Chapter 4: Or In Rain

Rachael woke slowly, her body finally surfacing from its drug-induced slumber. Parts of the room swam around her, gradually going in and out of focus; her mind stirred in its chemical cage.

'Where am I? What happened?" her drowsy mind asked.

She fumbled through her memories, and slowly Rachael assembled her recent history, fragment by fragment.

'Going to the doctors, '

'Coming hard, and shocking the prudish receptionist, '

'Being pulled off her mum, '

The memory jarred a nerve, and Rachael's rolling eyes grew misty.

'The jab in her arm, and floating to the waiting ambulance, '

'Watching the countryside and mines drift by as she travelled far away from her home, '

'A serious looking woman in a blue uniform, and the smiling woman doctor, then darkness... '

Rachael sniffed back her tears, and moved. Her hand failed to reach her wet eyes. It was held firmly by a leather strap that stretched towards the headboard of the bed.

'Shit, I'm trapped!' the panicked girl thought.

Rachael noticed the red button close to her hand; her finger jabbed at it furiously. Almost at once the glossy green door swung open, and in walked a familiar figure.

"Awake are we? Good. So are we more sociable today?" asked a matronly voice.

"Sod off!" Rachael snarled.

"Before or after I release you?" the nurse asked.

"Release me, you mean you will take these shackles off?" Rachael smiled weakly.

"Yes, you know they are only on to stop you wandering around when you are too drowsy. We don't want any accidents, these neuroleptics are pretty powerful," the nurse paused, "but you seem awake enough to me."

"What are neuroleptics?"

"The class of drugs you are on, Rachael, they help control your symptoms -the voices?"

"Voices, no - there is just one voice, that bitch Lalo. She controls me!"

"Rachael, you are ill, the doctors and I will help you."

"By drugging me and tying me down?" Rachael spat out.

"You keep up that spirit, girl; it will help you get better,"

"I'm not ill..." Rachael's voice trailed off.

The nurse walked forward and unbuckled the straps securing Rachael to the hospital bed. Rachael read the label on the nurse's lapel: 'Cora Vickery. Matron Unit 5.'

"Cora, what sort of name is that?" Rachael asked.

"A Scottish sort, Rachael, is that OK with you?"

"You don't sound Scottish."

"I've been here so long, the accent - it fades, I expect. Anyway, Dr Kemp will want to see you shortly, now you are back with us."

"Well fuck her, I'm staying here." growled Rachael.

"We'll see, Rachael, we will see." The matron winked, and swept out of the room.

Rachael sat in the doctor's office, glaring at the pasty-faced girl opposite her; she was the epitome of everyone's image of the institutionalised. Her sallow cheeks were bony ridges above a deeply hollowed mouth, at which skinny fingers plucked for no obvious reason. Her dirty blonde hair hung lankly across her forehead, mostly obscuring the pale blue darting eyes. The girl, for she was no more than that, looked like a startled deer, caught in the headlights of an oncoming lorry.

For an instant, Rachael felt sorry for her waif-like companion, and was just about to speak, when the door opened. In breezed a woman in a business suit, who sat behind the room's solitary desk. Quietly she thumbed through a few sheets of paper, and then spoke.

"Welcome, Rachael, I am Dr Kemp and this is Pearl. Please try to relax; we are just here to make our introductions. Pearl will be your mentor and room mate, she knows all about the hospital - and will help you to feel at home here."

"I'm not sharing a room with that junkie! She looks a right smack-head, how the hell can she help me?" Rachael gave a derisory laugh.

"Pearl has never abused drugs, Rachael; she suffers from agoraphobia and an eating disorder. She is however, bright and capable. Now introduce yourself to Pearl, I'm sure she will accept your apology." Dr Kemp frowned.

"Yeah, sure, bog off!" said Rachael.

"OK then Rachael, have it your way. I still want you to introduce yourself, and explain why you are here."

Rachael's face fell, her confident, cheeky air evaporated. She couldn't discuss this - not now; stuck in a room with a Welsh clone of Shirley Conran, and a zombie. Rachael shifted uncomfortably, and stared at her tightly clasped hands. Her panic was blind; there was nowhere left to turn. Rachael's moods swung wildly. Was she losing her mind?

