The Book: Chapter 7

Eddie’s head snapped up, his scrawny neck all sinewy. He looked like a ventriloquist’s dummy. His eyes were bloodshot, locking onto hers, and the intensity made her stomach twist. He looked beyond her, tracking something invisible and he wasn’t aware of her or anybody else.

‘We’re all going to die. I brought it out of hell and it’s coming,’ he said. His voice rasped, it sounded rubbery and inhuman as he rambled.

He grabbed another chair before Alice could react and hurled it against the wall with the superhuman strength of a crazed mind. The crash sounded like a gunshot, and one of the patients let out a startled scream.

Alice flinched but held her ground, forcing her voice to hold onto a calm tone even as the adrenaline rushing through her system made her want to run. ‘Eddie, I’m here to help you. But I need you to calm down, okay? Nobody’s going to hurt you. I promise.’

‘I heard on the news— about a crash at Newby Bridge. It’s my fault and it wants me to do it again.’ His hands flew to his head, clutching his temples as he staggered against the wall. ‘It’s in my head.’

His legs buckled, and Alice thought he’d collapsed. But he straightened, his body trembled and his eyes were unfocused.

‘You sent it. You’re one of them.’

The accusation frightened Alice as she struggled to find the right words. ‘Eddie, that’s not true. You know me.’

He laughed, a guttural sound that made the hairs on her neck stand on end. ‘You’re all liars.’

Two of the security team arrived. One of them—Carl—nodded at her, waiting for her signal and when prompted, Alice spoke to Eddie, her voice soft. ‘I want to help you. But I need you to trust me.’

Eddie was beyond hearing anything. He’d dropped to his knees, his hands still clutching his head as alternated between mumbles and wails. Disjointed phrases left his mouth between gasps for air.

Carl came in, his steps hard but unhurried. ‘Eddie, we’re going to help you, buddy. Lie down on the floor for me. There’s a good lad. Let’s not make this difficult.’ he said. Carl and the other guard, Mason, moved together one on each side of Eddie. They restrained him while Eddie thrashed, but by the time the nurse arrived with a sedative, he was spent. His face hit the floor as the medication took effect and Carl was ready with his hand out to stop Eddie hurting himself.

Alice’s chest heaved as she caught her breath. The other patients were escorted out of the dayroom first. They were frightened and agitated, some of them acted out and had to be restrained and sedated as well. Dominoes, one went and the rest followed. An elderly woman clutched her rosary, muttering a prayer as urine pooled around her bare feet, but she didn’t notice. The room fell silent except for the hum of the lights. And, in a ward filled with perpetual noise, it wasn’t right. Alice didn’t like it. The two shattered chairs lay in the corner and she made a mental note to have them removed and replaced. One of the patients must have been working at the nuts for hours to unbolt two chairs from the floor.

The sedative Eddie had been given was strong enough to knock him out. He was unconscious but breathing steadily as Alice waited for the porters to bring a gurney for him. Carl and Mason returned to the dayroom after helping the staff herd the rest of the ward into lockdown. Josh had stayed with her while they were gone, but she was glad when they took Eddie to his room. His dignity had been compromised lying on the floor. She went with them and asked them to put him on his bed with a blanket draped over him. The rage had left his face and he seemed peaceful. It felt eerie and Alice noticed that her hands trembled as she brushed a strand of hair from his forehead. Patients kicked off, every single day. This should have been routine, but something about the way he’d stared at her was different.

‘Why today, Eddie? What set you off?’

 She stood up as the guys lifted him onto the stretcher, her eyes searching for a clue to explain the eruption.

Her hands shook and she clutched them together to stem the shaking. A book was half-hidden beneath his small bolted-down desk. Its pages fluttered, but there was no breeze stirring the air. She saw it in her peripheral vision and turned sharply to look, but by now it was still.

It was open, its pages displayed as though mocking her. Alice’s fear caught in her chest. She took a step closer, already knowing which book it was. The words on the exposed page were too small to read, but its intent was clear—it wanted her to read it.

How did it get there?

She’s returned it to the library two days ago. She’d seen it on the shelf, where it belonged. But it had appeared in her office since then and now here.

‘Alice?’ Carl’s voice broke her thoughts, startling her.

She forced herself to look away from the book, her hands clenching into fists at her sides. ‘It’s okay, Carl, you can go now. Thank you.’

The thought of touching the book made her stomach churn. She picked it up, avoiding the words on the page in case they burned her and she put it on the bedside table. It was warm to the touch and she shuddered.

The emergency bell rang as she was about to leave Eddie’s room, taking the book with her to throw in the bin. Moving it went out of her head as she followed the others to the next trauma. But even as she left, she knew it was watching her.

By Wednesday, the tension in the ward was palpable. Alice felt it when conversations stopped as she entered a room. The staff were uneasy and the patients acted out. Something was brewing as they worked in the pressure cooker.

Alice finished filling in the daily records and went to the nurses’ station. She’d just sat down when a scream came from the common room and she dropped the timesheet she was working on and bolted for the sound.

One of the long-term patients was huddled in a corner of the room. Her face contorted in terror. Her shriek dissolved into panicked sobs as she rocked to a self-soothing beat only she could hear. ‘There’s a demon inside me,’ she screamed, her voice was raw. Every word tore from her throat in a plea for salvation.

Alice knelt in front of her, trying to calm her. ‘Lisa. Look at me—I need you to breathe with me, okay?’

Lisa was inconsolable. Her nails dug into her palms with such ferocity that blood dripped from her hands like a nun with stigmata.

Alice reached for her hands to still them, but Lisa lashed out, her strength fuelled by panic.

