My Crazy, Orphaned, Dangerous Mate

5*Arraja POV

I hear a commotion outside my door. I can hear several unfamiliar voices. Visitors? We hardly ever have visitors here. People usually don't come around here more than once or twice a year.

I can sense somebody right on the other side of my door. It's the same feeling I get when I can feel someone staring at me.

"Young man, you can't go in there!" Miss Margaret speaks, probably to the person right by my door.

I know why people aren't supposed to see me. Even as bad and dirty as this place is, I'm still considered the 'biggest blemish on the face of the Pike's Point Orphanage', at least that's what I'm told. I don't quite know what that means though.

I can hear a boy's voice mumble something, then Miss Margaret speaks a bit more, though it is further away and harder to hear, and soon enough, the door to outside closes and it is silent again.

For a few minutes, that is. My door is opened with a lot of force by Miss Margaret herself, and the light from the cracks in the ceiling outside my room blind me for a second. I have a window in my room, but just outside of it are only plants, so I don't see the sun very much.

"Hi, Marge," I greet her, trying to smile, my voice raspy and my throat a little dry, as I don't talk too much. There's no need to. When I'm not left in here for days on end with no more than a piece of bread thrown in to me like I'm some sort of wild animal, I'm being pushed around and forced to do everything the women in charge tell me to do without question. So I usually am not allowed to talk.

Miss Margaret walks up to me quickly and roughly squeezes my chin in her hand.

"You will speak to me with more respect than that, you ungrateful little wretch. I give you a home and food, this is what I get for treating you so well? You will call me Miss Margaret, or you will not speak at all!" She spits in my face.

"Yes, Miss Margaret," I put my head down when she releases me, shoving my head back. I hadn't really meant to be disrespectful, I don't think, when I called her that name. It's what Miss Greta and Miss Florence call her.

"You will have a visitor tomorrow. Maybe someone will actually keep you this time, though I don't know why they'd want to, you're disgusting!" She squishes up her face, looking like she had eaten something sour. She really shouldn't put her face like that, it'll make more wrinkles.

"Yes, Miss Margaret." I look down.

"Come, now, let's see if we can get you to look presentable enough for someone to be able to stand looking at you for more than a few seconds."

Miss Margaret undoes the heavy chains from my wrists and ankles that keep me attached to the far wall. When I once asked why I had to wear the metal, Miss Annabel, the nicest lady that is in charge of us, told me that it is to keep everyone else safe from me after last time.

I don't remember anything about what happened last time, or what she was even talking about, but I guess it was pretty bad for me to not be allowed out to see the other orphans here.

I know there are others here, because in the few times people have come in and adopted me, I see them. They don't have rooms like mine though, just sheets.

Yes, I've been adopted a couple times already. I've actually only been back in my room for a couple months, I think. The people that took me brought me back about a month later, every time, and always told Miss Florence or whoever else was there that I was crazy and they didn't want me around anymore. I'm not quite sure I remember why they always looked so scared, though.

Miss Margaret drags me by my elbow into the bathing room. Miss Greta is waiting with jars of hard soap that they will dig out and rub on my body. It hurts, but they say they have to do it so people will want to take me home.

After they strip me of my dirty loose dress that I always wear, I am dunked into a big bucket of cold water. I don't think they have enough money for hot water here.

"These scars...despicable," Miss Greta tsks while rubbing the hard soap into my arm. She is talking about the colorful art on my body.

Some of the people that got me before had put a needle in my skin lots of times before it turned into a beautiful picture. They called it a tattoo, and I have lots of them now. I don't know why nobody else likes it. I think they're all wonderful, but they always get hidden behind my long-sleeved dress that I wear when I have visitors.

I didn't want to have them put on me at first, but now I think they look very pretty and I think I'll want more, some day.

"Leave her alone, you know she didn't get them on her own accord," Miss Annabel tells them when she walks in with a towel and my long-sleeved dress.

The dress is expensive looking and I love to wear it, but I'm only allowed when someone comes to see me. The Miss Ladies always tell people that I'm a bad kid and that they can bring me back whenever. I'm not even a kid, really. I'm 17 years old which is almost old enough to be taken to 'the loony bin' where they say I'll go when I'm an adult, whatever 'the loony bin' is.

"They're everywhere, good thing the sleeves cover them up, nobody will want to see that first thing. Won't make a good impression, and you do want to make a good impression, these people have money, I can tell," says Miss Margaret.

"After they sign the papers, it won't really matter too much. They'll take her home, see the ink, wait a while then realize how crazy she is, and bring her back. It's what we expect," Miss Greta replies to her.

I'm pretty sure they think I can't understand what they say about me. I'm not stupid, at least I don't believe I am, but they seem to think I'm dumber than a box of socks. However that saying goes.

I've been in the 'real world', as in, away from this place but still in the same general area, many times with different families and some not-so-families. Just people here and there who would bring me with them because they think I'm pretty and let me live with them for a little while and bring me back.

People are weird.

Miss Annabel comes over to me after Miss Greta pulled my shivering self out of the bucket and wraps the towel around me.

"We'll finish up tomorrow. You have to be on your best behavior when they come. Nobody wants a bad girl," Miss Margaret tells me before they walked out, leaving me with just Miss Annabel.

"We'll put the dress on you tonight. Don't get it dirty and get a good sleep so you look good for your visitors, alright?" I nod.

She quickly dries me and drapes the dress over my body. She takes me back to my room and only attaches my feet with the long chains before laying a clean blanket over my bed and letting me lay down. I still don't understand why they chain me, it's not like I can run away or open the heavy door that's always locked. Even when I do get the urge to try to leave, there's no way out because even my window has bars on it.

"Goodbye, go to sleep," she calls with a slight smile before shutting my heavy door and leaving me in darkness, yet again.