Chapter One
The Fourth Floor


My second day on the fourth floor, I was taken off the IV and the monitors. They told me to stay in bed for one more day to rest, at least. I was sitting up with little effort now, but knew they were right. It's how it always was. So I rested. Every so often I would turn on the TV, but I rarely watched anymore. It was all just so much noise. And the third day I was given clothes to walk around the floor. It was still ugly, hospital clothing, but it was better than the horrid gown.


After getting dressed she climbed gingerly out of the bed, nearly slipping as she did so. Thanks to her illness, she was smaller than others her age by far. Standing by the bed, it nearly came up to her chest. It was something she was used to, and why she preferred to keep from getting in and out of the hospital beds too much. They'd had some that were smaller, made for little children, but apparently they didn't exist here on the fourth floor. Unlike the rooms elsewhere, this room was also packed with one-use emergency equipment. Things that were usually stored in the center of the emergency room, to be shared by all the rooms there... instead it was like a personal emergency room, just for her. And yet there was fancy wallpaper, paintings and pictures, and expensive curtains on the windows, as though trying to make you forget that you're in a hospital, even without the equipment.


They said that it was a place where people went to wait for advancements and experimental procedures. So many fancy words for saying that there was nothing left in the world for you. And as she stepped from her room, into the lovely hallway, she became more and more sure... this was where she was going to die.


I wandered the halls of the fourth floor. There were many other rooms, and all of the ones I saw were empty. There was a lounge, that I could just see past the white halls and the lovely paintings, but I wanted to see what else there was. But there weren't even any restricted doors or doctor's offices, only a nurses' station with a guest registry. Giving up, I went into the lounge at last.


Walking in, there were many comfortable-looking chairs and sofas. A few tables, and a shelf with games that looked like they had never been touched. To one side, with a sofa facing it, was a TV. I walked over to see a boy that looked to me my age... or at least, he looked as I imagined my classmates would look. Tall, and just beginning to mature. I wasn't sure, because I hadn't been to school in years, but the fourth-graders on TV looked like him.


He was talking to a very pretty lady, who I guessed was his mother. She looked like she was struggling not to cry, but he was smiling at her. So fake. His eyes were blank, emotionless, as though he hadn't felt anything in years. His smile was empty, forced, there for the benefit of his mother. For the first time since I was told I would die, I felt my chest tighten, and my eyes were threatened with tears. I didn't want to be like that, with blank eyes and forced smiles. I wasn't afraid to die, but if I was going to die then I wanted to die with emotions!


He said something to make his mother laugh, and she looked a little more confident. She stood and kissed him on the forehead, blinking tears away, then walked out of the room. I barely got a glimpse of a guest sticker on her chest saying, “Bethany.” The boy turned back to the TV. I walked over and looked out the window, not wanting to talk to him, for fear of looking into those horribly blank eyes.


“You're new here.”


I jumped, a little startled, and looked back to him. He hadn't even moved. He still stared at the TV, though didn't really seem interested in what was there. “I- I am,” I managed to get out. Feeling silly, I walked over and sat next to him. His hospital band was the same as mine, and I realized for the first time that I'd never seen ones like these before. They were a soft plastic with our names and patient numbers permanently imprinted on them. His name, “William Moore,” seemed to glare at me.


He didn't turn to look at me, but only kept staring blankly at the TV. “Then I have something to tell you, and I'll only say it once.”


He sounded so rehearsed. I nodded, and I don't think he saw. But then again, whether he saw or not probably didn't matter.


“You probably already know why you're here. It's the end of the line. You should think of where you want to die. You'll get to go home three times. After the third time, you die here. If you want to die at home, do it your third time back, or you won't have a choice. But everyone has that choice: die here, or die at home. And do your part, tell this to anyone else who comes in here.”


I swallowed hard, turning and watching that blank expression. “But you've only said it once! Why should I tell anybody that? Why don't you do it?”


He turned to me, that blank look as if he didn't even exist. “Next week... I go home.”