‘Hold her arms—she’s going to hurt herself,’ Alice shouted. Two nurses rushed over pinning Lisa’s arms to inhibit her movement before attaching hospital restraints. Her screams were persistent, echoing off the walls like a bench saw dissecting a log.

‘She needs sedation. Administer midazolam at 10 milligrams IV, now.’ Mara nodded and left to get the required dosage.

It took twenty minutes for the medication to take effect and calm her. Her body slumped and she relaxed against Alice who was on the floor with her. Lisa’s head Lolled against Alice’s shoulder as her breathing evened. The room was quiet, except for the shuffle of staff moving about and the ambient noise of patients further afield.

Alice surveyed the aftermath. Lisa was put on a stretcher, a sight Alice was seeing far more than was usual. The patient’s face was streaked with drying blood, her eyes fluttering closed. Alice ached for her, but Lisa was peaceful now.

Alice’s relief was short-lived.

There was a book on the table.

That book.

Its dark leather was unmistakable, the edges worn but intact, as though it had been sitting there for years instead of hours.

It was in Eddie’s room that morning.

She didn’t see it when they’d burst into Lisa’s bedroom, but the patient had taken all her attention.

The book had magnetism, drawing her closer despite her instinctive revulsion. She hovered over the cover and the skin of her hand prickled with static.

‘Dr Grant.’ One of the nurses snapped her out of her thoughts.

Alice jerked back, blinking from a dream. ‘Yes?’

‘Are you okay?’

She looked at the book. ‘Sorry. I’m fine.’ Alice dismissed the creeping anxiety as exhaustion replaced the adrenaline, and she felt crushed.

On Friday, Alice was ready for an almost unheard-of weekend off with Mick and she was excited. The morning was flying in and she was in good spirits even though she’d begun to dread her rounds. The week had been relentless, and the increased incidents above what was considered normal were taking a toll—not just on her it affected the whole unit. The staff were snappy with each other, their patience thin, and the patients were restless and more prone to meltdowns. Molly had one of the psychic premonitions. ‘Danger’s coming,’ she said. ‘And there’s menace in the air.

Alice was halfway through her rounds when a call came through on the ward intercom. ‘Dr Grant to room 34.’

Her stomach sank. She knew which patient from the room number.

It was Eddie. Here we go again. She sighed as she ran.

The door to his room was ajar, and two nurses were inside, working beside the bed. The room was quiet with the silence that pressed against her ears and made her heartbeat sound deafening.

Eddie lay in bed, his body stiff and his arms at his sides. He stared at the ceiling, unblinking. Alice thought he was dead.

‘Eddie?’ she said, leaning over him. ‘It’s Dr Grant. Can you hear me?’ She’d made the initial three-phrase First Aid opening gambit.

She straightened, taking a few seconds to watch him—observe, assess, act. There was no response. Eddie didn’t have any recognition in his eyes and didn’t move. The pulse in his neck was undetectable and his heart rate was dangerously low. She leaned in, checking his vitals. His pulse was there, but slow and tachycardic and his breathing, though shallow, was at least consistent. Physically, he didn’t show any sign of imminent cardiac arrest. But his mind had retreated to an unreachable place.

‘What happened?’ she asked Felix.

‘He was fine at breakfast. Quiet, but nothing unusual. When I came to check on him, he was like this.’

‘How long?’

He looked at Debbie for confirmation. ‘I’ve been here about five minutes. I called for help and then Mara put a shout-out for you.’ Felix filled in the details and Mara nodded.

Alice brushed a strand of hair from her face as she scanned the room for it. She was conditioned; like Pavlov’s dog.

It was on the floor on the far side of the bed, as if Eddie had been reading it immediately before he fell into his catatonic state. Its positioning was unnervingly deliberate. It was closed, upward facing and it was there with a purpose.

‘Has this book been here the whole time?’ Her voice came out sharper than she’d intended as she picked the book up and put it on the bedside table.

The nurse looked at it and shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Jesus, Felix. Think. Was it there when you found him like this?’

‘It must have been.’

‘And earlier in the day?’ Alice asked as she secured the oxygen mask over Eddie’s face, twisting the valve to regulate the flow. She talked to him as she stared at his chest, watching for signs that his breathing was improving and waiting for a response that didn’t come.

‘I don’t know. Why?’ Felix looked panicked.  

Alice didn’t answer. She focused on Eddie, but, her mind raced. The coincidences stacked up—Lisa, Eddie, and this. The book appeared during every incident, as though it fed on the chaos. She concentrated on administering medication and stilled her tremor; thinking a book had something to do with this was a ridiculous notion. She had to know. ‘Have you seen this book in any other patient rooms?’ She waved it in the air like an End-of-the-world evangelist.

‘No,’ Mara said, and Felix shook his head. Alice saw the concerned look that passed between them. And she noticed Mara looking at her shaking hand.

Her rational mind dismissed the thought—it was an inanimate object. But the idea twisted in her brain, tying a knot she couldn’t unravel.

‘Get it out of here,’ she shouted.

Felix blinked. ‘What?’

‘That book. Get rid of it. Now.’

He stared at her as though she’d grown a second head.

‘Are you okay, Dr Grant?’ Mara said, using Alice’s professional title. She put her hand on her arm. ‘Why don’t you take your break? I can finish up here,’ Mara said.

‘I’m fine. That bloody book’s everywhere. It’s freaking me out. Eddie’s burning up. Pass me a cold flannel.’

Felix left with the book, and Alice went back to Eddie. ‘What’s wrong with you, Eddie?’ she asked. But she already knew the answer.

Book Links

Katherine Black Amazon Page. 17 books to choose from: all on KU.

 

 https://www.amazon.co.uk/stores/Katherine-Black/author/B071JW51FW?