“Hi Millie!”
Lucy jumped, waving both arms from the sidewalk, her pink sneakers tapping the warm stone tiles with excitement.
Millie’s head popped out from the window high above — floor 37, Lucy’s mom always said. So high up it made your neck ache just to look.
“Hi Lucy!” Millie giggled, her dark curls bouncing in the wind.
She leaned out. Too far.
Her elbow cleared the ledge.
Her knees shuffled forward.
Lucy waved harder.
And then—
The scream was short.
The fall felt endless.
The sound when Millie hit the pavement was like a tree snapping in half.
Then came the blood.
Then the pieces.
Then silence.
And then, the screaming — most of it from Lucy, drenched in something warm and red that she didn’t understand, staring at the shape that used to be her best friend.
Seven Years Later
Lucy doesn’t talk now.
She lives behind locked doors and padded walls, in a place where the screams of other children echo down the halls like ghosts. A place where light flickers and time means nothing.
She walks in slow, unsteady steps, dragging a soft stuffed lamb wherever she goes — its matted fur crusted from years of being held too tightly.
She sucks quietly on a rubber pacifier. The nurses call it a “comfort item.” Lucy doesn’t care. It helps.
Her diaper rustles under her institutional smock. She barely notices. It’s just part of her now — like the dummy, like the lamb, like the emptiness.
They feed her by hand. She doesn’t chew much. Just swallows what they give her and stares at the wall. Sometimes a tear rolls down her cheek without her even noticing it.
Other kids shout, fight, cry, bang their fists against the doors. Lucy doesn’t flinch. She’s not afraid — not of them, not of the noise. She’s just somewhere else, always.
They trust her, because she’s quiet. Because she doesn’t hurt anyone. Because she’s been like this too long.
But every now and then, someone new will ask, “What happened to her?”
And the staff will say, with lowered voices:
“She saw her best friend fall. Floor 37. Hit the ground in front of her. Covered in blood. She was five.”
And that’s all they ever say.
Chapter 2 – The Loop
Lucy’s days are all the same.
Wake.
Change.
Eat.
Sit.
Wander.
Sleep.
Repeat.
She doesn't know what day it is, and she doesn’t care. The lights tell her when it’s morning. The nurses tell her when it’s time to be cleaned. The food tray tells her when it’s mealtime.
Sometimes she forgets her own name.
They wake her gently. They always do. Loud voices make Lucy retreat too far, and then it’s a whole thing — silence, curling into herself, maybe a diaper change needed again. So the staff learned. Soft touches. Low voices.
A warm hand on her shoulder.
“Good morning, Lucy.”
She blinks, sucking gently on her pacifier.
Her lamb is already in her arms. Someone always tucks it in before they close her door.
Chapter 3 – Chalk
Mara came back the next day.
No clipboard this time. No badge, no big announcement. Just a soft knock on Lucy’s open door and a quiet, “Hi again.”
Lucy didn’t turn.
She was sitting on the floor, legs splayed, her lamb in her lap. Sucking gently on her pacifier, eyes unfocused, her thumb brushing the edge of the stuffed animal’s ear again and again and again.
Mara stepped in, slow. Sat cross-legged a few feet away. No sudden moves.
“I brought something.”
She reached into a worn canvas tote bag and pulled out a photograph.
It was small. Curled at the edges. Faded from years of sunlight.
Mara held it out, flat on her palm.
“That’s me when I was little,” she said. “Five years old. That’s my sister next to me. She had this big gap in her teeth and she loved frogs. We found one that day in the grass. I was terrified, but she picked it up like it was a kitten.”
Lucy didn’t look.
Her gaze hovered somewhere around Mara’s elbow. No reaction. No flicker. Just the soft, rhythmic suck of her pacifier and the faint crinkle of her diaper when she shifted slightly.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to look,” Mara said, after a beat. “I just thought maybe you’d like to know I was little once too.”
She didn’t press the photo closer. Didn’t nudge it toward her. She just set it gently on the floor, halfway between them, and stood.
She came back again an hour later.
“Let’s go for a walk,” she said.
Lucy stood, because that’s what she was used to doing when asked. Her lamb dangled from her hand, the worn ear dragging along the scuffed linoleum floor as Mara led her down the hallway.
They passed the rec room. The lunchroom. The medicine room.
Then Mara opened a quiet door near the end of the hall.
Inside: a small room. Two chairs. A table. No cameras. No restraints. Just soft yellow light and a single narrow window, too high to look through.
Lucy stepped inside.
And stopped.
Her eyes fixed on the wall. Blank, beige, boring.
Mara waited. Then gently took Lucy by the waist and lifted her onto the chair.
Still no resistance.
Still no expression.
Mara reached into her tote again and pulled out a thick stack of paper.
Then — a small box of chalk pastels. Bright. Dusty. The kind that get all over your fingers and leave color on your skin.
She placed them on the table.
“You don’t have to draw,” she said. “But you can.”
Lucy stared at the wall again.
Unmoving.
Mara didn’t say anything else. She just pulled her own chair out and sat down beside her, hands in her lap.
A minute passed.
Then five.
Then ten.
The silence wasn’t awkward. It was gentle. Patient.
Lucy didn’t touch the chalk. She didn’t even seem to see it.
But she wasn’t leaving.
And she hadn’t looked at the wall again either.
Just the table.
Just the colors.
And for the first time in a very, very long time — her lamb slipped out of her hand and landed softly on her lap, forgotten for just a moment.
Chapter 4 – The Mark
The chalk sat untouched for almost an hour.
Mara didn’t speak.
Didn’t look at her.
She just sat there, legs crossed, picking at a hangnail, humming softly under her breath — not a lullaby, not a song, just a melody without shape.
Lucy sat motionless.
Her lamb rested on her lap now. Both hands free.
The pacifier stayed in her mouth, the rhythm of her suckling slowing.
And then—
She blinked.
Just once.
Her eyes dropped from the wall.
Down to the table.
To the paper.
To the chalk.
Her fingers twitched.
Mara didn’t move. Didn’t breathe loud enough to interrupt whatever this was.
Lucy reached out.
First one finger. Then two. Then her whole hand, hesitant — like she was touching something hot, something fragile.
She picked up a piece of green chalk.
Held it in her fingers like it was foreign. Like it might vanish if she squeezed too hard.
Then — slowly, cautiously — she pressed it to the paper.
A single line.
Wobbly. Faint.
Then another. Crossing it.
A shape started to form. Not clear. Not perfect. A strange kind of squiggle. But intentional. Her hand moved on its own now, loose and drifting, letting something pour out that had been locked up for too long.
Mara didn’t ask what it was.
She didn’t praise her.
She just watched, quietly.
Lucy’s lips moved around her pacifier. Not words — just the soft motion of someone working through a feeling. Something old. Something painful. Something wordless.
She switched to red. Drew a curved shape. Then black. A few dots. She pressed harder with that one. The black lines were thick. Angry. Buried under the green.
Then she dropped the chalk.
Just like that.
Her shoulders slumped.
She turned away from the table. Picked up her lamb.
Stuck her thumb in her mouth this time — not the pacifier.
And leaned sideways until her head rested on the table.
Eyes closed.
Done.
Mara didn’t touch the drawing.
Didn’t analyze it.
Didn’t say a damn thing.
She just stood up, folded a soft blanket from her tote, and draped it over Lucy’s narrow shoulders.
And then she sat back down and waited.
Not for more.
Just for her.
Chapter 5 – Reactions
Lucy’s drawing was still on the table when the staff found it.
Smudged, childlike, strange.
Green scribbles. Red curls. Angry black lines layered over top.
No signature. No explanation.
But it was there.
And that was enough.
Janine stood in the doorway, hand on her hip, brow furrowed like the paper might explode.
“You sure she did this?”
Mara didn’t answer. She didn’t have to. Lucy was still slumped in the chair, wrapped in the blanket, thumb in her mouth, lamb clutched tight to her chest like it was made of glass.
Mara stepped in front of the table, casually sliding the drawing under a folder.
“Yeah,” she said. “She did.”
Janine gave a low whistle.
“That’s… wow. She hasn’t done anything like this in years.”
“Let’s not make a big deal out of it.”
But of course they would. They always did.
By lunchtime, the whispers were circling.
“She drew something.”
“The quiet one?”
“Maybe she’s finally coming out of it.”
Some of the staff peeked into her room as she ate, like she was some kind of miracle blooming in a petri dish. A few kids even stared — not out of cruelty, just confusion. Lucy wasn’t supposed to do anything. That was the unspoken rule.
But now she'd moved. She'd made a mark. And that made her unpredictable again.
Lucy didn’t react to the attention.
But she stopped eating halfway through her lunch. Turned her head. Shut down.
Mara saw it. She leaned in.
“Want to come back to the room?”
Lucy didn’t nod. But she stood.
The art room was quiet again. Chalk still sitting on the table. Paper fresh.
Mara didn’t bring up the drawing.
She didn’t say anything about it.
She just took her seat again, same posture, same silence.
This time, Lucy sat without help. Just lowered herself into the chair like she was trying to be invisible.
And Mara did something she hadn’t done before.
She drew, too.
A soft scrape of pastel across paper.
Mara picked up a blue stick and drew a crooked little house with four windows and a round, lopsided sun. Nothing special. Just a kid’s drawing. A mirror.
She glanced sideways. Not at Lucy — at the corner of her own paper.
Then she added a stick figure.
And another.
One small. One tall. Holding hands.
No words. Just color.
Lucy's eyes flicked sideways.
She didn’t touch her own chalk.
But she looked.
And this time — that was enough.
Chapter 6 – Setback
The nightmare didn’t wait for midnight.
It came fast — like a hand pulling her under, like a scream swallowed before it even hit her throat.
Lucy jerked awake, soaked in sweat and something else.
Her lamb was on the floor.
Her sheets were wet.
Her pacifier was missing.
And for the first time in a long time, Lucy screamed.
Not a whimper.
Not the silent sobbing she used to do when the lights flickered or someone nearby threw a chair.
A full-body, raw-throated, terrified scream.
The kind that reached through every locked door in the hallway.
The kind that yanked the night staff to their feet before the second syllable left her lungs.
Lucy screamed until her voice cracked. Until her body shook. Until she couldn’t tell where she ended and the memory began.
Blood on her arms.
Red on the pavement.
Bones.
Screaming.
The sound — the sound of Millie hitting the ground, over and over and over and over and over—
“Lucy!”
Janine was on her knees beside the bed, wide-eyed and breathless.
She’d been asleep in the staff room and came running barefoot.
Another nurse — an older one with thick arms and calm eyes — was already lifting Lucy, soaked clothes and all, gently into her lap.
“It’s okay, baby. You’re okay. We’ve got you.”
Lucy didn’t seem to hear.
She kept crying.
Kept kicking.
Her face was red, twisted, wet with snot and spit and tears.
She grabbed at her own hair. Bit her hand. Scratched her arms.
“Hold her,” Janine said. “She’s stuck. She’s in it.”
The older nurse sat on the bed, cradling Lucy like an infant, swaying gently.
“Shhh. Shhhh. You’re not there. You’re here. Just us now, sweet girl. Just us.”
The sheets were stripped.
The floor was cleaned.
A fresh diaper, warm blanket, soft lullaby humming through the dark.
Lucy lay in the nurse’s arms for the rest of the night, her body slack, her breath hiccupping in waves.
They never put her back in bed.
Just kept holding her, rocking her like a child who never got the chance to stop being five years old.
And when her pacifier was found under the corner of the bed and returned to her lips, she took it and sucked like it was oxygen.
By dawn, the ward was quiet again.
The other kids had stopped crying.
The doors were still locked.
But Lucy — limp, warm, wrapped in soft arms and humming breath — had finally fallen back asleep.
And no one said the word setback out loud.
But everyone thought it.
Chapter 7 – The Humming
The morning after the nightmare was gray.
Not rainy. Not stormy. Just gray — like even the sky knew it needed to tread lightly.
Lucy didn’t eat breakfast.
She sat at her usual spot by the window, blanket still wrapped around her shoulders, her lamb in her lap, her pacifier in place. Her eyes were puffy. Her face pale.
She wasn’t crying anymore.
But she also wasn’t there.
Janine brought her food, placed it on the tray, then backed off.
No one made her eat.
Not today.
Across the room sat another girl.
She was maybe a year older than Lucy — wiry, fidgety, eyes sharp behind a curtain of mousy brown hair. Her name was Riley, though most of the staff just called her The Whistler, because she never talked — only whistled or hummed, constantly.
Most of the kids didn’t like it.
It got under their skin.
But Riley never stopped.
That morning, she watched Lucy.
Not staring. Not rude. Just watching.
She saw the way Lucy sat there, motionless, wrapped in wool and memory. She saw the untouched food, the trembling fingers, the stuffed lamb clutched like it might vanish if let go.
And she started to hum.
Softly.
Not loud. Not showy. Just this little tune — drifting like a feather between their tables.
A lullaby, maybe. Something unfinished. Something warm.
At first, Lucy didn’t react.
Her eyes didn’t lift.
Her hands didn’t move.
But her head… tilted.
Barely.
Like a flower turning toward faint sunlight.
Riley kept humming.
Didn’t look at her.
Just kept her head down, sketching circles into the wood grain of the table with her thumbnail, the sound rising and falling in quiet waves.
Lucy blinked.
A slow one.
Like she’d just come up for air.
The tune swirled through the stillness, wrapping itself around her ears, into the cracks Mara had started. Into the space left by the scream.
She didn’t hum back.
Didn’t move.
But her fingers tightened around her lamb.
And for the first time since she woke up soaked and screaming, Lucy wasn’t alone in her silence.
Later, in the hallway, Riley passed her without a word.
No eye contact. No smile.
But she brushed Lucy’s shoulder as she walked by.
A tiny touch.
Not even a second long.
And it was like Lucy had been seen.
Not as a patient.
Not as “the baby.”
Not as the girl who screamed.
Just… as a person.
And when she got back to her room that night, Lucy picked up a piece of chalk.
A new one.
Blue.
And drew a single line across a page.
Chapter 8 – The Drawing
Lucy was back in the art room.
The same table. Same worn chalk. Same silence.
But she wasn’t alone this time.
Riley sat across from her. No humming. No speaking. Just the soft tap-tap of her fingernails on the table’s edge.
She pulled something out of her hoodie. A folded piece of paper, crinkled and bent at the corners.
She slid it across the table.
Lucy stared at it.
Didn’t reach.
Didn’t blink.
Just looked — confused, hesitant, uncertain.
A drawing.
Childish. Rough. Heavy lines. Dark colors. Angry scratches in red and black. A figure — small, stick-like — crouched in the corner of a box. Another shape, larger, looming above. Shapes around them. Sharp. Violent.
Lucy's eyes traced the page. Her brow furrowed.
