Before Her

Jane 22

Jane
Lunchtime. Lunchtime meant a break and food. My breaks and eating times, were normally spent with Newt and Minho. Minho was out in the maze, so that left Newt, who was training the new runners.

I greeted Frypan and was a chicken sandwich and a bright green apple. I walked over to where the runners were training, all seven boys had their sleeves rolled up and were sweating like pigs. They were doing push ups, again.

The view gets better as I walk closer. Six boys, lined in a horizontal line in front of their trainer, Newt, all of them were on their hands and toes, pushing themselves up then down again. I didn't know how to react, this morning I had woken up to him crying and screaming my name. He wouldn't tell me what happened in his dream, but I was a little touched that he had been dreaming about me. I walk till I'm standing next to Newt, producing a shadow over him. He looks up, his cheeks flushed from the push ups and smiles at me before continuing. After a few more push ups he stands up beside me. I toss him the apple, he raises his hand and catches it, taking a big bite. I unwrap my sandwich and start eating.
'How are they going?'
'Not bad. Done about two hundred, I think.' I nod and keep eating.

'Alright shanks. That's about it, stage one complete. Now all you have to do is keep bloody working on your cardio and your running. Now we're on to stage two, which is more like work experience, we're letting you out in the maze. But first, we gotta see how good your memory is.'
Newt starts walking and disappears into the map room, the boys follow him hesitantly. I still have a few minutes left. I pull open the iron door and slip in. The map room wasn't at all what I had imagined it, I don't even know how I had imagined it really. It was a small building and had only one room. There were cabinets placed in every free spot against the walls and chairs stacked high in a corner. In the centre was one big circular table. Pencils and paper were placed at a certain distance from one another.
'What's this?' A short boy with brown hair and freckles sprayed across his face asks.
'This slint-head, is stage two. You wanna know why we call this the map room? Because we map out the maze. The bloody maze changes every bloody night, and every bloody day we go out there, run to the end of the maze and run back, hoping for some bloody miracle that someone will find an exit.

Now, today and the next few days, you all get to experience first hand, what I've been going through for the last two bloody years. It's too late to go out into the maze now, so you'll go tomorrow. Today, you get to do the mapping.'
The boys murmur quietly before picking up a pencil.
'Alright shanks, listen carefully. I will say directions, you will all copy them down as fast as you can. Now listen. Left, right, right, straight, left, right, straight, right, right, left, straight, left, straight, left.' All six boys scramble for the paper, furiously scribbling down lines in as Newt says them.
'Alright hand them up,' says Newt. He takes another bite from the apple, as he inspects the sheets of paper. I peer over his shoulder trying to read the unmatchable patterns off each sheet.
'Unbelievable. None of you got it right, not even close. All of you try again.'
Silence.
'Are you going to tell us the directions?'
'No,' he pauses at their confused expressions and sighs, 'You're going to use the same directions. If you wanna be a runner, you have to memorise every single direction you take. That's what we all go through, so if you can't do that, you aren't meant to be a runner.'
The boys start sketching the directions that Newt had said, and he walks over to where I'm standing, chewing the apple as he walks.
'Don't you think you're being a little hard on them?'
'Trust me, I'm not being hard at all, this is me being bloody nice,' he replied, stretching the word half sarcastically, half enthusiastically when he said 'nice'.
I couldn't help but smile at his reply. He takes another bite and chews slowly.

After a while, I go back to the infirmary and relieve Andrew for his lunch break. The line wasn't as long now because most people were at lunch. I walked to Andrew's station and cleaned up all the used bandages and empty bottles. Honestly, none of these boys could ever keep their station clean for at least one patient. I've told every single med-jack over and over and over. None of them listen. Every single day, at the end of the day, I clean up their mess. I clean every table, put away all the kits, fill up bags full of bloody bandages and cotton balls. Everyday, I come in at the morning and the tables are as messy as a pigsty.

I go around collecting all the bandages and cotton balls and disgustingly bloodied objects, stuffing them into a large plastic bag. By the time I had gone around the whole infirmary I had two and a half full plastic bags. I placed them by the trash can since I couldn't be bothered to push them in. Andrew returned just as I walked back to his station.
'I see you've cleaned up all the dirt in here,' he says, nodding to his table.
'Yeah, you guys really really need to learn to clean up after yourselves.'
He shrugs, 'Bad habits die hard.'
'Small steps, you could start with small steps.'
'I seriously doubt that would work.'
'Yeah well, you're the keeper so we gotta start with you, okay? How about you start by disposing used bandages into the plastic bags that are at each table?'
'There are plastic bags at each table?'
'Yeah!' I say in exasperation, throwing up my hands.
'Okay, okay. I'll try, but I can't promise anything, so please don't bite my head off.'
I feel my eyes lower at him, 'I'm not gonna bite your head off. I'm not that mean, but if you don't change any of your habits at all, I won't just bite your head off. I'll stab you with a syringe full of that thing that makes you sleep, and drag you into the blood house where I'll personally chop you up into pieces and then feed you to all the animals.'
My ideas seemed to get more and more ridiculous as I said them. Andrew let out a deep laugh and walked over to his station where he started to unpack the kit before calling a patient to come in. I smile and return to my own table where I pull out the gloves and antiseptic and call for the next patient in line.