Haunted Rayne

14 - Parents Day (part 2)

Leaning over the edge of her bed, Bianca Hawthorne hurled a stomach full of bile into the puke can beside her. The lighting in the Infirmary was known for its warmth and accommodating dullness, but as Bianca pulled away from the can with a string of spit dangling from her chin, hundreds of bright white dots speckled her vision.

"Please! Turn off the lights!" she cried out to the physician, but her voice was quiet and coarse.

In the waiting room, her father yelled, "I just don't understand why you can't tell me what's wrong with her!"

"Mr. Hawthorne, she has a fever," Doctor Campbell said, "and despite her behavior, it's actually rather mild. I'm only reading one-hundred-point-one. From what I gather it isn't viral or bacterial, but I highly recommend sending her to the hospital for further testing. I've done all that I can here."

Bianca was in a state of delirium.

Her mother, dressed in a butterscotch blouse and white cotton slacks, sat in the cot beside her. After tying her graying brown hair into a bun, Bianca's mother wiped the spittle from her daughter's lips with a warm, damp cloth and eased her into bed.

The room reeked of something putrid, like rotten eggs and spoiled milk. Bianca could smell it everywhere—in her skin, in her hair, under her nails, in her mouth.

"I need to shower!" Bianca wailed, trying to heave herself out of bed.

Her mother laid her back down. "No, no. What you need is rest."

"Please," she sobbed. "I need to get it out. I need to get it out. I need to—"

"Bianca—"

"Please!" she screamed. "Just take me home! I wanna go home!"

Bianca trembled, scanning the Infirmary.

They were not alone.

In the corner of the room, the eyeless girl twitched. Her head hung limply to the side, gobs of black liquid oozing down her cheeks like gruesome tears. Bianca's own tears blurred her vision, and when she closed her eyes and opened them once more, the decaying girl was suddenly three steps closer. Bianca buried her face in her mother's breast, gripping the fabric of her blouse as if her life depended on it as she screamed and wailed.

Then, without further preamble, Bianca lost consciousness.

There were cracks in her memory from that point onward, and Bianca assumed that perhaps Doctor Audrey Campbell had sedated her.

She had not.

When Bianca regained consciousness, she was laying on her dorm room bed, a fluffy robe around her body and damp hair wetting the pillowcase beneath her. Her mother stood in the corner of the room, mid-sentence as she adjusted a crooked frame on the wall.

"—just to keep an eye on you, don't you think?" Mrs. Hawthorne turned towards her daughter, an expectant smile on her face.

Bianca blinked.

What happened?

Wasn't she just in the Infirmary?

"Well?" her mother pressed.

It was almost as if there was an entire conversation that Bianca had missed and could not remember. She blinked once more. "Wh . . . what?"

"Oh, my goodness. I said," her mother began irritably, "it doesn't matter if you feel better. I think it's best if you come home for a little while. Doctor Campbell said they can approve a medical leave for up to three weeks without involving the courts, so—"