Something in her stomach twisted — a slow, sick churn.
Then—
“What’s this?”
The voice snapped the moment in half.
Janine had walked in without knocking.
She snatched the drawing off the table so fast Lucy flinched and Riley jumped.
Her eyes went wide, wild.
“Where did you get this?” Janine barked.
Lucy shrank back in her chair.
Riley stood up fast, already backing toward the door.
“Riley,” Janine said, her voice lower now, tighter. “Come with me. Now.”
Riley didn’t resist. She followed. Silently.
Lucy watched the door close behind them.
An hour passed.
Lucy sat in silence, legs dangling, lamb limp in her lap.
The nurses were murmuring outside the room. Talking fast. Serious.
Mara wasn’t there.
Then the door opened.
Janine stepped inside again, holding a mug of tea.
Her face was softer now.
“Hey, sweetheart,” she said. “You okay?”
Lucy didn’t answer. She just stared at the table.
The drawing was gone.
“That picture Riley gave you,” Janine said carefully. “It wasn’t… it wasn’t very nice, was it?”
Lucy’s pacifier moved slightly in her mouth. Her hands clutched tighter around the lamb.
Two more nurses hovered in the doorway. One of them whispered:
“Do we know what the drawing was supposed to mean?”
“She’s been… through it,” the other said. “Her whole file is redacted. Sexual abuse, violent home, the works. She’s only ever drawn stuff like that.”
“Why give it to Lucy?”
“Maybe she thought Lucy would understand.”
Silence.
Janine looked back at Lucy.
Her eyes softened again.
“You're safe here, okay?” she said gently. “You don’t have to look at things like that.”
But Lucy didn’t feel unsafe.
She just felt confused. Cold. And strangely empty.
Because Riley had shared something — raw, messy, horrible — and now she was gone.
And Lucy didn’t know if she’d see her again.
That night, Lucy didn’t draw.
She didn’t cry.
She just lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.
And somewhere in the quiet dark, she heard it:
A faint, shaky humming.
Down the hall.
From another room.
Riley.
Still there.
Still humming.
Still trying to speak, in the only way she knew how.
Chapter 9 – Fallout
Mara returned just after lunch.
She already knew something had happened.
The whispers started before she even got past the front desk.
“Riley lost it again.”
“She was restrained this time.”
“Lucy was in the room.”
She walked fast. Passed the nurse’s station. Didn’t stop to talk.
She already knew where to go.
Lucy sat alone in the corner of the common room, her lamb clutched tight in her lap, pacifier bobbing gently. Her smock was clean, her diaper fresh, her hair brushed. She looked fine.
She looked normal.
But Mara knew that look.
She’d seen it before — the kind of quiet that wasn’t peace.
It was retreat.
Total emotional shutdown.
Mara crouched beside her.
“Hey, Luce.”
Lucy didn’t turn.
Didn’t blink.
Just kept staring out the window that didn’t open.
“You wanna come with me?”
No response.
But after a moment, Lucy stood. Automatically. Like a ghost rising out of a body.
She followed Mara down the hallway.
Passed two locked rooms.
Passed the one Riley was in.
From behind that door came screaming.
Riley’s voice, hoarse and broken, shouting things no twelve-year-old should even know how to say.
Obscene.
Violent.
Desperate.
“I SAID NO! HE TOLD ME TO—”
“YOU THINK I LIKED IT? YOU THINK—”
“I’LL DRAW IT AGAIN, I DON’T CARE! I’LL DRAW ALL OF IT!”
Mara didn’t stop walking.
But Lucy did.
Only for a second.
Then she kept moving.
No emotion. No reaction.
Just distance.
They entered the art room.
Mara closed the door softly behind them.
Same table. Same paper. Same chalk.
She didn’t sit right away. Just stood by the shelf, pulling a few new pastels from a box. Reds. Purples. Browns.
“You don’t have to draw today,” she said quietly.
Lucy sat in her usual seat.
Pacifier still in place. Lamb in her lap.
Staring at the paper.
“I know Riley scared you. She scared the staff, too.”
Still no reaction.
Mara walked over. Set the chalk down in front of her.
“But I think… maybe what she was trying to do wasn’t scary.”
She sat down.
Folded her hands. Waited.
“I think Riley was trying to show you what happened to her. And it wasn’t supposed to make you afraid. I think she thought you’d understand.”
A pause.
“Because maybe you do.”
Lucy's thumb brushed the lamb's ear.
Her eyes lowered to the chalk.
Then — slowly — she picked up the purple.
She drew one line.
Then another.
Then stopped.
But she didn’t let go of the chalk.
Mara leaned in slightly.
“You don’t have to draw her pain, Lucy.”
“You can draw your own.”
No reply.
But a tear slid down Lucy’s cheek.
Silent.
Clean.
As if her body remembered how to cry even though her voice had long forgotten how to scream.
That was enough for today.
Mara didn’t push.
Didn’t praise.
Just let Lucy sit there.
Holding a purple chalk stick like it was the last solid thing in her world.
Chapter 10 – The Flower
The chalk was pale yellow.
Lucy's fingers moved carefully — not with the hesitation of before, but with focus. Intention.
She didn't just scribble.
She crafted.
Each petal curved gently, shaded with soft strokes of pink and white. The stem was thin, delicate. Two green leaves sprouted from either side, curling slightly at the ends.
It was a flower. But not like a child would draw.
It was real.
Alive.
Gentle in a way Lucy hadn’t touched in years.
Mara sat nearby, quiet, barely breathing. Watching it happen.
Lucy finished the drawing. Stared at it for a long time. Then looked up — not at the wall this time.
At Mara.
And she tapped the page. Twice.
Then pointed to the door.
Not for me.
Mara blinked, surprised, but nodded slowly.
“You want to give it to someone?”
Lucy nodded.
One small, slow nod.
“Riley?”
Another nod.
And then — something no one had seen in seven years.
Lucy held out the drawing.
Arms extended. Offering.
Riley was still tied to her bed when Mara entered her room.
Restraints across her arms and legs, not tight — just firm enough to keep her grounded. Her face was red and raw from crying. Her voice hoarse from screaming.
She didn’t even look up when the door opened.
Didn’t care.
What more could they take?
Mara didn’t speak. She just walked over and held the paper out where Riley could see it.
“Lucy drew this,” she said softly.
“For you.”
Riley’s eyes flicked over.
Barely interested at first.
Then she saw it.
The flower.
The yellow. The curve of it. The softness. The detail.
Her jaw trembled.
“She made that?” she whispered, voice rasped and hollow.
Mara nodded. Set the drawing on the bedside table. Slid it gently within Riley’s line of sight.
Riley stared.
Her chest hitched.
A breath caught in her throat like a stone.
And then — the tears came.
Fast. Hot. Uncontrollable.
She sobbed like she hadn’t since she was a child. Not the angry kind, not the wild rage she'd lashed out with the day before — this was different. This was grief. Pure and unfiltered.
“It’s beautiful,” she gasped between sobs. “It’s so… it’s so…”
She couldn’t finish.
Didn’t have the words.
So she just cried. Loud. Shaking. For hours.
Lucy sat in the art room the whole time.
Quiet.
Still sucking on her pacifier, lamb on her lap, hands covered in chalk dust.
But her eyes weren’t distant.
They were… calm.
Present.
Like something inside her had settled, just for now.
Because she’d given something to someone who needed it more than she did.
And for the first time in a long, long time…
That felt like enough.
Chapter 11 – The Cost of Memory
Lucy sat at the art table again.
Same chair. Same lighting.
But something was different now.
Her fingers gripped the brown chalk tightly.
She wasn’t drifting.
She wasn’t hiding.
She was remembering.
The flower had been a gift — something beautiful, born from stillness.
This drawing was not that.
She began with the ground.
Hard lines. Stone texture.
Gray. Brown. Red.
Then the building — tall, cold.
She drew windows.
One, up high.
Marked with a faint X.
Then a stick figure.
No face. Arms out. Waving.
Another figure.
Falling.
No details.
Just a shape. Airborne.
And then — the bottom.
Thick black scribbles.
Red exploding outward.
No shape, just chaos.
Her hand trembled as she drew.
Her breath grew short. Laboured.
She sucked hard on her pacifier.
Her lamb lay forgotten beside her.
The chalk snapped in her grip.
And then — her eyes widened.
A low grunt escaped her lips.
A sound of strain, confusion.
Her face twisted slightly. She shifted in her seat, legs stiffening.
And then it happened — a thick, warm release.
Her diaper crinkled slightly
Her body tensed, then slumped.
The smell came seconds later.
Heavy. Pungent. Inescapable.
A sharp reminder: Lucy’s body still responded like a child’s under stress.
She sat frozen, eyes wide, cheeks flushed deep red.
A nurse entered the room almost instantly, having sensed it before the scent even confirmed.
“Okay, sweetheart,” she said softly. “Let’s get you cleaned up, alright?”
Lucy didn’t resist.
She stood slowly, lamb in hand, pacifier still in her mouth, and let herself be led out — one small hand holding the nurse’s fingers tight.
She was gone for fifteen minutes.
No one touched the drawing.
Mara didn’t even glance at it.
Just sat quietly, watching the spot where Lucy had been, like a candle that had gone out mid-glow.
When Lucy returned, she wore fresh clothes. Clean diaper. New socks. Her lamb had been gently wiped down and tucked under her arm.
Her eyes were glassy.
But she walked to the table on her own.
Sat back in her chair.
And didn’t cry.
Down the hall, Riley still held the flower drawing in her hand like it was treasure.
She hadn’t stopped crying since she got it.
Not screaming now.
Not breaking.
Just tears.
Flowing.
Constant.
Quiet.
Someone had given her beauty.
And Lucy had drawn her pain.
And both things were true at once.
Chapter 12 – Her Turn
The nurses had loosened Riley’s restraints the day before.
She didn’t scream anymore.
Didn’t fight.
She just cried quietly, staring at Lucy’s flower.
She kept it folded in her hand, even when she slept.
She’d asked — begged, actually — to see Lucy.
They didn’t allow it.
But they let her have paper.
And crayons.
Riley hadn’t drawn anything nice in her life.
Her art was always black, red, chaos.
Abuse poured out in shapes and jagged lines.
But now…
She tried.
The next morning, just after breakfast, Lucy sat in her corner of the common room.
She had her lamb. Her pacifier. Her distance.
Mara was across the room, watching quietly.
Then came Riley.
Loose hoodie. Bare feet. Face blotchy from crying.
A nurse walked behind her, keeping close.
Riley held a folded paper in both hands, shaking like it might disintegrate.
She stopped in front of Lucy’s chair.
Her eyes — swollen, red — locked onto Lucy’s.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “For the first drawing.”
Lucy didn’t move.
Riley unfolded the paper with trembling fingers.
It was rough.
But it was a flower.
Yellow and pink. Big petals. Off-center stem. A little heart drawn in the corner.
Childish. Imperfect.
But full of soul.
“It’s all I know,” Riley said, her voice breaking. “But I… I tried.”
“I drew you something better. Because you gave me something beautiful. And I didn’t know people like you existed.”
Her legs buckled slightly.
Tears streamed down her face.
And then — her body gave out too.
A warm puddle began to form at her feet. Silent. Spreading. She didn’t notice.
Or maybe she did.
But didn’t care.
“I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “I’m sorry I’m like this.”
She placed the paper on Lucy’s lap with shaking hands, then collapsed to her knees.
The nurse moved in quickly. Calm. Practiced.
“Okay, Riley. You did great. Time to rest now, okay?”
She didn’t resist. Just cried louder.
As they lifted her to her feet, she looked back at Lucy one more time.
“Don’t forget it,” she choked out. “Please don’t forget my flower.”
Lucy looked down at the picture.
Crayon lines. Uneven colour.
But beautiful.
Beautiful because it cost something.
Because someone tried.
Because it was the first gift Lucy had ever received that wasn’t food, medicine, or pity.
She didn’t cry.
She didn’t move.
She just held the drawing against her chest like it was made of glass.
Chapter 13 – The Outburst
Lucy was back in the art room.
Not drawing.
Just sitting.
The flower from Riley was folded in her lap. A corner worn soft from her thumb brushing over it again and again. Her lamb rested on the table beside her.
The air smelled faintly like disinfectant and chalk dust.
Mara sat near the back, quiet, watching.
Then came the voice — faint, distant, but urgent:
“Lucy!”
It echoed faintly from the hallway.
From down the corridor.
From Riley’s room.
“Lucy, can you hear me?”
Lucy looked up.
“Can you… draw me something?” Riley’s voice cracked.
“Not… not sad. Just… something nice. Something pretty.”
“Please.”
Mara blinked.
Her heart twisted. She turned to Lucy, expecting silence.
But Lucy had already picked up the chalk.
Yellow. Pink. Light blue.
Her hands moved without thought — not in fear, not in panic — in kindness.
She started sketching a sky.
A sun with long rays. A swing set. A hill with trees. A rabbit.
It wasn’t detailed like her first flower.
But it was joyful.
Like a memory she’d never had, but wanted to.
She worked slowly. Gently.
Mara watched from the corner, hand over her mouth.
And then — without warning — she stood up and stepped out of the room.
She made it to the staff break room before she broke.
Mara sat hard in the nearest chair, dropped her head into her hands, and sobbed.
Not just for Lucy.
Not just for Riley.
But for all the girls who never got to be little, who never got to be safe, who only now — through diapers and pacifiers and chalk flowers — were starting to speak.
Her shoulders shook with it.
She didn’t wipe the tears.
She let them fall.
Ten minutes later, chaos.
Screaming down the hallway.
Staff running.
Riley’s voice, loud and furious:
“DON’T TOUCH IT!”
“IT’S MINE! SHE GAVE IT TO ME!”
And then — the smell.
Sharp. Foul. Gut-level.
Mara sprinted back down the corridor.
What she saw stopped her in her tracks.
Riley stood barefoot in the middle of the hallway, tears streaking her cheeks, smeared with her own mess.
Feces on her hands.
Brown streaks on the walls.
She’d snapped.
Thrown it. Smeared it. Covered the door. The bed. The floor.
A nurse was already putting gloves on.
Another stood frozen.
“She was calm ten minutes ago,” someone muttered.
“She just lost it.”
“She said the flower drawing was hers and someone tried to take it—”
“No one tried to take anything!”
Riley screamed again.
High-pitched. Wild. Wounded.
“YOU DON’T GET TO TOUCH MY NICE THINGS!”
“YOU DON’T GET TO RUIN THEM!”
Mara stepped forward.
“Let me,” she said. “Just let me try.”
Back in the art room, Lucy sat frozen.
She heard it all.
The screaming.
The crashing.
The crying.
The word "flower" screamed like a curse.
She didn’t cry.
But she put the chalk down.
And stared at the new drawing.
Half-finished.
A sun that would never be coloured in.