"If it's easier Rachael, Pearl and I will start first?"

Rachael nodded sullenly.

"I'm Dr Virginia Kemp, Child Psychologist and Psychosexual counsellor. I'm from Cardiff originally, and my friends call me Ginny."

Pearl glanced up, the hair fell away from her eyes; the pale orbs scanned Rachael intensely.

"Me, I'm Pearl, Pearl White. I like it here, it's safe, Rachael; you don't have to go anywhere you don't want to. I hate going outside, so they keep me here, safe and sound," Pearl stated in a clear low voice.

"My name is Rachael Savage; I'm here because I hear a voice."

"Yes and the voice tells you to do unpleasant things. Why do you listen, why do you do as the voice says?" Dr Kemp asked.

"It's not my fault! When Lalo talks to me I lose control, I have to do what she wants," Rachael stated.

"So this Lalo, is she a real person?"

"Yes, she's the lezzy bitch that set me up, she made me grope my mum - I didn't want to do it!" Rachael spoke through her tears.

"You groped your mum? Gross..." Pearl eyed Rachael with suspicion, "I'm not going to share a room with her!"

"Pearl, Rachael is on a high dose of colozapine, she won't hear the voices now. You are quite safe, Pearl, and Rachael will help you get over some of your fears," Virginia said.

"I don't like her! She's weird; let me share with someone else - anyone else," Pearl pleaded.

"Now, Pearl..." Dr Kemp was interrupted by Rachael.

"Please Pearl, I'm sorry, I need a friend..." tears streamed down Rachel's face "I'm lost, I don't understand what's happening to me."

Pearl's expression changed as the last sentence left Rachael's lips. She sat forward, and rested her thin hand on Rachael's.

"It's OK, I know. We'll help each other, I'll be your big sister, Rachael"

"Big sister? How old are you, Pearl?" Rachael sniffed.

"I'm seventeen, Rachael, and you?"

"Seventeen, but you look like a kid. I'm fourteen, but I look older than you."

"Pearl's illness has stopped her developing sexually, Rachael, that's why she looks as she does." Dr Kemp added.

"I still don't have periods, and I never want to!" Pearl's voice quaked.

"You want to be a little girl forever?" Rachael asked, incredulously.

"I never want to be a woman, to have to..." Pearl's voice trailed off.

Pearl coughed and dry retched.

"OK, Pearl, we aren't going to talk about that any more. Calm down, calm now."

"I'm all right, sorry," whimpered Pearl.

"Let's wind this up, you two girls go and get to know each other. We'll talk more tomorrow"

Virginia smiled as the girls wandered away from her office. She had high hopes for them both, and as experimental as this approach was - it did show promise.

Jeff panted, and drove his buttocks down once more. He relished the feel of her soft suction, pulling him into her very core. He closed his eyes and blindly stroked her rib cage. He swept his fingers over her smooth breasts and located her needy nipples. She tightened against him, her breath coming in short gasps. Jeff felt her legs cross behind his flexing back; lovingly she drew him to her. He felt the beginning, his slack pouch contracted--squeezing and propelling his seed on its furious journey. Lustily, headily, he came, filling her and calling the name of his love into the still night.

"Maldea!"

He opened his eyes, and stared down into the deep blue ones returning his gaze.

"Oh god, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry..." Jeff puffed.

"Don't worry, Jeff, it's not the first time," she said.

"I know, but that's hardly an excuse!"

"Look, I know I'm just the substitute here. I know how much you love her."

"You are no substitute, Janet; you are far more than that - without you I'd have gone mad years ago," Jeff protested.

"I know, but I will never understand it, you are crazy about her - are you sure it can't work?"

"We can never just make love, she always holds something back," Jeff paused, "it's as if she's afraid it will all start again."

"What will all start again, Jeff? In all these years - you never have told me," Janet asked.

"And I never will!" Jeff shouted.

Jeff grabbed his trousers, and started to pull them up his legs. His hands trembled with rage.

"You're not going now, Jeff, you can't just storm out on me, again!"

Janet curled her arm around Jeff's waist; her fingers fondled his wet shaft, and then sank down to weigh his ample balls. She felt him swelling against her wrist; he was weakening.

"Leave it, Janet, I have told you before there are things I can't tell you -I'm going home."