Free Inanimate by Deryck Jason Page A

the awkward Doctor for
a moment before looking back at the much warmer
MacNamee.
    “ Connor?”
    “ Yes Greg?”
    “ Do you know why you were
brought here?”
    MacNamee ’s question was more for his
knowledge of the boy’s level of awareness than anything
official.
    “ Yes” Connor looked down at the floor. “I did
a bad thing.”
    Satisfied, MacNamee breathed
easy.
    “ Yes son. Yes you did. But
we’r e here to
help you through it. I’m going to set you up with a colleague of
ours, a Doctor Paul Frieda, he’s a very nice man and he’ll talk to
you some more ok?”
    MacNamee got up and put his chair back against
the wall as Connor simply stared at the floor. MacNamee was walking
out the door when he heard Connor say something, it was quiet and
his brain had to replay it to make sure he heard it right. He was
sure he heard Connor utter:
    “ It was fun
though.”
    MacNamee stopped dead and turned around,
trying to be friendly but not accusing.
    “ Did you say something
Connor?”
    Connor slowly turned and lifted
his head to meet MacNamee’s.
    “ My bad thing … I said; it was
fun.”
    MacNamee held his breath and
focused on composure. His eyes never left Connors. Later he would
think about how he had misjudged the youngster, lost sight of the
fact that although this was a child in age, the crime he had
committed was purely monstrous. At the time though, his mind had no
thoughts except composure . All he decided to say was:
    “ Dr. Frieda will talk to
you.”
    Connors eyes
follow ed
MacNamee’s as he left the room. When Crass turned the key in the
lock he saw the shock in his young colleague’s eyes.
    “ Try not to think about
it .”
    “ I can’t not think about it Ben, he’s so young.”
    “ We have other children in here Greg, and we
have had others in the past…”
    “ I know Ben but not like
this ”
MacNamee interrupted “We’ve never had a kid who basically committed
matricide in his own home.”
    “ He’s a very disturbed little boy
Greg, nothing more. Let ’s get him in with Frieda; he’s the expert on
children here. He’ll help the boy more than we can.”
    Walking away from the
room, MacNamee couldn’t help but glance over his shoulder at
“101” getting further away. He wondered if he would ever know what
was going on in Connor’s head.

CHAPTER 10

    Andy Williams approached the city limits.
Driving far, he hoped, would quell some of his guilt. Still
partially intoxicated from his all-night bender his driving was
fast and erratic. He didn’t stop to think that if a police car saw
him he almost certainly would have been pulled over, and if so then
he would have been spending at least a night behind bars. He just
drove on, past the city limit sign, leaving, he hoped, all of his
problems behind him.
    In a small room cleverly concealed behind
a one-way mirror the two doctors observed Connor’s interaction with
Doctor Frieda. Compared to the much larger room where Connor sat
this one was dark and very functional. Crass was right, they did
have other children in the hospital but they were not often
permanent guests. Children with illnesses like autism or severe
learning difficulties would come to the larger room to be treated
by Frieda. MacNamee did not feel right here. He did not like the
fact that children were tricked into feeling safe and comfortable
while they were secretly being watched from the next room. However,
this was one of Dr. Crass’s generally praised initiatives, designed
to allow the Doctors to observe the behavior of disturbed children
while they themselves were completely at ease. This ease allowed
the children to be able to talk openly without feeling the
uncomfortable presence of eyes upon them. Connor sat, in a room
surrounded by colorful toys. A selection, chosen by Doctors who had
kids themselves in order to get away from the banality of the usual
garbage toys you would normally find in GP’s waiting rooms or
low-brow pediatrics departments. Nothing here was