Chapter 14 – The Hug
The new policy hit the ward like a silent hammer.
After Riley’s outburst — the feces, the screaming, the hallway mess — the administrators acted fast.
“She's unpredictable.”
“She's escalating.”
“We need safety protocols.”
So they made the change.
Not to punish — they claimed. Just to “prevent another incident.”
During art time, Riley was now restrained.
Not tied down. But fitted into a padded straight jacket — soft enough not to hurt, tight enough to keep her hands from doing any “damage.”
She could still walk. Still sit.
But she couldn’t draw.
Couldn’t hold.
Couldn’t touch.
The first time they brought her into the art room wearing it, Lucy was already there.
She looked up. Eyes wide. Confused.
Riley shuffled forward, arms bound to her sides, jaw tight, tears already brimming.
Lucy didn’t draw right away.
She just stared.
Then, slowly, she picked up the chalk.
Pink. Orange. Yellow.
She drew a butterfly.
Bright wings. A soft sky. A winding trail of tiny hearts behind it — a quiet little flight path of freedom.
No one asked who it was for.
But everyone knew.
When she was done, she slid it across the table toward Riley.
No words.
Just the drawing.
Riley looked at it for less than a second before she burst.
A guttural sob tore from her chest like it had been waiting for years to escape.
“NO ONE TAKE THIS PICTURE FROM ME!”
Her voice echoed off the padded walls like a war cry.
“IT’S MINE! MINE! I’LL KILL ANYONE WHO TOUCHES IT!”
The nurse stepped in, hand out, trying to calm her — but she backed off quickly.
Mara didn’t move.
She just watched.
Watched Lucy stand up.
Walk slowly.
And wrap her arms around Riley’s jacket-bound frame.
Lucy hugged her.
Tight.
Face buried in Riley’s shoulder, arms locked around her like she was trying to physically keep her together.
Like she was saying:
“No one’s taking it.”
“No one’s taking you.”
Riley stood frozen.
Then her knees buckled.
But Lucy didn’t let go.
And Riley cried. Cried louder than anyone in the ward had ever heard. Years of hell pouring out in sobs and shaking breaths.
No one interrupted.
No one pulled Lucy away.
Not this time.
Eventually, the nurse walked over.
“Do you want me to help you sit down?”
Riley nodded.
Lucy helped lower her to the floor.
Still holding on.
Still wrapped around her.
Still not letting go.
For the rest of that session, the art room was silent.
Except for the sound of two broken girls breathing into each other’s shoulders.
Chapter 15 – Warmth
They were escorted down a quiet hallway, away from the buzz and static of the main ward.
The hydrotherapy wing was quiet. Calmer.
Dim lighting. Heated floors.
Everything smelled like eucalyptus and clean tile.
Lucy walked barefoot, hand in hand with Mara.
Riley shuffled beside them, still wearing soft restraints — not the straight jacket this time, just gentle wrist guards.
A compromise.
Her eyes were heavy, still red, but her breathing was slow. Peaceful. For now.
The pool room was warm and silent.
No splashing. No chlorine stink.
Just a wide, shallow pool of perfectly heated water — therapeutic temperature, designed to ease the muscles, soothe the mind.
The nurses helped the girls into soft water-safe wraps — modest, comforting — then eased them down the warm metal steps into the water.
Riley flinched at first.
Then sighed.
Deep.
Long.
The tension melted from her shoulders almost instantly.
Lucy didn’t speak, of course.
But she drifted toward Riley.
And reached for her hand.
They floated like that — side by side, tethered only by their fingers, eyes half-closed.
No screaming.
No chalk.
No trauma.
Just warmth.
Water hugged them from all sides like a blanket that didn’t need words.
Mara sat nearby, eyes stinging with tears she didn’t show.
They deserve this every day, she thought.
Not just as treatment. As life.
After half an hour, they were gently lifted from the water, wrapped in thick towels, and led to the steam room.
The air was thick with heat and vapor — a warm fog that clung to their skin.
Riley leaned back against the tiled wall, eyes closed, legs outstretched. Her face was flushed, but her hands were calm.
No fists. No scratching.
Lucy sat close beside her.
Their shoulders touched.
It was enough.
They didn’t need to talk. Didn’t need to look at each other.
Just be.
Then came the sauna.
Dry heat. Wooden benches. The scent of cedar.
Lucy curled her knees to her chest, pacifier in her mouth, her lamb resting on her towel-wrapped lap.
Riley stretched out on her side, cheek on the bench, sweat beading at her temples.
“I don’t feel broken in here,” Riley whispered.
Lucy blinked. Looked at her.
“I feel like a kid. Not a monster. Just a girl who wants to float and be warm and… not scream.”
Lucy reached over.
Touched her hand again.
And Riley smiled.
A small one.
But real.
For the first time in what felt like years…
Neither girl cried.
And no one had to hold them back.
Because here, in the warmth and steam and silence…
They didn’t need fixing.
They just needed rest.
Chapter 16 – Her Name
They were back in the quiet lounge after hydrotherapy — the room with soft beanbags, floor pillows, gentle lighting that didn’t buzz like the overhead fluorescents in the main ward.
Lucy sat cross-legged on the padded mat, her lamb in her lap, cheeks still glowing from the warmth of the sauna.
Riley lay beside her, head resting on a folded towel, eyes half-shut in post-float calm.
Mara sat nearby, notebook in hand, not writing. Just watching. Just being there.
No one was crying.
No one was screaming.
The room was still.
Lucy kept looking at Riley.
Then away.
Then back again.
Her fingers picked at the edge of her lamb’s ear — her usual signal that something was coming.
Mara saw it and sat forward, gentle, alert, silent.
Riley opened one eye.
“You good, Luce?”
Still no answer.
But Lucy shifted forward slightly.
Her pacifier hung loosely from her lips, not actively sucked — just… resting.
She opened her mouth.
Then closed it.
She opened it again. This time, a breath came out. Like a warm gust escaping after years trapped behind her ribs.
“Ruh…”
Riley sat up.
Eyes wide. Frozen.
Lucy’s brow furrowed.
She looked down, embarrassed. About to shut down.
Riley leaned in, whisper soft.
“It’s okay. I heard you.”
Lucy sucked in another breath.
“Ruh… Rye…”
Her voice cracked. Dry. Gravelly. A sound unused for too long.
But it was there.
Riley’s name.
Slow. Broken.
Beautiful.
Riley put her hand on Lucy’s.
“That’s me,” she whispered, voice shaking. “That’s me, Lucy. You said me.”
Lucy looked up.
A tear rolled down her cheek.
Not from fear.
Not from pain.
But from relief.
And when Riley leaned forward and hugged her — this time Lucy hugged back.
Not clinging.
Not shaking.
Just soft.
Steady.
And safe.
Mara had to blink hard.
She didn’t write a single note.
She just sat there, hands over her mouth, letting the moment exist without analysis.
Because no chart could capture this.
No file.
No diagnosis.
Only this:
A girl who hadn’t spoken in seven years trying to say her friend’s name.
And a girl who thought she’d never be loved hearing it.
Chapter 17 – New Words, New Eyes
The next morning started slow.
No alarms.
No screaming.
No accidents.
Just quiet chatter, soft clinking trays, and the occasional shuffle of slippered feet on tile.
Lucy and Riley sat at their usual table in the corner.
Two trays in front of them — oatmeal, bananas, warm milk.
Riley fed herself now.
Lucy let Riley spoon-feed her sometimes — not because she couldn’t, but because it felt safe.
And today?
Lucy laughed.
Barely a whisper of it. A tiny puff of air through her nose, followed by the smallest smile.
But it was real.
Riley blinked, grinning wide.
“That was a laugh.”
Lucy lowered her eyes, shy.
But she smiled again.
Later, in the art room, Mara sat beside Lucy with a mirror in one hand and a small voice recorder in the other.
Nothing intimidating. Nothing official.
Just a way to help Lucy see herself. Hear herself.
“You don’t have to talk today,” Mara said. “But if you want to, you can try. I’ll play it back for just us.”
Lucy nodded.
A little nod. Nervous.
She looked into the mirror.
Her own face looked strange to her. She barely recognized it when it moved. Her lips. Her jaw.
Mara handed her the recorder.
Lucy stared at it.
Then whispered:
“Rye…lee.”
Soft. Cracked. Just a breath of a sound.
Mara hit play.
“Rye…lee.”
It echoed back, barely audible.
Lucy’s hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes went wide.
She heard herself.
And she didn’t panic.
She just… smiled.
Meanwhile, Riley sat at a corner desk, gripping a crayon hard in her hand.
She wasn’t drawing chaos anymore.
She was writing.
Thick, wobbly letters on a wide sheet of paper:
L
U
C
Y
She coloured the letters pink.
Then added flowers around them.
A little heart.
A sun.
She folded it three times and walked it across the room, barefoot.
Laid it in Lucy’s lap.
Lucy opened it.
Saw her name.
Her real name.
Written by a girl who used to smear pain across every page.
Lucy traced the letters with her fingers, one by one.
Then leaned forward.
And kissed Riley’s cheek.
Outside the door, two nurses were watching.
Janine. And one of the higher-ups — the type who signs off on “containment protocols” and “risk management.”
They didn’t speak for a long time.
Just watched through the small window in the door.
Finally, Janine whispered:
“So… what do you think?”
The higher-up sighed.
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Folded her arms.
“I think we’ve been getting this wrong.”
Janine nodded slowly.
“They’re not regressing,” she said.
“They’re just… starting over.”
Later that day, the restraint order on Riley was lifted.
No more jackets.
No more panic protocol.
She held her own chalk.
Her own crayons.
And she used them to draw flowers, suns, clouds — all the things Lucy once gave her.
She even drew the two of them.
Side by side.
Holding hands.
And for the first time in the ward’s history…
The staff didn’t file it under “creative expression.”
They filed it under progress.
Chapter 18 – Outside
It was supposed to be a good day.
The nurses said so.
“A reward,” they called it.
“A safe outdoor break. Ten minutes.”
For most kids, it would’ve been nothing.
But for Lucy and Riley?
It was everything.
They hadn’t seen the sky in years.
The doors clicked open.
Fresh air slipped in — real air. Not filtered, recycled, piped through vents.
It smelled like damp grass and tree bark and something Lucy couldn’t name.
She gripped Riley’s hand hard.
So hard her knuckles went white.
“It’s okay,” Riley whispered.
“You’re with me. I won’t let go.”
Lucy didn’t move.
Didn’t look.
Just closed her eyes.
Tight.
As the nurses gently guided them outside, Lucy kept her lashes clamped shut — like if she opened them, the world might fall apart again.
The courtyard was fenced in, nestled between two tall institutional buildings.
The grass was soft.
There were daisies dotting the green.
Even a small tree, swaying in the wind.
But Lucy wouldn’t look.
She just walked with her eyes shut, one hand in Riley’s, the other clutched around her lamb.
“Come on,” Riley said, tugging gently.
“It’s beautiful, Luce. The grass is soft. And the daisies — they’re like the ones you drew me.”
Lucy whimpered.
Her body trembled.
The sound of the wind brushing against the fence made her flinch.
They reached the center of the yard.
Lucy sat down, slowly, with a soft squish from her diaper. Her bottom landed gently on the grass, her legs folding under her. She didn’t move after that.
She just cried.
Silent, slow tears rolling down her cheeks. Eyes still closed.
Riley knelt beside her.
“You’re safe, Lucy. There’s nothing here that can hurt you. Just me. Just grass. Just flowers.”
She plucked a daisy from beside her and brushed it against Lucy’s arm.
“Please… just open your eyes.”
Lucy sobbed once — a full, body-deep sob.
Then… slowly…
She opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was white petals.
Then green blades of grass. Dewy, soft, clean.
Then Riley’s face — close, steady, kind. Watching her.
Lucy blinked, mouth quivering.
She looked around — at the grass, at her knees, at the little yellow heart of the flower Riley held out.
And then… she looked up.
Tall buildings.
Gray.
Glass.
Too tall.
Her chest tightened. Her lip shook.
The sky above was open, vast — too big — and the buildings felt like cliffs ready to collapse.
The same kind of buildings she saw that day.
The same angle she looked up at before it happened.
Lucy let out a whimper.
“No. No. No…”
Her eyes shut tight again. Tighter than before.
She rocked once.
Twice.
And didn’t open them again until they were back inside.
Back in her room, safe beneath warm lighting and padded walls, Lucy curled up under a soft blanket.
She didn’t speak.
Didn’t cry.
Just lay there with her lamb, eyes still closed, fists clenched in the fabric of her smock.
Riley sat beside her on the mat.
Still holding the daisy.
She didn’t push.
Didn’t beg.
She just placed the flower beside Lucy’s hand, leaned back against the wall, and whispered:
“It’s okay.”
“We’ll try again next time.”
Chapter 19 – Daisy Chains
The art room was quiet.
Lucy sat alone.
Drawing daisies.
Over and over.
Yellow centres. White petals. Some with stems, some without. A little breeze in the lines if you looked close enough.
Riley was missing.
She hadn’t come to breakfast.
Not to group.
Not to therapy.
Mara said she was resting.
But Lucy knew something was wrong.
After her third daisy, Lucy stood.
She wandered — slow steps, barefoot, lamb tucked in her elbow, pacifier bobbing gently.
The hallway was quiet.
She turned the corner toward Riley’s room.
Nurses were gathered outside. Quiet voices. One had gloves on. Another held a clipboard.
Lucy peered through the small crack in the door.
She saw a mop.
Red.
Wet.
Thick red soaked the strands like paint — but Lucy knew it wasn’t paint.
She gasped — sharp and sudden.
A nurse turned, eyes wide.
“Lucy! No!”
Lucy ran.
Fast. As fast as her legs would carry her.
Back to the art room.
She slammed the door behind her, climbed onto her chair, and curled her knees into her chest.
She didn’t cry.
But she didn’t blink either.
Later that day, in her room, Lucy sat on her bed — lamb beside her, blanket draped over her shoulders.
From the vent near the floor, she heard two nurses talking while they cleaned the room next door.
They weren’t being quiet.
One whispered:
“They found a stick. Long. Jammed up inside her…”
“Jesus Christ. Don’t say it like that—”
“I’m just saying. She could’ve— she almost—”
“It was self-harm. Not attention-seeking. Don’t twist it.”
“She won’t be back. Not for a while.”
“They’re moving her to high observation. Maybe even a secure wing.”
“Poor kid.”
“She was just getting better.”
Then the mop bucket sloshed.
Then silence.
Lucy didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe.
She stared at the floor, eyes blank.
That night, Lucy didn’t speak.
Didn’t play.
Didn’t reach for her pacifier.
She just drew.
Picture after picture.
Daisy. Daisy. Daisy.
Then Riley.
Riley’s face. Riley’s eyes.
Then a girl screaming.
