Acid Rain by R.D Rhodes (ebook reader txt) 📕

minutes with her, Liz. That’s all. That’ll sort her out.”

A cold fear ran up my spine and tingled to my head. I couldn’t believe he had just said that. He couldn’t have meant what I thought he did. Not so openly. Surely? But the way his eyes kept leering at me confirmed it.

I backed up tighter to the wall.

“May-buy two.” Liz said. Their eyes poured into me while they talked as if I wasn’t there.

I didn’t dare take my eyes off them.

Suddenly the hall doors swung open from behind me and Sanders was standing there with one hand holding them open.

“C’mon then! What you waiting for? The doctor can see you now.”

Chapter 9

I couldn’t get out of that ward quick enough, and I almost dived behind the door that Sanders was holding open. But as I stood in the buffer zone before the second locked door, waiting for her to unlock it, she remained where she was, looking back.

“Kev, would you come with me to escort her up.”

Shit, I thought. I stood there with my eyes fixed on the floor. He entered through the door and stood right next to me while her key jangled in the lock.

She stepped the two paces forward and unlocked the second set of doors and Kev immediately stepped out in front and to the left, blocking off the staircase down.

“C’mon then, madam.” Sanders said, looking at me with hatred.

She waited behind the door as I stepped through, and quickly locked it behind her. While the key turned in the lock, I cast a quick glance at Kev and the stairs down- taking in his athletic physique, his long muscled legs. No, it’s useless, I thought, and dismissed the idea. The doctor will have something to say about it anyway. They can’t make me take something against my will.

“C’mon.” Sanders ordered.

I followed her bouncing ponytail up the stairs, Kev right behind us. She led me up to the top floor then along an empty corridor down what I knew must have been the west wing of the building. Her heels sharply pierced the silent air while she paced along faster than ever.

We past door after door then she suddenly stopped at about the tenth one down, where “Dr Dickson” was lettered in silver plaque over the glossy oak wood. She knocked once, pulled it open and gestured me inside. I stepped into the room and the door shut firmly behind me.

A stout, powerfully built man was sitting before me, behind a huge oak desk, his body slouched forward on his clasped hands. He twiddled his thumbs as he scrutinized me from dark eyes set deep under black bushy eyebrows. His hair was groomed in a buzz cut, his skin was tanned, and his strong chin speared from his angular face. Something about him reminded me of the security guy on the gate. He was much better looking than him though, and he knew it. Maybe it was the bushy eyebrows.

He stretched back and folded his huge hands behind his head.

“Take a seat please.” he almost yawned.

I sat down in the seat opposite him.

A dim light came into the room from the small window behind his head. Below the window running right along the back wall was a large, solid bookshelf, filled with chunky hardbacks of various sizes. His desk was filled with books drawn from that shelf, and numerous psychiatry journals were also piled up on top of each other. In front of him and lying between us was a big blue binder with the letters DSM printed on the side.

“Now then”, he swept the back of his hand across the desk and nudged a few books away, clearing a space in front of him but keeping the blue binder where it was. He resumed a more professional position, speaking boldly and direct.

“My name is Doctor Dickson and I’m going to be your Doctor here for the duration of your stay.”

He looked back at the books and folders he had just moved to the edge of the desk and stretched out his long arm to pick one back up. His fingers grasped at the orange folder on the bottom of the pile and he spread apart the binder and ducked his head close to the pages.

“Is it Aye-sha…Ayee-sha..”

“Ayee-sha.” I said.

“Oh-kay. Ayee-sha… McGillivray. Oh yes, I had a look at this last night. It says here you suffer from blackouts and depression. Is that right?”

I looked at him blankly.

“Well? Is that the case?”

I felt my back slink down into the seat. “I have done, in the past. But the thing is I don’t-“

He raised his right hand and showed me it. He was an arrogant bastard.

“Hmm...” He went on reading, his stubby fingers flicking through the pages as his expressionless pupils rolled back and forth. Suddenly a startled look glinted in his eyes. He raised his head and stared at me in what appeared to be fascination. Then he returned to the folder and flicked a few more pages. He snapped it shut and put it down.

“Would you say you’re an angry person?”

His eyebrows were raised thoughtfully. He was actually being serious.

“Erm, no more than anyone else.”

He nodded. “You haven’t been on any medication before.”

“Is that a question or are you telling me?”

He didn’t answer.

“No. I never have.”

“How would you describe your sleeping patterns?”

“Depends. Sometimes it’s okay. Sometimes I struggle to sleep at all.”

“And would you say you’re an anxious person. Nervous when meeting other people?”

I struggled to see the relevance in these daft questions.

“Not really, it just depends. What kind of questions are these?”

“And how would you describe your motivation? Would you say you have difficulty in motivating yourself to do things? Do you get angry when someone forces