The Calling | The House of Voices #1

Nine - Bonding

Bonding

Parish:

He was in a bad mood.

He hadn’t been in the Institute for more than twelve hours, but already Parish was starting to hate the place. The yellow wallpaper that had been designed to look cheery made him nauseas; the wooden floors and homey furniture filled him with loathing; and the smiling faces that had been plastered onto every single nurse in the building made him compelled to punch someone.

The only thing that had managed to put a smile on his face was the fact that they’d served his favorite foods for breakfast, and even that smile hadn’t lasted long when he found out from Sid that French toast for breakfast was extremely, extremely rare.

He had escaped to the entertainment room directly after breakfast. He wanted to be alone, and hiding from all the Institute’s other inhabitants seemed to be the only way to achieve that. It wasn’t that he hated them. Far from it. He just wasn’t happy being here with them. He wanted things back to the way they were.

The sound of a girl laughing pulled Parish’s attention from the view outside the window and back into the entertainment room. Yanking his iPod out from his jeans pocket, he increased the volume and continued to ignore the outside world.

As the sounds of heavy metal blasted in his ears, Parish was suddenly startled into the real world by a soft tap on his shoulder. He leapt out of his seat and wheeled around to find himself face to face with one of the prettiest girls he’d ever seen.

She was much taller and slimmer than the girl from the hallway – October – had been, and seemed to be in a much better mood. The girl had a head of thick, glossy black hair; a pair of bright blue eyes and a wide smile that displayed a set of brilliantly white teeth. Parish might have considered her to be extremely beautiful, had he not noticed the conniving look that was flashing in her eyes.

His smile disappeared as quickly as it had appeared.

“What do you want?” He snapped, shutting off his iPod and stuffing it into his pocket.

“Aw,” The girl pouted, looking like a porcelain doll who hadn’t got her way. “For a moment there, it looked like you were happy to see me.”

“That was a grimace.” He replied coldly. “It’s how people respond when they’re not happy to see someone.”

The girl’s smile abruptly transformed into a dark scowl, making everything that had made her look devastatingly pretty only a few minutes ago, disappear in the blink of an eye. “I wouldn’t diss me so easily if I were you.” She warned primly, draping her arms over the back of the large, stuffed armchair he had just vacated.

“Thank God you’re not me, then.”

She ignored his retort, wiping her frown off her face and turning it into a too-sweet smile. “There aren’t any other girls in this place, you know.”

He rolled his eyes in annoyance, trying to keep his rising temper from getting out of hand. He couldn’t imagine what the nurses would do to him if he flew off the handle and slapped the girl in front of him. “Which is funny considering that I know for a fact that there are two other girls living here.”

She scoffed. “Them? Please. You don’t want to associate with them, trust me. The pretty one’s a bipolar and the biggest flake you’ll ever meet, and the ugly one is loner weirdo who’s got Schizophrenia. Not the kind of company a guy like you would ever keep.”

Parish’s blood boiled at the girl’s comments about her fellow inhabitants. How could she talk about the other girls like that? They were sick, yes. But so was she. Otherwise she wouldn’t be standing in front of him, would she?