Then blood.
Then a hand reaching.
Then another daisy.
She filled page after page.
Her hand cramped. Her fingers blistered.
But she didn’t stop.
Not for diaper changes.
Not for supper.
Not until a nurse took the chalk away at bedtime.
Even then, Lucy clutched the last drawing to her chest as she lay in bed, eyes open.
Wide.
Unblinking.
When Mara came in later to check on her, Lucy didn’t speak.
She just handed her a folded picture.
A single daisy.
With two words, printed carefully underneath in bright red crayon:
“For Riley.”
Chapter 20 – All I’ve Known
The knock-on Lucy’s door was soft, but she didn’t look up.
She was surrounded.
Dozens — no, hundreds — of drawings were scattered across the floor, taped to walls, stacked in uneven piles. All of them were of Riley.
Riley laughing.
Riley crying.
Riley holding her hand.
Riley in the art room.
Riley in the steam room.
Riley hugging her.
Lucy sat in the centre of it all, cross-legged, chalk dust all over her hands, a crayon-streaked lamb in her lap, pacifier between her lips.
Mara stepped inside quietly.
She didn’t ask what the pictures meant.
She already knew.
“You’ve been busy,” she said gently.
Lucy looked up. Eyes tired. Hollow. Hopeful.
“Lucy… would you like to visit Riley?”
Lucy's breath caught.
She stood slowly. Nodded.
Mara reached for her hand.
And the two of them made their way to the High Secure Wing.
The corridor buzzed differently there.
Stricter. Colder. Fewer colours. More locks.
But Lucy didn’t flinch.
Not this time.
Because she saw her.
Riley.
Sitting in a beanbag chair inside a glass-walled room, surrounded by nurses.
She wore a diaper, now visible under a soft, long shirt. Her hands were wrapped in bag mittens, soft restraints to keep her from hurting herself. Her hair was messy. Her eyes — exhausted.
But when she saw Lucy…
She lit up.
Lucy ran.
Right past the nurses. Right through the open door. Straight into Riley’s lap.
And they cried.
They didn’t need to say anything.
Mara, standing at the nurse’s station nearby, said:
“Lucy can stay a few hours.”
Then she stepped back, giving them space.
They sat on the padded floor together.
Lucy still had her pacifier. Riley still had her mittens.
But their arms were around each other.
And for the first time in days, they weren’t alone.
Lucy pulled back slightly. Her brows furrowed.
She pointed at Riley.
Tapped her own chest.
Then made a broken motion across her abdomen.
“Wh…wuh…” she struggled to form the word.
“What did… you…”
She trailed off.
But Riley understood.
She hesitated. Looked around. Then mimed it.
She moved her hands in the air as best she could — the gesture unmistakable.
Then she mouthed the words slowly.
Lucy stared.
Then stood.
Walked to the corner of the room.
And with a soft gasp, began flailing her arms, frustrated. Confused. Hurt.
She turned back to Riley.
“Whuh… why?” she whispered.
A real word.
Full of ache.
Riley looked down.
Her voice cracked when she spoke.
“It’s all I’ve known all my life.”
Lucy didn’t ask anything else.
She just walked back.
And wrapped her arms around Riley’s neck.
Pressed her face into her shoulder.
Pacifier back in her mouth.
Sucking gently.
Quietly sobbing.
But not letting go.
Not for anything.
They stayed that way for the rest of the visit.
Two broken kids who didn’t have answers.
Just each other.
Chapter 21 – Help Me
It started with shaking.
Not the building. Not a dream.
A nurse, panicked, shaking Lucy awake.
“Lucy. Lucy—please. I’m sorry, baby, but I need you. It’s Riley. She’s going to hurt herself. She’s saying she doesn’t want to live. I think… I think you’re the only one who can stop her.”
Lucy blinked.
Damp. Cold.
Her diaper clung to her. Her t-shirt stuck to her back. The room was dark.
But her body moved before her mind did.
She didn’t even grab her lamb.
They half-walked, half-dragged her through the halls. No alarms. No shouting. Just a single open door at the far end of the wing, pulsing like a wound in the night.
Riley was inside.
Naked.
Screaming.
Sweating and shaking, eyes wild.
There were nurses standing back, unsure. No one wanted to make the first move.
Her hands gripped something — something sharp — held tight, too close to her body, in a place that made even the staff flinch.
“GET AWAY FROM ME!” Riley screamed.
“I’LL DO IT! I DON’T CARE ANYMORE!”
Lucy stepped into the doorway.
Breathing fast. Not scared — just full. Full of too much feeling and no room to hold it.
She reached up and pulled the pacifier out of her mouth.
Her voice barely worked — soft and cracked like an old tape.
“Riley…”
(cough)
“Please… talk to me.”
“Let us… mmm… let me help you.”
Riley froze.
Just for a second.
Her eyes locked on Lucy’s.
And for the first time in hours — she saw something other than pain.
Lucy stepped forward. Slowly.
The nurses tensed.
But Lucy wasn’t afraid.
She walked up to Riley — tears falling now — and wrapped her arms around her. Just like that.
A hug.
A real one.
“Don’t,” Riley whispered.
“Don’t touch me. I’m not like you.”
“I DON’T KNOW HOW TO BE A KID LIKE YOU, LUCY!”
Her body shook. Urine streamed down her legs, unnoticed, mixing with the blood already drying on her skin. The floor was slick and cold.
She sobbed — deep, choking sobs that made her whole chest cave.
And the knife clattered to the floor.
Gone.
Riley sank into Lucy’s arms.
They both cried.
Lucy didn’t speak again. She just held her.
And then she walked her — still holding on — down the hallway to the shower room, while a nurse followed quietly behind, saying nothing.
Inside, Lucy turned the water on warm, high pressure.
She stepped in fully clothed, her diaper swelling under her shirt.
Riley stepped in with her, still trembling, still sobbing.
The water rushed over them, washing blood and urine and shame away.
Lucy laid down first, flat on the tile, and pulled Riley close.
Riley curled into her — like a child, like someone who’d never been held properly before.
Lucy stroked her damp hair out of her face.
Riley’s crying slowed.
She sucked her thumb.
“It’s okay,” Lucy whispered.
“I’m here.”
And under the water, wrapped in steam and silence, they both fell asleep.
Two lost girls.
Alone together.
But safe.
Chapter 22 – Two Mornings
The bathroom floor was warm from the overhead vents.
Lucy and Riley lay side by side, wrapped in towels like cocoons. Fresh diapers. Clean shirts. Hair still damp.
The water had long since stopped.
But the warmth lingered.
They looked like two kids asleep after a long swim.
Around 11:00 a.m., the door creaked open.
A nurse peeked in — one of the kind ones. Older. Gentle hands. Tired eyes.
She smiled softly at the scene.
“Hello, sleepyhead.”
Lucy blinked awake, pacifier still in her mouth. Her lamb was tucked under one arm.
“It’s almost lunchtime. You want breakfast?”
Lucy nodded slowly.
She looked at Riley — still asleep, thumb in her mouth now, breath calm.
Lucy whispered:
“She’s okay.”
The nurse nodded but said nothing.
The hallway lights were bright. Too bright after the fog and safety of the shower room.
But the nurse held Lucy’s hand the whole way to the nurses’ station.
And when she arrived—
Applause.
Soft. But real.
Two nurses clapped. One gave her a warm cup of cocoa. Another gently patted her shoulder.
“You were so brave, Lucy.”
“You saved her life.”
“She trusts you. That means something.”
Lucy didn’t say anything.
She just sat on the high stool, sipping her cocoa, eating a banana and warm oatmeal. Her diaper rustled softly as she shifted, but no one teased. No one laughed.
She was a hero here.
Even if she didn’t know what that meant.
But down the hall… behind a locked door…
Riley was awake, too.
Gagged.
A soft cloth tied around her mouth — not tight, but firm. Meant to keep the volume down.
Her hands were still wrapped. The mittens were replaced by padded sleeves, Velcroed tight.
She was in a padded room now — white walls, no corners, just a drain in the middle of the floor and one high window.
They’d stripped her down again. Dressed her in a fresh smock and a thick diaper. No shoes. No socks.
She didn’t cry.
She just stared at the door.
Waiting.
Wishing.
Back at the nurse’s station, Lucy finished her breakfast.
She smiled when someone handed her a marker and paper.
She drew two stick figures.
One had wild hair.
The other had a pacifier.
They were hugging.
In the corner, she drew a sun.
“For Riley,” she whispered.
The nurse smiled and nodded.
“We’ll give it to her soon, honey.”
But they wouldn’t.
Not yet.
Not until they were sure Riley wouldn’t “ruin the moment.”
And in the padded room, Riley sat against the wall.
Eyes closed.
Mouth gagged.
Humming through her nose.
The same tune Lucy had hummed weeks ago.
The one with no words, but all the meaning in the world.
Chapter 23 – New Rules
Riley didn’t talk about the episode.
Not when she woke up. Not later that night. Not the next morning.
But everyone knew it had changed something.
The nurses, especially.
Tonya met with Mara that afternoon behind closed doors. Then another meeting with the entire care team. By the end of the day, a new protocol had been posted on the ward board.
"Patient Riley is not to be changed, cleaned, or physically handled without the presence of her comfort partner: Lucy."
No one argued.
The first time the new rule was tested, Riley had another accident.
It wasn’t dramatic. Just sudden.
She froze, mid-step in the hallway, and whispered, "I need help."
Lucy didn’t say anything. She just reached out and took her hand.
They went together.
Tonya was waiting in the changing room.
She greeted them both with a calm smile.
"Lucy, you can stay right here," she said. "You can hold Riley’s hand the whole time. I’ll talk through every step. No surprises."
Riley nodded slowly.
She still looked nervous. Still clenched her jaw.
But she laid down on the table without flinching.
Tonya put on gloves. Opened a fresh pack of wipes. Spoke softly.
"Okay Riley, I’m going to untape the sides now. That’s all."
Lucy moved to her head and held her hand tight.
Riley trembled once.
But she didn’t dissociate.
She looked at Lucy.
Lucy gave her the pacifier she’d been carrying.
Riley took it.
Sucked.
Breathed.
Wiped. Cleaned. Dressed.
No tears.
Just peace.
Later, Mara pulled Lucy aside gently in the art room.
"Lucy," she said, "Can I ask you something?"
Lucy nodded.
"Why do you stay with her when it’s hard? Even when she’s upset?"
Lucy looked down at her drawing—a sketch of a girl sitting in the rain, with another girl holding an umbrella over her head.
She picked up a crayon.
Added a tiny lamb at their feet.
Then whispered:
"Because she’d stay with me."
Mara smiled softly.
"That’s all the reason anyone ever needs."
The staff began adjusting too.
They talked softer around Riley. They kept the wipes warmer. They gave her time.
And Lucy was always nearby.
Not because she had to be.
But because she wanted to be.
And Riley never let go of her hand again.
Chapter 24 – New Rules
Riley didn’t talk about the episode.
Not when she woke up. Not later that night. Not the next morning.
But everyone knew it had changed something.
The nurses, especially.
Tonya met with Mara that afternoon behind closed doors. Then another meeting with the entire care team. By the end of the day, a new protocol had been posted on the ward board.
"Patient Riley is not to be changed, cleaned, or physically handled without the presence of her comfort partner: Lucy."
No one argued.
The first time the new rule was tested, Riley had another accident.
It wasn’t dramatic. Just sudden.
She froze, mid-step in the hallway, and whispered, "I need help."
Lucy didn’t say anything. She just reached out and took her hand.
They went together.
Tonya was waiting in the changing room.
She greeted them both with a calm smile.
"Lucy, you can stay right here," she said. "You can hold Riley’s hand the whole time. I’ll talk through every step. No surprises."
Riley nodded slowly.
She still looked nervous. Still clenched her jaw.
But she laid down on the table without flinching.
Tonya put on gloves. Opened a fresh pack of wipes. Spoke softly.
"Okay Riley, I’m going to untape the sides now. That’s all."
Lucy moved to her head and held her hand tight.
Riley trembled once.
But she didn’t dissociate.
She looked at Lucy.
Lucy gave her the pacifier she’d been carrying.
Riley took it.
Sucked.
Breathed.
Wiped. Cleaned. Dressed.
No tears.
Just peace.
Later, Mara pulled Lucy aside gently in the art room.
"Lucy," she said, "Can I ask you something?"
Lucy nodded.
"Why do you stay with her when it’s hard? Even when she’s upset?"
Lucy looked down at her drawing—a sketch of a girl sitting in the rain, with another girl holding an umbrella over her head.
She picked up a crayon.
Added a tiny lamb at their feet.
Then whispered:
"Because she’d stay with me."
Mara smiled softly.
"That’s all the reason anyone ever needs."
The staff began adjusting too.
They talked softer around Riley. They kept the wipes warmer. They gave her time.
And Lucy was always nearby.
Not because she had to be.
But because she wanted to be.
And Riley never let go of her hand again.
Chapter 25 – The Circle Expands
It had been nearly a week since Riley's new care plan was introduced, and everything was different.
Not louder. Not faster.
Just... softer.
Lucy and Riley were no longer the strange pair kept at the edges. Other children had started watching them, quietly at first. A few girls from the east wing had started sitting closer during therapy sessions. A boy who used to throw things now asked if he could draw next to Lucy in the art room.
Mara noticed it first. Then the staff.
The bond between Lucy and Riley wasn’t just helping them. It was changing the ward.
Group therapy had grown to nine participants. A circle of beanbags now surrounded a large rug in the therapy room, and today, Mara brought a new prompt.
"Tell us something safe. Something that makes you feel okay."
Silence. A cough. Some eye-rolling from the older kids.
Then Riley spoke.
"When Lucy feeds me."
A few heads turned. One girl giggled unkindly. But Riley didn’t shrink.
"She doesn’t do it because I can’t feed myself. She does it when I shake. Or when I forget I deserve food."
The room was quiet.
Lucy looked at her, pacifier tucked into her sleeve.
"She does it like it matters," Riley added. "Like I matter."
Mara nodded. "Thank you, Riley."
Another boy, Caleb, picked at the carpet.
"My safe is... when I get to sleep without shoes on. Means I won’t have to run."
That changed something.
Suddenly, kids were talking.
A girl who never spoke said her safe was warm milk at night. Another said his safe was holding a teddy bear with no eyes.
Then someone asked:
"Lucy, what’s yours?"
Lucy hesitated. Looked at Riley. Then took out her pacifier.
"Her voice."
The room was silent again.
Riley looked like she might cry.
"Even when it’s scared," Lucy added. "It’s always honest."
That afternoon, something unexpected happened in the common area.
One of the newer girls—Juno, barely ten—was crying behind the bookshelf.
A nurse was trying to coax her out, but Juno kept saying, "Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me!"
Lucy noticed. She stood up. Walked away from her drawing.
