Chapter 1: The Night Intake
The air tasted like bleach and quiet desperation. Susanna traced a finger around the rim of the paper cup in her hands, feeling the cheap, waxy edge threaten to split. The linoleum floor was the color of old teeth, its surface reflecting the sickly glow of the fluorescent tubes humming overhead. Somewhere down the hall, a metal cart clattered, the sound sharp and lonely in the silence.
This wasn't how she’d imagined the inside of a place like Claymoore.She’d pictured something grander, or at least more tragic. Wood panels.High windows. Not this bland, windowless box that smelled of antiseptic and stewed vegetables.The door swung open with a soft whine.
A nurse in white squeaked past, not even glancing at Susanna on the cold metal chair. Then, following in her wake like a shadow that had learned to walk, came a woman.
She moved differently than anyone Susanna had seen here.It wasn’t a shuffle or a trudge.It was a slink. A deliberate, hip-swaying saunter that seemed to mock the sterile hallway. She had wild, honey-blonde hair that fell past her shoulders and sharp cheekbones that looked like they could cut glass. Her eyes, a pale, knowing blue, locked onto Susanna’s immediately.
Without a word, the woman slid into the chair next to her, crossing her legs. She was wearing state-issued sweatpants and a faded t-shirt, but she wore them like they were silk.
“You’re new,” the woman said.It wasn’t a question.
Susanna nodded, her throat too dry to speak.She took a tiny, useless sip of the tepid water in her cup.
“Intake’s a bitch.They leave you here to marinate. Makes you feel small. That’s the point.” The woman’s voice was low, a little rough around the edges, like she’d smoked a thousand cigarettes just for the sound of it. She leaned in, her scent cutting through the antiseptic—sweat, generic soap, and something fiercely, unmistakably human. “You look like you need a friend.”
“I’m okay,” Susanna managed, the words feeling brittle.“Sure you are. That’s why you’re in the palace of the broken beautiful.” The woman smiled, a slow, crooked thing that didn’t quite reach her eyes. “I’m Lisa.”
“Susanna.”
“Susanna.” Lisa tasted the name.“Pretty.Literary. You a writer?”
The guess was so direct, so accurate, it felt like a violation.Susanna stiffened. “How did you know that?”
“You’ve got the look.Watching everything, taking notes in your head. All that silent, screaming observation.” Lisa shrugged, picking at a thread on her pants. “Also, your hands are ink-stained.They don’t give us pens here, honey. So that’s old news. You’ve been clinging to that habit for a while.”
Susanna curled her fingers inward, hiding her palms.She felt exposed, x-rayed.
“Don’t worry,” Lisa purred.“It’s a good thing. Means you’re not one of the empty ones. The real ghosts.” She jerked her chin toward the hallway where a woman was pacing a tight, obsessive pattern, muttering numbers under her breath.“See that? That’s poetry nobody bothers to read.You and me, we read it. We’re the ones who see the wiring behind the walls.”
A strange, traitorous warmth spread in Susanna’s chest. It was the first thing anyone had said to her in hours that acknowledged a mind, a self, instead of a list of symptoms.“Why are you talking to me?” Susanna asked.
Lisa’s smirk deepened.“Because you’re interesting. And because this place will eat you alive if you don’t learn the rules, and they don’t put those in the welcome packet.”
“What are the rules?”
“Rule one: the doctors are tourists. They visit, they take pictures, they leave. Don’t confuse their curiosity for care.” Lisa’s eyes flickered over Susanna’s face, calculating. “Rule two: the real power isn’t in the nurse’s station.It’s in here.In us. Who you align with determines whether your stay is merely miserable or truly hellish.”
“And rule three?” Susanna heard herself ask, drawn into the game.Lisa leaned closer, her voice dropping to a whisper.“Rule three: you stick with me. I know where the extra blankets are. I know which orderlies you can bribe with cigarettes, and which ones you should never be alone with. I know how to get sugar packets after lights out.” She paused, letting the pragmatic, tiny rebellions hang in the air. “I see you, Susanna.All that quiet.It’s not emptiness.It’s fuel. But you need a match.”
The metaphor should have been a warning.It felt like a promise. Susanna was so cold, sitting in that chair, and Lisa was radiating a chaotic, feverish heat. It was irresistible.The intake nurse appeared at the door, folder in hand. “Kaysen?The doctor will see you now.”
Susanna stood, her legs unsteady. She looked down at Lisa, who was still sprawled in the chair, a portrait of insolent comfort.
“I’ll be around,” Lisa said, not looking up as she examined her own fingernails. “Find me at dinner.Sit with me. Unless you want to eat with the vegetable plates.” She said it like it was the most obvious choice in the world.
Susanna followed the nurse down the bright, buzzing hall.The clatter of the metal cart was louder now. As she turned the corner, she glanced back.
Lisa was watching her go, that same cryptic smile playing on her lips.She didn’t wave. She just watched, a panther lounging at the edge of a clearing, sure the fawn would circle back.
And Susanna knew, with a cold, clear certainty that cut through the fog of her fear, that she would. The leash was invisible, but she had already felt its first, gentle tug. It felt, terrifyingly, like the only hand she had to hold.