Page 24 of The Lost Girls of Willowbrook

After taking her empty cup, Marla handed her a bowl of what looked like watery oatmeal. “You know what to do,” she said. “Bring the dish over when you’re done.” Then she moved on to the next girl.

The serving of watery oatmeal barely covered the bottom of the bowl. And there was no spoon. Sage looked around to see if anyone else had a spoon. No one did except for the attendants, who were going around the tables using the same spoon to feed those who couldn’t feed themselves. After shoving a few overflowing spoonfuls into a resident’s mouth, the attendants made sure their juice cups were empty, then moved on to the next person. No one got any more than those first few mouthfuls before Wayne picked up the bowls and returned them to the carts.

Those who could feed themselves ate with their fingers, greedily stuffing oatmeal into their mouths before Wayne and the attendants took it from them. Some dumped the food on the floor and lapped it up like dogs. The wailing and shouting and shrieking continued through it all, and Wayne had his hands full trying to help and keep everyone under control.

“You better eat,” someone said in Sage’s ear, startling her. “You know we don’t get much. You’ll still be hungry when you go to bed.”

It was Tina. She stood next to Sage in her lilac-covered dress, twisting a lock of her thin hair between her finger and thumb, back and forth, and back and forth.

“Where’s yours?” Sage said.

“Already ate it. Time’s almost up, too, so you better hurry.”

“Does it taste as bad as it looks?”

Tina shrugged. “I can’t remember ever having anything that tasted any better. Been here too long, I guess.”

Sage looked at the watery oatmeal. Tina was right. It might look and taste horrible, but whether she wanted to or not, she needed to eat to keep up her strength in case she wasn’t released as soon as she hoped. She took a deep breath, lifted the bowl, and scraped two fingers full into her mouth. As expected, the oatmeal, or whatever it was, tasted like paste. She swallowed without chewing, anxious to get it over with.

Across the room, Wayne dragged a woman away from a garbage can next to the Plexiglas cubicle, forced her over to a couch, and tied her ankle to the couch leg. When he walked away, the woman got up and tried to follow him, but she reached the end of the tether and fell, then pounded her fists on the floor, screaming.

“Damn it, Betty,” Tina said, watching the woman. “Don’t you ever learn? That’s what you get for being a picker.”

“What’s a picker?” Sage said, desperate to distract herself from the slop she was eating.

“Geez Louise,” Tina said. “You really did forget everything, didn’t you? You know, it’s when you pick through the garbage for food.” She pointed at a young girl sitting on the floor across the room. “That one’s a biter.” She pointed at others. “That one’s a head banger. That one over there is a grabber. That one’s a soiler, and that one’s a puker.”

Sage grimaced and gave up trying to finish the oatmeal. While she was grateful to have someone to talk to who understood so much about Willowbrook, there were some things she’d rather not know. “Do you know what’s in the orange juice? I can’t remember.”

Tina shrugged. “Some kind of tranquilizer. We get it with every meal, which is either oatmeal or mush.”

“Mush?”

“Yeah, they grind it up so no one chokes. Brown mush is meat. Green mush is some kind of vegetable. And white mush is either potatoes or rice. But most of the time it’s mixed together so you can’t tell what’s what anyway.”

“Great,” Sage said. Not that it mattered. The food was the least of her worries. And with any luck she’d be released before lunch anyway. “Where do we go after this?”

Tina made a face. “What do you mean?”

“When we’re done with breakfast,” Sage said. “Where do they send us next?”

Tina let out a humorless laugh. “Sometimes they let us outside if it gets too hot in here during the summer, but other than that, this is it. We stay here in the dayroom until after dinner.”

Sage gaped at her, dread pressing against her chest. “But what about school?” she said. “Where do we have classes?”

“Only the kids who live in the experiment ward get lessons.”

Oh God.Her fears were real: Willowbrook was a school in name only. “What about doctors? How often do we see them?”

Tina scrunched up the unscarred side of her face, thinking. “Umm, the last time I saw one was when Marla broke my arm. I think that was about a year and a half ago.” She regarded Sage, a worried look in her eyes. “Are you sure they didn’t mess with you while you were gone? It seems like you forgoteverything.”

The watery oatmeal soured in Sage’s stomach. “Are you saying they don’t reevaluate the residents every once in a while to see how they’re doing?”

“I don’t know what re . . . re . . . whatever that word was. I don’t know what it means.”

“Reevaluate means to look over your case, to see if you’re getting better or worse.”

“Well, they told me a long time ago I’d never get better.”

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