Straight toward the nurse.
She didn’t yell.
She just stood between them.
"Please stop," Lucy said, her voice small but steady.
The nurse blinked, surprised.
"We’re trying to calm her down."
"It’s not helping."
Mara came over.
"Lucy? You want to talk to her?"
Lucy nodded.
She crouched next to the bookshelf.
"Hi," she whispered.
Juno peeked through her arms. Eyes wet. Chest heaving.
"I don’t want anyone to touch me."
"No one will," Lucy said. "Not unless you say okay."
Juno stared at her.
"You mean that?"
Lucy nodded. She sat on the floor beside her.
A long silence.
Then Juno whispered:
"I saw you with Riley. You don’t leave her."
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because she didn’t leave me."
Juno nodded. Wiped her face. Moved a little closer.
By the end of the hour, they were both colouring on the same page.
No one else interfered.
Later that evening, Mara and two staff met to review the day.
"Lucy advocated for another child today," one said, eyes wide.
"With her words," added another.
Mara smiled.
"She’s not just healing," she said. "She’s leading."
That night, Riley and Lucy lay in their beds, facing each other.
"You helped her," Riley whispered.
Lucy shrugged.
"You helped me first."
Riley reached across the small gap between them and held her hand.
The silence that followed wasn’t empty.
It was full of everything they had built.
And everything they still could.
Chapter 26 – New Rules
Riley didn’t talk about the episode.
Not when she woke up. Not later that night. Not the next morning.
But everyone knew it had changed something.
The nurses, especially.
Tonya met with Mara that afternoon behind closed doors. Then another meeting with the entire care team. By the end of the day, a new protocol had been posted on the ward board:
"Patient Riley is not to be changed, cleaned, or physically handled without the presence of her comfort partner: Lucy."
No one argued.
The first time the new rule was tested, Riley had another accident.
It wasn’t dramatic. Just sudden.
She froze, mid-step in the hallway, and whispered, "I need help."
Lucy didn’t say anything. She just reached out and took her hand.
They went together.
Tonya was waiting in the changing room.
"She needs help," Lucy said quietly, motioning to Riley.
Tonya nodded. She guided them in. Another nurse joined them. The table was prepped. Gloves. Wipes. A clean diaper. Routine.
But nothing about Riley’s body was routine today.
As they laid her down, she began to tremble.
"It’s okay, Riley," Tonya said. "We’ve got you."
But Riley’s breathing changed.
Quicker.
Shallow.
Her legs twitched as they undid the tapes. And then, without warning—
"No," she whispered. "No no no no..."
The nurses paused.
"Sweetheart?"
Riley's eyes were wide. Distant.
"I’ll be good," she said, voice cracking. "I’ll be good this time, please don’t—don’t do that."
Lucy didn’t move from her side. She clung to her hand.
Riley's body stiffened.
"Please, I'll be quiet. I won’t say no. I’ll be good."
The nurses looked at each other, suddenly tense.
Lucy stepped closer, her small hand holding Riley’s tighter.
"Riley," she whispered, softly but firm, "Look at me."
Riley didn’t respond.
Then she wet herself again—a small surge, unexpected, spreading across the mat and floor. The nurses remained calm. Gloved, careful, professional.
"We’re here," Tonya said. "You’re safe. No one is going to hurt you."
But Riley was spiralling.
Her hands gripped at the sides of the table.
Lucy, quiet and composed, reached up and gently placed her thumb at Riley's lips.
Riley, eyes wide, instinctively took it. Sucked once. Then again.
Her breath began to slow.
Her shoulders loosened.
The trembling stopped.
Ten minutes passed like that.
No one said a word.
When the change was done, Riley was clean, wrapped in fresh softness, her thumb still resting gently in Lucy’s hand.
And then—
Riley fell asleep.
Right there on the changing table.
Safe. Quiet. Held.
Lucy didn’t move.
She just stayed beside her, like she always had.
And always would.
Later, Mara pulled Lucy aside gently in the art room.
"Lucy," she said, "Can I ask you something?"
Lucy nodded.
"Why do you stay with her when it’s hard? Even when she’s upset?"
Lucy looked down at her drawing—a sketch of a girl sitting in the rain, with another girl holding an umbrella over her head.
She picked up a crayon.
Added a tiny lamb at their feet.
Then whispered:
"Because she’d stay with me."
Mara smiled softly.
"That’s all the reason anyone ever needs."
The staff began adjusting too.
They talked softer around Riley. They kept the wipes warmer. They gave her time.
And Lucy was always nearby.
Not because she had to be.
But because she wanted to be.
And Riley never let go of her hand again.
Chapter 27 – The Circle Expands
It had been nearly a week since Riley's new care plan was introduced, and everything was different.
Not louder. Not faster.
Just... softer.
Lucy and Riley were no longer the strange pair kept at the edges. Other children had started watching them, quietly at first. A few girls from the east wing had started sitting closer during therapy sessions. A boy who used to throw things now asked if he could draw next to Lucy in the art room.
Mara noticed it first. Then the staff.
The bond between Lucy and Riley wasn’t just helping them. It was changing the ward.
Group therapy had grown to nine participants. A circle of beanbags now surrounded a large rug in the therapy room, and today, Mara brought a new prompt.
"Tell us something safe. Something that makes you feel okay."
Silence. A cough. Some eye-rolling from the older kids.
Then Riley spoke.
"When Lucy feeds me."
A few heads turned. One girl giggled unkindly. But Riley didn’t shrink.
"She doesn’t do it because I can’t feed myself. She does it when I shake. Or when I forget I deserve food."
The room was quiet.
Lucy looked at her, pacifier tucked into her sleeve.
"She does it like it matters," Riley added. "Like I matter."
Mara nodded. "Thank you, Riley."
Another boy, Caleb, picked at the carpet.
"My safe is... when I get to sleep without shoes on. Means I won’t have to run."
That changed something.
Suddenly, kids were talking.
A girl who never spoke said her safe was warm milk at night. Another said his safe was holding a teddy bear with no eyes.
Then someone asked:
"Lucy, what’s yours?"
Lucy hesitated. Looked at Riley. Then took out her pacifier.
"Her voice."
The room was silent again.
Riley looked like she might cry.
"Even when it’s scared," Lucy added. "It’s always honest."
That afternoon, something unexpected happened in the common area.
One of the newer girls—Juno, barely ten—was crying behind the bookshelf.
A nurse was trying to coax her out, but Juno kept saying, "Don’t touch me! Don’t touch me!"
Lucy noticed. She stood up. Walked away from her drawing.
Straight toward the nurse.
She didn’t yell.
She just stood between them.
"Please stop," Lucy said, her voice small but steady.
The nurse blinked, surprised.
"We’re trying to calm her down."
"It’s not helping."
Mara came over.
"Lucy? You want to talk to her?"
Lucy nodded.
She crouched next to the bookshelf.
"Hi," she whispered.
Juno peeked through her arms. Eyes wet. Chest heaving.
"I don’t want anyone to touch me."
"No one will," Lucy said. "Not unless you say okay."
Juno stared at her.
"You mean that?"
Lucy nodded. She sat on the floor beside her.
A long silence.
Then Juno whispered:
"I saw you with Riley. You don’t leave her."
"No."
"Why not?"
"Because she didn’t leave me."
Juno nodded. Wiped her face. Moved a little closer.
By the end of the hour, they were both colouring on the same page.
No one else interfered.
Later that evening, Mara and two staff met to review the day.
"Lucy advocated for another child today," one said, eyes wide.
"With her words," added another.
Mara smiled.
"She’s not just healing," she said. "She’s leading."
That night, Riley and Lucy lay in their beds, facing each other.
"You helped her," Riley whispered.
Lucy shrugged.
"You helped me first."
Riley reached across the small gap between them and held her hand.
The silence that followed wasn’t empty.
It was full of everything they had built.
And everything they still could.
Chapter 28 – The Room Goes Still
It started like any other group therapy session.
The circle of beanbags. The soft lighting. The quiet hum of the air vents. Everyone was getting used to sharing now. Safe things. Scary things. Small victories.
Lucy sat with Riley, as always. Thumb hooked on her lamb's worn ear. Riley clutched her hand like a tether.
Mara sat on her usual stool. Calm. Watchful.
"Today," she said, "you can share something that you carry with you. Something heavy. Something you're ready to let go of."
There was silence.
A few kids fidgeted.
Then Riley blinked.
Her fingers tightened around Lucy's.
"Can I talk?" she asked.
Mara nodded gently. "You can talk about anything."
Riley took a deep breath.
And then she began.
Her voice was steady. At first.
"It started when I was little. I didn’t know it was wrong because it felt like it had always been that way. There were things that happened in the room down the hall. I wasn’t allowed to close the door. He—"
She stopped. Swallowed hard.
"He told me it was our secret. That good girls don’t make noise. And if I told, he’d say I was the one who liked it. That I made it up."
Lucy moved closer.
Riley stared ahead, seeing something no one else could.
"I used to hide in the laundry basket. I'd breathe through the holes. I didn’t know how to make it stop. I didn’t know how to fight."
Her voice cracked, but she kept going.
"When I came here, I thought I was trash. I thought I was broken. Every time someone touched me, I thought it was going to happen again. Even the nice nurses. Even Mara. I still dream about it. Sometimes I wake up and I’ve..."
She paused again.
Her face flushed.
A quiet, wet sound came from beneath her.
Her diaper swelled.
No one moved.
"I still have accidents. I still think I deserve them. But Lucy doesn’t think that. She looks at me like I’m worth something. Even when I’m a mess. Even when I’m shaking. Even when I’m dirty."
She was crying now. Not loud. Just steady.
"He told me if I ever told anyone, they’d look at me like I was disgusting. But you’re not. You’re just listening."
A boy across the circle began to shake.
Then he wet himself. A puddle grew beneath him, slow and silent.
No one teased him.
Because the room was still.
Riley’s words had cut into something deeper than fear.
Mara wiped a tear from her cheek.
No one said anything.
Until Lucy leaned in.
And wrapped her arms around Riley.
Held her tight.
Whispered something that no one else could hear.
Riley broke.
Folded into her.
Sobbed into her shoulder like she was releasing every scream she’d never been allowed to make.
The room didn’t move.
Didn’t breathe.
Because for the first time, they weren’t just looking at the quiet girl and the wild one.
They were looking at survivors.
At strength.
At something no one in that room would ever forget.
Chapter 29 – Juno
The changes on the ward weren’t just about Riley and Lucy anymore.
A new girl had arrived that week.
Her name was Juno. She was ten. Big eyes, small voice, and shoulders that never seemed to drop from around her ears. She didn’t talk. Didn’t eat much. She spent most of her time curled up under the art room table or hiding in the corner near the bookshelf.
Lucy noticed her first.
Noticed how the staff tried to approach gently.
Noticed how Juno flinched when a shadow crossed too close.
One afternoon, during group therapy, Juno was seated awkwardly at the edge of the circle, arms wrapped tight around her knees, eyes locked on the floor.
Mara opened with a simple prompt.
"Tell us one thing you do to feel safe."
Caleb mentioned a weighted blanket. Mira talked about a song she played over and over.
When the circle got to Juno, she said nothing.
But Lucy did.
"Sometimes, I draw someone holding an umbrella over me. Even if it’s just pretend rain. It makes it feel better."
Riley looked over at her with pride.
Juno peeked up.
Just for a second.
Later that day, Lucy found Juno in the hallway, sitting cross-legged, hugging her knees.
"Hi," Lucy said quietly.
Juno didn’t move.
"I used to sit there, too," Lucy added. "I liked the wall. It didn't ask questions."
A beat passed. Juno sniffled.
Lucy pulled a small crayon out of her pocket. Handed it over.
"You don’t have to draw. But you can."
Juno took it.
That was all.
But it was enough.
Chapter 30 – Ripple Effect
By the end of the week, Lucy and Riley weren’t just seen as a bonded pair. They were something else entirely.
The staff noticed it in subtle ways first:
The way younger kids sat closer when Lucy was around. The way Riley could help calm a room just by humming. The way Juno had started showing up at group therapy without being asked.
Mara called it a ripple.
And the ripple was growing.
During a team meeting, Mara brought up a new idea.
"I want to offer Lucy and Riley a mentorship role. Not formal. Just presence based. Letting them be who they already are — but with intention."
Some staff hesitated.
"Won’t that put pressure on them?"
"Only if we make it about responsibility," Mara replied. "It’s not about them fixing anyone. Just about them being who they are, with others who need it."
The proposal passed.
That afternoon, Mara pulled Lucy and Riley aside.
They sat together, Riley brushing the hair out of Lucy’s face.
"You two make other kids feel safe. Without even trying. I'd like to give you a chance to keep doing that... as mentors."
Lucy blinked.
"We don’t have to teach?"
"No," Mara said. "Just be. Sit with them. Listen. Show them what you already know."
Riley glanced at Lucy. Lucy nodded.
"Okay," Riley said.
"We'll try," Lucy whispered.
And so the next chapter began.
Not just healing.
But helping.
Chapter 31 – First Steps
The first session wasn’t called mentorship.
It was called “quiet group.”
A soft label. An easy beginning.
Five kids. Two staff. Lucy. Riley.
Everyone was told they didn’t have to speak. They just had to be there.
Lucy and Riley sat together on a beanbag. Juno was across the circle, her knees pulled to her chest. Another boy, Mason, stood for the whole session, arms crossed tight like he didn’t trust the furniture.
It was awkward. Silent. Heavy.
Until Lucy pulled a sheet of paper from the art bin and slid it across the carpet toward Juno.
A flower. A messy sun.
Then a second paper. This time toward Mason. A small tree, and two stick figures hugging beneath it.
Mason stared at it. Didn’t say anything.
But he sat down.
Just like that.
Later that day, Mara pulled the girls aside.
“You didn’t push anyone,” she said.
Lucy shrugged.
“I just let them come to us.”
Riley added, “We don’t fix. We sit.”
Mara nodded.
“That’s what makes it work.”
Two days later, Juno knocked on their door.
It was bedtime.
“I had a bad dream,” she said. “Can I sleep on your floor?”
Riley looked at Lucy.
Lucy nodded.
“Blanket’s clean,” she whispered, pointing to the corner.
Juno curled up with a pacifier of her own, silent and calm.
Lucy and Riley watched her drift off.
“We’re like mirrors now,” Riley whispered.
Lucy nodded.
“And night-lights.”
Chapter 32 – Ava Speaks
The next group circle was quieter than usual.
Not heavy.
Just waiting.
Ava had taken a seat beside Lucy, closer than normal. She didn’t fidget. Didn’t snap at anyone. She was just still.
Mara opened the floor gently.
“If you want to share something you’ve never said aloud before… this is a safe place.”
Silence.
Then Ava spoke.
Her voice was rough. Low. But steady.
