot and blinding. I turned to the wall and slammed my fists into it again and again and again until my knuckles screamed.
"You want a breakdown?" I roared. "Here it is! Go ahead, write this in your little stupid notes!"
My knees buckled, and I hit the ground hard, sobbing now—ugly, heaving sobs that tore straight from my chest.
I didn't hear the door open. Just felt the arms around me, rough hands grabbing, lifting me like dead weight.
I didn't fight.
I couldn't.
I was still crying. Still gasping like I couldn't breathe.
But in the middle of the chaos, something cracked open inside me. And for the first time in a long, long time—
I felt relief.