He turned back to stare at the television and the words hung in my mind. “How many times?”


“This will be my third time.”


“And... and you...”


“Not yet.”


My heart was pounding in my chest. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. And the world around me went black.


~///~


The EKG was beeping again, and I looked up to see a doctor I didn't know writing something in my file. He sighed and laid it on a nightstand that I'd only just noticed. “I'm alright.”


He seemed a little surprised and looked at me. He gave me a sad smile. “I know. You're not the first person to pass out their first time in the lounge.” He walked around the other side of the bed and turned off the EKG. “But we have to be careful, you know?”


I nodded and disconnected the red, black, and white wires that lead to the machine. “I know.” I began to peel off the sticky patches and frowned as each left a little white mark, which I knew would be red the next time I looked at them. “Is it true? What he said?”


He watched me a careful moment, and a certain sadness seemed to overcome him. “I'm afraid so.”


He reached to pick up my file and I leaned over, putting my hand on it. “I want to see it.”


He hesitated then nodded. “I'll let the staff know. Someone will come by to pick it up later.” With that, he left. Left me to read my secret history.


His answer would have been different, I know. I asked a few times to see my file, but they only said that if I wanted a copy I would have to request one, because they needed to put it back. I was betting that our files stayed on this floor now, and if they really needed it in a hurry, they would need it in here anyway. My mother didn't want to pay for a copy, and said it would take too much time.


I opened the folder, and all my recent information was there. I leafed through the pages detailing my operations. I didn't understand any of it. It was a very thick folder now, a little heavy and I was clumsy trying to get through it. When I went back far enough, I found my birth record. A piece of paper flat against the plastic-like paper of the heavy folder.


The next page was when I was two days old. Apparently I was a pretty big baby, growing fast already. I had gained almost a quarter of a pound. The next I was a month old, and I had a cold. I got medicine for a cough. There were growth charts now. There was a little dot for both my height and weight between lines that were labeled 50 and 75. Another page and I was three months old, and there were more dots in the same place. Not exactly, because the lines curved up, but they were still between the same lines. I had trouble breathing and they had me on a humidifier.


There were a few pages after that, a lot of doctor appointments with words I didn't recognize. Then I was six months old. The dots were between 25 and 50. Written there were the words: Failure to thrive. I only scanned through the the pages from there, but those words were written so many times. I didn't even look to see which one was after my first operation. I closed the folder and put it back on the nightstand.


A few months later I sat in the lounge, looking at the TV as brightly colored animated people laughed and joked and had fun. A woman came into the room, looking nervous, and a little lost. I came up on my knees in an effort to see over the back of the sofa. She was wearing that soft plastic around her wrist, and her blouse was open, her scars evident. “You're new here,” I said.


She nodded and began to walk over. But my first sentence stopped her, and she looked stunned.


“Then I have something to tell you, and I'll only say it once.” Taking a deep breath, I started, somehow remembering word for word what the boy had told me. “You probably already know why you're here. It's the end of the line. You should think of where you want to die. You'll get to go home three times. After the third time, you die here. If you want to die at home, do it your third time back, or you won't have a choice. But everyone has that choice: die here, or die at home. And do your part, tell this to anyone else who comes in here.”


She started crying and I climbed down off the couch. Walking over to her, I took her hand. “I'm Angelica. I'm gonna be eleven soon. Come on, watch TV with me.” I took a glance at her band. 'Erna Wilson.'


She nodded quietly and came to sit on the couch by me. She didn't watch TV though, and neither did I. She sobbed quietly into her hands. I stared at the TV.


I heard soft footsteps and someone sat on the couch by me.


“You're dying here?”


“Yeah, I am.”


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Part of the idea for this section came from a visual novel called Narcissus. It's a fan translated one. I don't know how it ends because it's glitchy, but I liked the floor for the dying, and the patients there telling newcomers about their "options." The thing that I left out is in the vn, the girl telling the guy this also tells him how to escape the hospital.