“I hurt people.”
Everyone froze.
“I wasn’t always like this. But I was bullied every day. Pushed. Spit on. Called names I won’t repeat.”
She swallowed hard.
“They followed me home. They laughed when I cried. One day… I snapped. I thought it would scare them. Make them stop.”
She paused. Looked at the floor.
“I went too far. I didn’t stop. And now… they’re gone. All of them.”
Even the air in the room stopped moving.
“I turned nine the day they brought me here,” she continued. “They locked me in the padded room because I kept screaming. The papers called me a monster. Called me the ‘Ava Killer.’ But I wasn’t trying to be anything.”
She wiped her eyes. Her voice cracked.
“I just wanted it to stop.”
No one spoke.
Until Lucy whispered to Riley, barely audible.
“We don’t judge Ava.”
Riley nodded.
Her reply was just as quiet.
“You were hurt. And you tried to make it stop the only way you knew how. That doesn’t make it okay… but it doesn’t make you less human.”
She looked Ava in the eyes.
“I was raped. So badly I can’t use the bathroom on my own anymore.”
Lucy squeezed Riley’s hand.
“And I’m here,” Lucy added, “because my best friend fell. Right in front of me. And I stopped being me after that.”
Riley took a breath, steady.
“Your moment… it wasn’t evil. It was your breaking point. It doesn’t define you. But it’s part of your story.”
Ava stared at them.
Tears fell, but she didn’t hide them.
“Finally,” she said. “Someone gets it.”
No one else spoke.
But no one walked away, either.
And for the first time since her arrival, Ava didn’t sit alone
Chapter 33 – The Breaker
The group room was too quiet.
Even the crinkle of beanbags shifting sounded loud. Nobody spoke. Not right away.
Lucy sat with her legs tucked under her. Riley leaned into her shoulder. Across the circle, Ava sat stiff as a board. Her hands clenched tight in her lap. Her jaw was locked.
Mara had opened the session with something simple.
"Say something you wish someone had said to you when everything fell apart."
No one answered.
Until Ava did.
"I wish someone had told me I was allowed to be angry."
Mara looked up slowly.
Ava’s voice was flat. Dry.
"I wish someone had said: 'What they did to you was wrong, and it's okay to be furious.' Because I was. I was so angry. All the time. They picked on me every day. I told adults. No one listened."
A beat.
"So one day I made them listen. I pushed back. I didn’t stop."
Ava’s eyes glistened, but she didn’t cry.
"Three of them. I remember their faces. I see them in my sleep. I didn’t mean to kill them. But I did. One didn’t get up off the pavement. Two more didn’t make it through the night in the hospital."
The room went cold.
"They called me a monster. The paper printed it: 'The Ava Killer.' I was nine."
She looked around the circle. Her voice didn’t rise. It didn’t break. It just kept going.
"They locked me in a padded room and told me I was dangerous. They fed me through a slot in the door for a week. I stopped speaking. I didn’t care. Why would I? No one wanted the truth. They wanted a headline."
Ava finally looked at Lucy. Then Riley.
"I didn’t do what I did because I’m evil. I did it because I was drowning and no one threw a rope. So I started swinging."
Silence.
Then Lucy whispered something only Riley heard.
Riley nodded.
She turned to Ava.
"You snapped," Riley said. "That was your breaking point."
Ava blinked.
"Yeah."
"We all have one," Riley said.
She took a shaky breath. Looked down.
"Mine was when I stopped being able to tell the difference between pain and routine. When my body didn’t feel like mine anymore. When I had to start wearing diapers not because I was scared, but because... because I was ruined."
Now she was trembling.
Lucy wrapped an arm around her.
Riley steadied herself.
"But I’m still here. So are you. That’s what matters. Not what they said. Not what you were forced to become."
Ava looked like she was holding her breath.
Then: "Finally. Someone who doesn’t flinch."
Lucy reached over.
Held Ava’s hand.
Just for a second.
No one else said a word.
But no one looked at Ava the same way again.
And for once, that was a good thing.
Chapter 34 – Something Like Love
It was just after quiet group. The room was dim and calm, the kind of calm that usually only came after someone cried. No one had today. But it had still been heavy.
Lucy and Riley were curled together on a beanbag in the corner, Lucy’s head resting on Riley’s shoulder, their hands locked like puzzle pieces.
Ava was sitting cross-legged across the room, doodling a tree on the back of an old worksheet. She glanced up, squinting at the two of them.
“Are you two, like... a couple or something?” she asked. “Like, gay?”
Riley looked at Lucy. Lucy blinked slowly but didn’t let go.
Riley shrugged, her voice calm.
“We’re each other’s safe place.”
Ava tilted her head. “So, like… you cuddle and stuff?”
“Yeah,” Riley said. “Especially at night. It helps with the scary parts.”
Ava chewed her pencil for a moment. “But are you gay gay?”
Lucy looked a little lost. Riley gave a soft laugh.
“I think maybe? But not in a kissing way. Or... anything weird. Just... in a holding way. In a ‘you make me feel like a person’ way.”
Ava went quiet. Then nodded.
“That makes sense.”
She looked down at her paper. Drew a second tree next to the first.
“I hope I meet someone like that,” she said softly.
Lucy looked over at her.
“You will.”
Ava looked up.
And for the first time since arriving, she smiled.
Not big. Not long.
But real.
Chapter 35 – The Fire Drill
It started with a buzz.
A long, low alarm tone that shook the ward from its bones. At first it didn’t sound real — just another hallway noise. But then the lights began to flash. Red. White. Red. White.
Mara appeared in the doorway to the rec room, her voice calm but firm.
"Everyone needs to line up. We have a drill."
Lucy clutched Riley’s hand immediately.
Juno had already curled into the corner, her hands over her ears.
Ava didn’t move at first. Her eyes flicked from one exit to another like a cat in a cage.
"This is not a punishment," Mara reassured. "It’s just practice. No one is in trouble."
Still, the anxiety buzzed louder than the alarm.
They were led in two lines out into the courtyard behind the facility.
For most of the kids, it was the first time they’d been outside in weeks. The air was cold and damp. Grass crunched under the weight of forgotten autumn leaves.
The staff were everywhere, counting heads, ushering stragglers. Lucy and Riley stood to the side, arms around each other like always.
Juno clung to Lucy’s hoodie.
Ava stood apart from everyone.
She was staring at the gate.
"Hey," Riley called to her. "You okay?"
Ava didn’t answer.
Instead, she took a step.
Then another.
Toward the outer perimeter.
One of the aides noticed too late.
"Ava!"
But she was already moving. Not running. Just... walking. Fast. Determined.
Lucy let go of Riley’s hand.
"I got her," she said, and took off.
She wasn’t the fastest. But Ava wasn’t trying to get away. Not really.
She just needed to move.
Lucy caught her by the sleeve right before the gate.
"Hey. Stop. Please."
Ava turned, eyes wide. Wild.
"I wasn’t gonna run. I swear. I just... I needed space."
Lucy didn’t let go.
"I know. But they won’t understand. You scare them when you disappear."
Ava looked down.
"I don’t mean to scare anyone. I just don’t like drills. The last one I had at school... someone screamed. Then I got blamed."
Lucy nodded.
"Then stay with me. I don’t scream."
Back inside, Mara took them aside in her office. Just Ava, Lucy, and Riley.
"You did the right thing," she told Lucy. "Both of you. But Ava, you can’t head toward the gates. It sends the wrong message."
Ava shrugged. "I didn’t even want to go out."
"Doesn’t matter," Mara said gently. "You’re here. That means something. It means we keep you safe. And part of that is learning how to move through panic without running away."
Ava looked at Lucy.
"She didn’t yell at me. Not even once."
Lucy looked at the floor. "Why would I?"
Riley piped up.
"We all have our alarms. Some go off louder than others."
Mara smiled.
"Then maybe next time we try something new, you three can lead the group. A little chaos, with a little calm."
Ava blinked. "Us?"
"You handled this better than most adults would have."
Riley looked at Lucy. Then at Ava.
"We can be the sirens, too. But the good kind. The kind that tells you where to go. Not what to fear."
Ava smirked.
"You’re all so weird."
"Safe weird," Lucy replied.
And for the first time, Ava didn’t sit at the edge of the circle.
She sat in the middle.
Next to them.
Where she belonged.
Chapter 36 – The Way They See Us
Something had shifted.
After the fire drill, after Ava didn’t run and Lucy stepped in, the ward saw them differently. Not just as kids with trauma. Not even just as survivors. But as something more.
Steady. Centred. Strange, but in a way that felt comforting.
The next morning, the whispers started. Not cruel. Just... curious.
"Did you hear what Lucy said to Ava?"
"Riley didn’t even flinch. She just knew what to do."
"I think Juno sleeps in their room sometimes. They let her."
Even the staff noticed it.
The aides stopped interrupting when Lucy or Riley spoke up during group.
The kids stopped snickering when they saw the two of them holding hands.
They had become something unspoken:
A lighthouse. A north star.
Not perfect. But permanent.
Caleb, the boy who used to throw chairs, asked if he could sit next to Riley during art.
"You don’t have to talk," he said. "Just... sit nearby. It makes me less loud inside."
Lucy started finding folded drawings slipped under her door. Sunsets. Daisies. Trees with hollow hearts. No names. Just little notes scrawled on the backs:
"You make this place feel less sharp."
"I want to be calm like you."
"You’re like a blanket I can’t touch."
During mealtime, it became normal to see a cluster of kids gather near them. Ava at one side. Juno curled under Riley’s arm like a baby bird. Even the kids who never spoke sat close by, just breathing the same air.
It wasn’t about being popular.
It was about feeling safe.
And Lucy and Riley were safe.
Not because they had nothing broken. But because they knew how to carry what was.
One afternoon, Mara walked through the ward, clipboard in hand. She paused outside the common area.
Inside, Lucy was reading aloud to three kids. Riley was helping Juno draw.
Ava was showing Mason how to fold paper stars.
None of it had been assigned. None of it was structured.
It was just happening.
Mara whispered to one of the aides: "They don’t even know they’re leaders. They just... are."
Later that night, Lucy found a note tucked into her pillow:
"You make the monsters in my head sit down and listen. Thank you."
She showed it to Riley.
Riley held it gently.
"We’re doing something good here," she said.
Lucy nodded.
And in the quiet of their room, they didn’t need to speak to understand:
They weren’t just helping people survive.
They were helping people belong.
Chapter 38 – The Quiet Crown
The day started soft.
No alarms. No screams. Just the rustle of blankets and the slow rhythm of breath from beds that finally, finally felt like places to rest.
Lucy was the first one up. Not because she was scared or had a nightmare — but because her body just… felt ready.
She slipped from under the blanket, her lamb tucked under one arm and padded barefoot into the hallway. The lights were still dim. Shift change. That in-between hour when the ward exhaled.
Riley was already in the art room.
She didn’t look surprised to see Lucy. Just smiled. Soft and sleepy. Her hoodie was half-zipped, and her diaper peeked out over the waistband of her pyjama pants — a detail neither of them noticed anymore, like a sock or a shoelace.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Riley said.
“Me either,” Lucy whispered.
They didn’t need to say anything else.
They sat together in the quiet. Just the two of them and a basket of chalk.
Riley started sketching — a messy swirl of colour and softness. Not a flower. Not a storm. Something in between.
Lucy watched.
Then reached for a piece of golden chalk.
And drew a crown.
Small. Simple. With three rounded points and no jewels. Just soft lines — like something worn by a child too young to know what royalty was.
She didn’t say who it was for.
She didn’t have to.
Riley glanced at it. Then smiled.
“Looks like mine,” she said, her voice barely more than breath.
Lucy shrugged, a quiet smirk playing at the edge of her lips. “Maybe it is.”
By breakfast, the others noticed.
Lucy and Riley moved like sunbeams — quiet but impossible to ignore.
They weren’t louder. Or flashier. They didn’t take charge or give orders.
They just were.
Steady.
Kind.
Like if the walls of the ward fell away, the two of them would still be sitting there, lamb and chalk in hand, whispering safe things into each other’s ears.
Juno called them “the queens.”
Not in a teasing way. Not sarcastic.
Like it was sacred.
She whispered it to Ava one morning, curled up under Riley’s arm.
“They’re like… the queens of the quiet,” she said. “They make it okay to be small.”
And the name stuck.
That afternoon, during group, Caleb brought something with him.
He held it behind his back until everyone was seated. His hands shook a little — not out of fear, but because he cared. Really, deeply cared.
When he stepped into the centre of the circle, he held it out.
Two paper crowns.
One blue. One yellow.
Both folded carefully, edges crinkled from trial and error. Tape held the corners. Glitter from the craft drawer clung unevenly.
He didn’t say much.
“Um. I made these,” he muttered. “For them. Cause they’re the reason I stopped throwing chairs.”
He held them out, awkward and proud.
Lucy blinked, stunned.
Riley didn’t move for a second.
Then she stood up, walked over, and hugged him. Full arms. Tight.
Caleb flinched at first — but then melted. Like someone had finally told him it was okay to be soft.
They wore the crowns the rest of the day.
No one laughed.
Not a single kid.
Even the staff watched from behind clipboards, wide-eyed and silent.
Because somehow, without ever being told to…
Everyone bowed a little when they walked by.
Chapter 39 – Tilly
The door opened during morning group.
No announcement. No clipboard-waving. Just the creak of the hinges and a new set of footsteps on the padded floor.
She was small— not tiny-for-her-age tiny, but built-like-a-barn small. Muscley arms, soft freckles, and a mess of sun-bleached curls barely contained under a lopsided straw hat.
Her boots thunked with each step like she was walking across a dusty barn floor, not the quiet padded rug of the therapy room.
She stopped just inside the circle and tipped her hat.
“Howdy y’all,” she said, with a grin like she’d just wrangled a tornado and wanted to invite everyone to the rodeo after.
Every kid stared.
Blank. Blinking. Processing.
Riley cocked her head. Lucy tilted hers the other way.
Juno whispered, “Did she say… how do y’all?”
Tilly looked around, entirely unbothered by the silence. She popped a toothpick from behind her ear and twirled it like a tiny baton.
“Name’s Tilly Mae. Tilly’s fine. Y’all can call me cowgirl if it suits ya.” She took a seat between Lucy and Caleb like she’d been there her whole life.
Her dress — white and too thin for the sterile chill of the ward — bunched at her knees. Her boots were dusty. Her accent was thicker than oatmeal in July.
Riley leaned toward Lucy and whispered, “I don’t know what she just said but I love her.”
Lucy nodded slowly. Smiled around her pacifier.
Yeah. They liked her already.
Group started the way it always did.
Mara smiled gently. “Today we’re going to talk about what safety feels like in our bodies.”
Groans. A few eye rolls. Juno immediately curled into Riley’s arm like a snail in a storm.
