Dear Tressi [✓]

3

'The Rothan's Home for Destitute Women' was a mental hospital in disguise.

Or at least, that's how anyone who spent any time inside would describe it.

It was situated in the northwestern border of the town, overlooking the Lapec lake, and was pretty much cut off from the residential portion.

Fifty years before, the land had belonged to a wealthy landowner called Val Rothan who had initially planned to build a lake house. But upon learning that the town was going to repossess the land, he instead chose to build a home for destitute women and secured the funding necessary to run it. The home was rife with complaints about the treatment of women who lived there, but nobody had cared enough to take it further, while the women living there neither had the choice nor the resources to pursue any legal action.

And this was where Mrs. Dala Sakit—Tressi's mother—lived.

If Tressi thought Lapec was dreary, it was nothing compared to how this institution seemed. A shiver ran down her spine as the building loomed into view. Ivy and moss covered most of the brick wall. Although, that sight was common in Lapec in general, owing to the stifling humidity and lack of sunlight.

She could see her skin pale in the rear view mirror of the cab.

'Don't dramatise it, Tress,' her husband would say. It did not help that the home was as depressing as can be.

Maybe she was making this more overwhelming than it needed to be. Trying to shake it off, Tressi walked through the sprawling lawns of the Rothan's institute. Though humongous in size, it wasn't built with taste. The result—a monstrosity.

The wet grass squelched beneath her feet as the imposing mist obscured the entrance from view. Only when she was five feet away, could Tressi clearly make out the details of the brick-walled archway.

She walked through the entrance to see it branch off into two narrow corridors, at the end of which there were staircases leading up to floors above.

She stood undecided at the entrance, not sure which way to go, and peered around for some sort of sign. She found one. A small wooden plank that read, 'Warden's Office' that pointed to the right hand side corridor.

Warden's Office. That could be a place to start.

Three doors down on the left, she found it. She raised her hand up to knock, but the pit in her stomach was unsettling.

There's no going back.

A tiny ray of sunlight—which had somehow managed to pierce through the veil of clouds—struck her engagement ring. The five carat diamond cast rainbows across her face as she stood rooted to the spot unable to go through with it.

Just do it.

Before the fear could claw its way back, she decided to go ahead and open the door herself.

There was a woman inside.

Short, very short, but pudgy. There was no neck to speak of. In place of the neck however, she had three chins that rested directly above her chest. Her round eyes bulged out of the sockets as her hands dropped the heavy register that she'd been holding seconds before.

Guilty. She looks guilty.

"Who are you? What do you want?" The woman asked—rather rudely—as her eyes assessed Tressi from head to toe.

Tressi was taken aback by the impoliteness. "I was looking to speak to the warden. Are you... the warden?"

"No," the woman replied, but this time the tone was a lot more muted. "I'm her assistant."

Tressi couldn't figure out why, but the power dynamic seemed to have shifted a little.

"What do you want with the warden?"

As she questioned Tressi, the woman tried to subtly push the register to a different place on the warden's desk. If she squinted, Tressi could even make out a rectangular clearance in the dust—presumably where the register had originally been.

"Well, what's it about?" the woman asked again, rudeness trickling back in.

"I'm here to visit Mrs. Dala Sakit. Is she still a... resident here?" Tressi almost said 'patient' but caught herself just in time.

At her words, the assistant's mouth opened with a pop, and her already bulged eyes extruded out of their sockets even more. "Dala Sakit? You sure you have the right name?"

"Yes," Tressi replied, confused by the reaction. "Is there any procedure that must be followed?"

The woman didn't reply immediately. She stared dumbfounded, with her mouth hanging open, reminding Tressi inexplicably of a goldfish.

"Well?" It was Tressi's turn to prompt.

The woman blinked. Shaking her head a little, she said, "There's no procedure as such. Although, the warden might wanna know."

"Thank you. And where can I find the warden?"

"She hasn't come in yet. You might've to wait here for half hour."

Tressi acquiesced and sat down on the chair opposite the warden's desk.

The woman looked more surprised than ever, as if she expected Tressi to just turn around and leave.

Shaking her head once more, she abandoned all subtlety and proceeded to place the register exactly in its original position before walking out the door.

With a considerable stretch of time ahead of her, Tressi looked around the room trying to distract herself from thinking about—

Well, just thinking in general.

The warden's small office showed signs of a woman who had tried hard to make the place less dingy. She had the walls painted pale pink and the room didn't smell of wet moss, unlike the hallway outside. It smelled a little like cheap air freshener which contained strong chemical undertones, usually marketed as a floral scent. But it wasn't overpowering, suggesting that it was used sparingly, with great care as to not waste it.

No photographs on the desk or elsewhere. Two magazines on celebrity gossip took up the center of the desk. There was no computer which seemed odd to Tressi, but the large register in the corner piqued her curiosity. She couldn't understand why the assistant had looked so shifty about it.

Unable to stop herself, Tressi picked up the register and flicked through it.

It had the details of the residents along with their sponsorship information. It seemed as though each resident had a sponsor who pledged money to help them take care of their expenses. But curiously enough, a handful of women had no designated sponsors.

Among them, was her mother. Her page too did not contain any mention of a sponsor.

Who's paying for this and when did she move in?

It must have been soon after she left.

Tressi remembered the phone call she made six months after she ran away. Terrified and desperate to come home, she had called in the middle of the night, but the line hadn't gone through. So she'd called Mrs. Lepoci who lived across from them and she'd told Tressi that her mother had moved into the institution. Mrs. Lepoci had given her the new number but Tressi—overcome with sudden unidentified despair—had only pretended to write it down.

Not now. Don't dwell on it now.

There was plenty of time for it later that night in the hotel room by herself. For now, she had to focus. Before she was completely ready however, she could hear footsteps outside the door.

Her time was up.