Tilly raised her hand.
Mara blinked. “Yes?”
“Is it just talkin’? Or can we do show n’ tell?”
Mara hesitated. “We usually just share verbally, but—”
Tilly stood anyway.
She pulled a small harmonica from the boot on her left foot and gave it a quick blow.
“Now I reckon this here tune don’t make no dang sense to some folk, but it’s what my granddaddy used to play ‘fore bedtime. He’d rock back on the porch swing, blow this tune while we watched the cows chew and the moon rise. That? That’s safe.”
She played two short, shaky bars. Off-key. Full heart. Nothing fancy.
Then she sat back down and nodded like she’d just delivered a TED Talk on honest living.
The room was stunned.
Riley clapped first. Soft. Then louder.
Lucy giggled. Actually giggled.
Even Caleb muttered, “Okay, that was kind of cool.”
Later, after group, Tilly caught up with Lucy and Riley in the art room.
She leaned against the table, chewing on a piece of straw she’d somehow smuggled in.
“So,” she said, “Y’all the queens I’ve heard tell of.”
Lucy blinked.
Riley snorted. “Is that what they’re saying now?”
Tilly nodded solemnly. “Sure, as biscuits and bullfrogs.”
Lucy offered her a piece of chalk.
Tilly took it like it was a sacred artifact.
And just like that, the circle grew wider.
Want to follow Tilly’s first meltdown next? Or how the group responds to her when her country sunshine finally cracks a little? I’m ready.
Chapter 40 – The Storm Under the Hat
By the second day, everyone knew two things about Tilly Mae:
- She was the smallest twelve-year-old any of them had ever seen.
- You did not mess with her.
She might’ve looked like a flower girl who wandered in from a county fair — straw hat, white frock, freckles for days — but she moved like someone who’d wrestled pigs and won.
Her boots were loud, her handshake was firm, and her arms had that wiry, hard-earned strength from hauling hay bales or wrangling goats. Probably both.
Riley, who had once been the fiercest presence on the ward, took one look at Tilly squatting to lift a full chair (just to move it closer to Lucy) and whispered:
“She’s terrifying. I love her.”
But tough kids are just soft kids with extra Armor.
And Tilly’s Armor? It was starting to crack.
It happened in the courtyard.
Another ten-minute outdoor break. The second one that week — a luxury.
Tilly wandered a little too far toward the fence. Not running. Just thinking. Staring at the line of trees beyond the wire.
That’s when the aide raised her voice.
“Hey! Stay in the yard, Tilly!”
She didn’t yell. Not really.
But she sounded like someone yelling.
Tilly froze.
Her whole body locked up, like she’d been hit by a stun gun.
And then—
“Don’t holler at me!”
She didn’t say it cute.
She barked it.
She spun around, fists balled, jaw clenched, shoulders rising like storm clouds.
“Don’t holler at me like I’m some damn mutt!”
Lucy and Riley both stood at the same time.
The aide stepped back, hands up. “I wasn’t—”
“You think I don’t know that tone?!” Tilly snapped. “You think I ain’t heard that voice before? I know what comes after!”
She stomped once. Hard. Her boot left a full print in the dirt.
“They shout, then they grab. Then they hit. I ain’t stupid!”
Her voice cracked.
And just like that — the fire went out.
She dropped to her knees. Slow. Like her bones had given up.
“I ain’t stupid,” she mumbled again. “I just don’t like being yelled at.”
Lucy got to her first.
She didn’t say anything. Just knelt in front of her and held out her lamb.
Not to give away. Just to offer.
Tilly looked at it. Then at Lucy.
Then buried her face in her own hands and started crying.
Not loud. Not messy.
Just broken.
That night, the staff changed her record.
New notes. New understandings. New rules:
"Tilly Mae has a trauma response to raised voices. Use soft approach only. Avoid sudden corrections. Seek Lucy or Riley when she's triggered."
They printed it in bold.
Tilly didn’t know about that yet.
But when she woke up the next morning to find her boots cleaned and lined up at the edge of her bed — with a single flower tucked inside the left one — she didn’t ask questions.
She just smiled.
And when she found Lucy in the art room later, she sat beside her, took off her hat, and whispered:
“I ain’t always mad. Just don’t know how to be soft yet.”
Lucy passed her a pink chalk.
“You’re doing fine.”
Chapter 41 – What I'm Used To
Tilly lay stretched out on her bed, boots still on, straw hat tilted low over her eyes.
And nothing else.
The door creaked open, and a nurse poked her head in, clipboard in hand.
“Oh! Sorry, Tilly — were you still getting dressed?”
Tilly pushed the brim of her hat up just enough to peek at her. “Huh? Oh, nah. I’m fine. This’s just how I’m used to bein’.”
The nurse blinked, then stepped fully into the room, careful, calm. She perched on the edge of the bed.
“Used to being like this? You mean… just the boots and the hat?”
Tilly nodded, casual. “Since I could crawl. Grew up like this on the farm. No fuss, no fabric, just dirt and air and chores.”
The nurse tilted her head gently. “You didn’t even wear underwear?”
“Nope,” Tilly said, like she was talking about the weather. “All weathers, too — hot or cold. Fed the pigs, wrangled the goats, herded the cows bare as a beetle. Had a pet crow named Jip, used to perch on my shoulder and eat seeds outta my hand.”
There was a pause.
The nurse smiled — kind, but cautious.
“That’s… wow. Sounds like you were pretty close to nature.”
Tilly nodded again, eyes drifting toward the ceiling. “It’s just what I knew. My ma and pa, they said it was natural. Said I was a wild spirit. They had this little clicky camera thing… took videos. Said folks paid money to watch.”
The air in the room changed. Subtle. Heavy.
The nurse’s smile faded into something softer. Sadder.
“Tilly…” she said quietly. “That’s not okay. What they did.”
Tilly shrugged. “Didn’t know it wasn’t. They never said it was wrong. Just said it helped with bills.”
The nurse didn’t say anything at first. Just sat there, letting the silence hold both of them for a while.
Then, gently: “It wasn’t your fault. You were just a kid.”
Tilly didn’t look away, but her voice got quieter. “Yeah. Still feels like it’s all I know.”
The nurse reached out, slowly, and touched her boot — just a light tap.
“Well, we’ll help you learn some new things too. Doesn’t mean forgettin’ the farm. Just… makin’ space for the rest of you.”
Tilly nodded.
Didn’t smile. But she didn’t frown either.
Just tipped her hat back down and said, “Reckon that’s fair.”
Chapter 42 – Sticky Sugar Cubes
Tilly lay flat on her bed, boots kicked up against the wall, straw hat tilted low over her eyes — and absolutely nothing else.
No shirt. No frock. No pants. Just dusty leather boots and a sun-bleached hat, like some kind of wild west bedtime outlaw who’d forgotten the whole concept of pajamas.
She huffed loudly at the ceiling.
Then again, louder — like maybe if she blew hard enough, the plaster would answer back.
The door eased open.
Soft footsteps padded across the floor — two pairs.
Tilly didn’t flinch. Didn’t cover up. Just tipped her hat back with one finger, squinting at the visitors.
“Well howdy there, sticky sugar cubes,” she drawled. “What can y’all do for me today?”
Riley blinked, amused but unfazed.
Lucy just smiled behind her pacifier and waved with one sleeve-covered hand.
“We were wonderin’,” Riley said, “if you wanted to come join story time with us. And maybe tell a few of your own in return?”
Tilly raised an eyebrow.
“Wait. Y’all readin’ books?”
“Not exactly,” Riley shrugged. “Ava reads. She’s got the best voice. She makes everything sound like a bedtime spell.”
Tilly leaned her head back down, boots thunking softly against the wall.
“I don’t read. Can’t write either. Math? That stuff gives me gas,” she muttered.
Lucy giggled into her lamb.
“I can count to ten,” Tilly added, “but once I get past that, all them numbers start lookin’ like snakes tied in knots.”
Riley sat at the edge of the bed, unbothered by the whole lack-of-clothing situation.
“That’s okay,” she said. “Nobody’s askin’ you to teach algebra.”
Tilly glanced over, then snorted.
“You ever seen a pig try to walk up a slide? That’s what my brain does when someone hands me a workbook.”
“We don’t care if you can read,” Riley said. “We just like your stories.”
“Besides,” Lucy added, voice soft but clear around her pacifier, “you talk better than books do.”
Tilly blinked at them.
Then swung her legs off the wall, boots hitting the floor with a dusty thump.
“Well damn,” she grinned. “Y’all coulda led with that.”
She stood up — still bare as a breeze except for the boots and the hat — and stretched like someone who’d never known shame.
“Let me grab my frock. Wouldn’t wanna knock over nobody’s innocence.”
Lucy and Riley laughed as she rummaged around, pulling on the wrinkled white dress like it was just another layer of armor.
Then the three of them walked out together — slow, soft footsteps echoing down the hall like a quiet little rebellion.
Chapter 43 – Pickle the Pig
Tilly flopped down into the biggest beanbag in the room like she’d just dropped off a hay wagon.
Her boots stuck out to the sides, hat tilted low, and the soft fwomp of the cushion made her grin.
“Well I’ll be,” she said. “This reminds me of the hay I used to sit on in the barn.”
Lucy was curled nearby with her lamb, Riley stretched out on the floor, chin on her hands, already smiling. They knew when Tilly started like that, they were in for something good.
“The sheep were okay,” Tilly continued, squirming a little to get comfier. “But they were itchy. Like... wearin' a sweater made outta dry grass and bad ideas. Wouldn’t sit with ‘em unless I had to.”
She chuckled, then adjusted her hat.
“But the pigs? Oh, them pigs were my best friends. Big ol' pink heaters. They’d keep me warm at night, all huddled up like a pile of snorin’ bread dough. I’d fall asleep in the straw, and next thing I knew — oink! — one of ‘em’d be rootin’ at my toes, wakin’ me up like a farm alarm clock.”
Lucy giggled, pacifier bobbing.
“I’d feed ‘em, clean ‘em, brush all the gunk outta their ears. My pa said no one made pigs shine like I did. He’d give me a sandwich sometimes when I was done workin’ — white bread, mayo, somethin’ unidentifiable between. I’d eat it so fast my jaw near locked up.”
She paused, softer now.
“But I always saved a bite for Pickle. That was my pig. Slept with me most nights. Snored like a tractor. Stank like mud and love. Wouldn’t trade him for a hundred clean pillows.”
Riley tilted her head. “Pickle, huh?”
“Yep. Named him myself.” Tilly puffed with pride. “Used to follow me like a dog. I swear he knew my moods better than people ever did.”
Her voice quieted, eyes drifting toward the beanbag ceiling.
“Sometimes, though... when Pa forgot the sandwiches… I’d eat what Pickle ate. Root around in the trough with him. He always nudged some my way. Never let me go hungry.”
Nobody laughed.
Not out of politeness.
Because they knew — in Tilly’s world, that wasn’t a punchline.
That was love.
Lucy reached over and rested her hand on Tilly’s boot.
Riley sat up, crossed her legs, and said gently, “I think Pickle might’ve been better to you than a lotta grown-ups.”
Tilly nodded, slow.
“Yeah,” she said. “He was. Pickle never raised his voice. Never locked no doors. Just grunted, shared his food, and made sure I had a warm spot in the straw.”
She smiled then — not big, but deep.
“Y’all shoulda met him. You’d’ve liked him.”
Riley leaned her head on Lucy’s shoulder.
Lucy held her lamb close.
And Tilly sat in that beanbag like it was a patch of hay, wrapped in memories that smelled like mud and warmth and home.
Chapter 44 – Talkin’ to Pickle
Tilly was quiet for a long time after the last story. The beanbag had swallowed half her body, her boots poking out, her hat drooped low like a storm cloud over her eyes.
Then, without warning, her voice cracked open the silence:
“Ah remember all them fun times I had with Pickle...”
Riley and Lucy looked over. She wasn’t looking at them — just staring at her own hands, fiddlin’ with the rim of her boot like it was holdin' a memory.
“He used tuh play with me,” she went on, voice thick and wet now, “and we even made up games together. Like, he’d roll a apple ‘cross the barn and I’d try n’ catch it 'fore it hit the wall. Sometimes he’d pretend he was chasin’ me and I’d squeal like a stuck raccoon.”
Her lip trembled. She sniffled once.
Lucy shifted closer, gently, but didn’t speak yet.
Tilly kept going.
“When I was ‘bout nine years old, ol’ Pickle taught me how tuh use the toilet next to his pen. I ain't lyin’. He walked on over, snorted all gentle-like, and pointed that snout right at the seat like, ‘There. That’s where ya go, dummy.’”
She chuckled through the tears now, wiping her eyes with the corner of her frock.
“He sat there gruntin’, I swear, like he was givin’ me a dang tutorial. I did what he showed me, and he gave this happy squeal like, ‘Atta girl!’ and then just went back to nappin’ in the straw.”
Riley’s eyes widened. “Wait, Pickle toilet trained you?”
Tilly nodded like it was the most normal thing in the world. “Sho’ did. Best teacher I ever had.”
Lucy, pacifier hanging loosely from her lips, said softly, “Doctor Dolittle… he can talk to animals.”
Tilly blinked, then snapped her fingers. “That’s the name! Ma pa used tuh say I was like Doctor Doddle. Or Do-a-little. Somethin’ like that.”
“Dolittle,” Lucy said again, smiling just a bit.
“Yeah,” Tilly whispered. “That’s it.”
She looked down at her hands, tears still streakin’ her cheeks, but her mouth held a smile now — tired, maybe, but real.
“Pickle understood me better than folks ever did. I reckon if he coulda worn boots, he’d’ve come here with me.”
Riley reached over and touched her boot. “Well, you got us now. We ain’t pigs, but we listen real good.”
Tilly laughed — soft and shaky, but it filled the room like sunlight through a barn slat.
“Y’all weird,” she said.
“And you love it,” Riley grinned.
“Damn right I do.”
Chapter 45 – The Day them fancy Motors Came
Tilly didn’t stop talking.
Not even when the tears kept fallin’. Not even when her voice cracked.
She just sat there in the beanbag like it was the last warm thing left in the world, and the words came out like a busted faucet that no one ever fixed.
“Ah remember…” she sniffled, eyes red and full of storm, “I remember the motors comin’ in.”
Lucy leaned closer. Riley put a hand on her boot again.
“They was loud,” Tilly went on. “Big White ones with fancy lights. Shiny. Like snakes with wheels. Pulled up fast — gravel flyin’ ever’where. And them fancy-lookin’ men got out. Suits. Shoes so clean they looked slippery.”
She wiped her nose with the back of her arm.
“My ma and pa… they was yellin’. I didn’t know why. But I knew it wasn’t good. I saw ‘em get put in one of the motors. Cuffed. Hauled off like cattle what bit the wrong hand.”
Her voice cracked.
“And I was holdin’ on to Pickle. Cryin’ so hard my belly hurt. He stood in front of me, y’know? Like a wall. Big ol’ fat snortin’ wall. Wouldn’t move. Even when they tried.”
Lucy’s lips parted around her pacifier. Her eyes wide, soft.
Riley barely breathed.
“They spoke weird. Kinda clipped, like they was talkin’ through a fence. Said they wanted to help me. Said I was safe now. But I didn’t feel safe. I felt stolen.”
She gritted her teeth. “They dragged me away from him. My Pickle. He squealed and chased after the van. I heard him screamin’. And they just… threw a blanket on me like I was somethin’ broke.”
Tilly’s whole body trembled now.
“I was in a hospital for a week. Cold lights. No boots. No hay. They kept askin’ me questions I didn’t understand. Like... how many times. What it looked like. What I remembered. But I didn’t know nothin’ that made sense to them. I just wanted my pig. I just wanted to go home.”
Her voice got quiet. So quiet it felt like the room was leaning in to hear it.
“Then they brought me here.”
No one spoke for a long time.
Then Lucy reached over and climbed halfway into the beanbag with her — didn’t ask permission, didn’t say a word. Just curled up beside her and wrapped an arm around Tilly’s middle.
Riley wiped her own cheek, then leaned over too, pressing her forehead to Tilly’s shoulder.
And in that moment — surrounded by foam and softness and kids who knew exactly how hard it was to be torn from your everything —
Tilly finally let herself fall all the way apart.
Not alone.
Not anymore.
Chapter 46 – Fancy Garments
Tilly had never really noticed before.
She’d been too busy telling stories, wrangling beanbags like wild cattle, or flopping into bed the way she always did — boots on, hat tilted, clothes optional.
But today, she caught sight of something as Riley changed into her nighttime clothes in their shared room. Something white. Puffy. Crinkly.
And very not normal.
Tilly squinted.
Then pointed.
Then blurted out, loud and confused:
“Well what in the Mississippi moonshine is that fancy garment you folks are wearin’?”
Riley froze mid-diaper taping and slowly turned her head.
Lucy, sitting cross-legged on her bed with her lamb, blinked in surprise — then giggled softly behind her pacifier.
Riley straightened, totally unbothered.
“You mean the diaper?”
Tilly cocked her head. “Diaper? That’s what y’all call it? Look like somethin’ between a saddle and a marshmallow.”
Riley smirked. “Well, it feels better than both.”
Tilly stepped forward, hands on her hips, squinting like she was inspecting a new kind of tractor. “I ain’t never seen one up close before. Didn’t have nothin’ like that on the farm. We just squatted where we stood and called it a day.”
Lucy nodded slowly, pacifier bobbing in agreement like yep, that tracks.
Riley picked up a fresh one and tossed it to Tilly.
“Wanna see one for real?”
Tilly caught it like a hot biscuit. Held it up. Turned it over in both hands. “Huh. Softer’n I expected. Smells like nothin’, which is honestly real impressive.”
She ran her fingers across the waistband. “So this thing catches... everything? Like pee, poop, the occasional meltdown?”
“Pretty much,” Riley said, laughing now.
Lucy added, “Some of us wear ‘em all day. Some just at night. It’s for comfort. Safety. Accidents.”
Tilly nodded, thoughtfully. “Huh. Back on the farm, I was lucky if I had a rag.”
She sat down on the edge of her bed, still holding the diaper like it was a relic. “So y’all ain’t ashamed? Wearin’ ‘em and all?”
Riley shook her head. “Why would we be?”
Lucy whispered, “It’s just what helps.”
Tilly looked at them. Then at the diaper.
Then shrugged.
“Welp, reckon I’m behind the times. All this fancy wear an’ y’all still sleep better than I ever did. Maybe there’s somethin’ to it.”
Riley tossed her a wink. “We’ll show you the good ones tomorrow. There’s even ones with little stars on ‘em.”
Tilly grinned. “Stars? Well hell. That’s better’n most of my underwear ever was.”
They all laughed.
And in that moment — between the jokes, the curiosity, and the softness of a crinkly white marshmallow-garment — something else settled in:
Tilly wasn’t just visiting this place anymore.
She was becoming part of it.
Chapter 47 – The Ground Feels Honest
It didn’t take long for Tilly to start rearranging things.
Not like decorating — more like undoing what didn’t make sense to her.
The first thing to go was the bed.
Not physically — she didn’t have a screwdriver or the time — but she made it very clear she wasn’t usin’ the thing.
Every night, the nurses would peek in and see the same sight:
Bed untouched. Blanket still folded.
Tilly?
Curled up on the floor beside it — boots off, white frock half-covered by a blanket she’d dragged down and tucked around herself like a sleeping bag from a farm supply store.
When Riley asked her why, Tilly just shrugged.
“Beds too soft,” she said. “Feel like I’m tryin’ to sleep on a pile of overcooked pancakes. Can’t trust a bed that swallows ya.”
Lucy giggled softly from across the room.
“And that mattress? Got no truth to it. The ground’s honest. You know where ya stand with the floor.”
The second change?
The window.
Tilly kept it open. All the time. Even when the night air turned sharp and cold enough to make the nurses mutter as they passed her door.
“Don’t y’all dare close that,” she said once to Janine, arms crossed and breath fogging in the chill. “I need the wind. Need the air. Can’t sleep right without that feelin’ of outside.”
Riley had once woken up in the middle of the night and found Tilly standing on her bed — barefoot, hands on the windowsill, eyes closed — breathing deep like she was pulling a memory out of the sky.
Lucy had just watched from under her blanket and whispered, “She’s like a raccoon raised by wolves.”
And somehow… that made perfect sense.
By the end of the week, the staff gave up trying to “correct” Tilly’s room.
They just wrote a new note in her file:
Room modifications approved: Floor bedding + open-window preference. Cold exposure tolerated well. Emotional regulation improved with familiar elements.
And Mara?
Mara didn’t argue once.
She just brought Tilly a thicker blanket and said, “If the floor’s your peace, then we’ll keep it swept.”
Tilly grinned.
“See? Y’all catchin’ on.”
Chapter 48 – The Gift
It started as a joke.
Lucy and Riley were lying on the beanbags during a rainy afternoon, flipping through an old therapy tablet someone had left in the common room.
Most of the apps were boring — breathing timers, slow bubble animations, a weird puzzle game that made Riley curse under her breath.
But then Lucy found the Farm Sounds folder.
She looked at Riley. Riley looked at her.
And in unison, they said: “Tilly.”
They found her in her usual place — floor of her room, wrapped in her blanket like a burrito of attitude and hay dust.
“Y’all lookin’ suspicious,” Tilly muttered without even looking up.
Riley plopped down beside her and held up the tablet. “We got somethin’ for you.”
Lucy hit Play.
The sound that came out was a low, steady moo. Soft. Slow. Gentle.
Tilly blinked once.
Then sat up straighter.
“That one’s hungry,” she said immediately, like she was talking about a neighbor at the dinner table. “Ain’t complainin’, just waitin’. Soundin’ patient, but she’s got a baby growin’ in her belly. Needs extra grain.”
Lucy hit the next one — another moo, higher-pitched this time. Quick and sharp.
Tilly flinched. “That one’s pissed. Lost her calf. Y’all hear that second bellow? She’s callin’ — not at the barn, at the pasture gate. Baby’s on the wrong side.”
Riley and Lucy froze.
The next sound was a pig — low grunt, followed by a few snorts and a long, echoing squeal.
Tilly narrowed her eyes. “He wants out.”
Riley blinked. “Out?”
“Outta the pen. Ain’t hurt. Just sick of bein’ penned in. He’s got that wander-grunt — nose pushin’ at the latch, hopin’ it’s loose today.”
More sounds followed.
Goats. Roosters. Sheep.
Every time, Tilly didn’t just hear them.
She understood them.
Not in some magical animal-whisperer way. No glowing eyes or trance-like daze.
Just Tilly being Tilly.
Plainspoken, sharp-eared, and tuned into every little shift in tone like she’d spent her whole life decoding animal feelings the way other kids learned the alphabet.
By the time the nurses wandered by and peeked into the room, there was a small crowd gathered.
Not just Lucy and Riley, but Caleb, Juno, even Ava, all watching Tilly like she was translating a language no one else could hear.
“She’s not guessing,” Riley whispered to Mara, who stood in the doorway, stunned.
“She’s... listening.”
Mara scribbled something down in her notes, then paused, watching Tilly tilt her head at another clip.
The girl squinted. “That goat’s fakin’ it. Lazy lil’ thing. Pretendin’ to limp so she don’t gotta walk uphill to the water trough.”
The group lost it.
Tilly just shrugged. “Goats lie. I seen it.”
That night, Lucy left a drawing outside Tilly’s door.
A cow, a pig, a goat — all smiling.
In the middle: a tiny girl in boots and a hat, arms out wide like she was welcoming them home.
Underneath, in big bubble letters Riley had helped write:
TILLY MAE: FARM TALKER
She didn’t say anything when she found it the next morning.
But she taped it to the wall above her floor bed.
And left the window open a little wider — just in case the wind carried any animal sounds her way.
Chapter 49 – The Baby Goat
It was early morning, and the hallway lights had just clicked into their dim pre-breakfast glow.
Tilly was in her room — same as always.
Hat on.
Boots laced.
Everything else? Optional.
She was sprawled on the floor, one leg bent, arms behind her head, just starin’ at the ceiling like it might someday explain life to her.
That’s when she heard it.
Bleat.
High-pitched. Short. Wobbly.
Not human.
She sat bolt upright. “...What in the hay was that?”
Another bleat.
Closer now.
Then the door creaked open — and Mara stepped in, holding a squirmy, soft-bodied little baby goat in her arms. Big eyes. Tiny hooves. One floppy ear.
Tilly’s jaw dropped.
She scrambled to her feet — hat askew, boots thudding against the floor — and practically levitated toward the sound.
“Well hello there, darlin’!” she gasped. “You lost or lookin’ for your mama?”
The goat bleated again, louder this time.
Tilly dropped to her knees and opened her arms without hesitation.
The baby goat trotted right over and bonked its head gently into her bare belly like it had been born just to find her.
Mara watched from the door, smiling. “His name’s Buster. He’s a rescue. One of the local therapy farms had a new litter, and I thought... well, maybe Tilly could use a little home in her hands.”
Tilly didn’t answer.
She was too busy cradling the goat’s tiny head in her palms and whisperin’ straight-up nonsense:
“Aw sugarbean, look at you. All fuzz and tremble. You missin’ your mama, huh? I know that feelin’. Don’t you worry none — you got me now.”
The goat bleated again, softer now, like it understood.
Tilly pulled the goat into her lap — skin on fur, boots on tile, heart already full.
Lucy peeked around the corner, Riley close behind her.
When they saw the scene, they froze.
Riley whispered, “She’s not even cryin’. She’s just... home.”
Tilly glanced up at them, eyes shining but no tears falling.
“Y’all,” she said, voice wobbling just a little, “He smells like hay and hope.”
Lucy giggled around her pacifier.
Riley just nodded.
Yeah. That was Tilly.
No shirt.
No shame.
Just boots, a hat, and a heart big enough to hold the whole barn.
Chapter 50 – A Bale o’ Hay and a Bit o’ Peace
Tilly loved that dang goat.
Buster wasn’t just a barn buddy. He was her shadow, her emotional support farm critter, her fuzzy-tailed conscience with four hooves and a knack for knockin’ over juice cups.
Everywhere she went, he trotted after — clumsy, snortin’, tail waggin’ like he’d won a prize just for breathin’.
And Tilly?
She took care of him like he was gold.
If he peed? She mopped it.
If he pooped? She had a towel ready quicker than the staff could blink.
“He’s just a baby,” she’d say, waggin’ a finger at anyone lookin’ sideways. “Y’all act like y’ain’t never had an accident. Least he don’t try to lie about it.”
But even with Buster cuddled against her side at night, Tilly was still restless.
She’d toss and turn on the floor, boots off but hat still on, eyes wide open long after lights-out.
Next mornin’, she found Mara in the hallway, clipboard in hand.
Tilly stomped right up, Buster trottin’ behind her like a four-legged beanbag.
“Mara,” she said, voice all scratchy and serious, “I need help.”
Mara blinked. “Okay. What’s goin’ on?”
Tilly shuffled in place a little, rubbed the back of her neck.
“I can’t sleep right. I ain’t got no real ground. The floor’s too clean. Too flat. Too… fake. I just want a bale o’ hay to curl up on and a blanket at night. Somethin’ real. Somethin’ that smells like home.”
She frowned, eyes gettin’ shiny but stubborn. “An’ the floor? It ain’t right without no darn drain in it neither. How’m I s’posed to feel settled without a place for the mess to go?”
Mara gave her a kind smile. “I can’t do anything about puttin’ a drain in your room, Tilly — pretty sure the maintenance team would riot — but a bed of straw? That might be possible. If I can get the board to pass it.”
Tilly nodded, slow and solemn, like she was makin’ a deal with the wind.
“A hope they do then,” she said, voice small.
Then she turned and walked away, boots thunkin’ lightly, Buster clip-cloppin’ after her into the therapy room like he had his own appointment to keep.
Inside, the other kids were already gathered.
Caleb sat drawing pigs. Ava was helping Juno braid yarn. Lucy and Riley were curled up on the reading mat, whisperin’ about some book where animals could talk.
Buster made his grand entrance like royalty — sniffin’ shoes, nudgin’ knees, and demanding exactly the level of attention he knew he deserved.
Every kid lit up. Even the quiet ones.
Tilly leaned against the doorway, arms crossed, hat tipped back.
“He likes y’all,” she said. “He’s picky too. If he ain’t tryin’ to bite your shoelaces, that means he thinks yer good people.”
She walked in, dropped to the floor beside Buster, and rubbed his ears.
Then, without warmin’ up, without announcin’ it, she started talkin’.
“You ever heard ‘bout the time Pickle got stuck in the tractor shed? Thought it was a storm shelter, bless his dumb heart. Rained so hard he slid clean across the floor and knocked over a box o’ nails. Looked like a porcupine for an hour.”
The room filled with laughter.
Juno giggled so hard she had to cover her mouth. Even Ava cracked a smile.
Tilly grinned.
“An’ another time, we had a goat named Cheese Puff. Got his head stuck in a fence every day for a week. Pa said he had a ‘learnin’ disability.’ I said he just had a big head.”
They laughed more.
And as Buster curled up against her boots, and the room buzzed with joy she hadn’t even meant to make, Tilly leaned back and sighed.
“Reckon if I can’t have a barn,” she said softly, “this’ll do just fine.”
Chapter 51 – Darn Tootin’
Tilly hadn’t slept worth a lick.
She was tossin’, turnin’, sweatin’ like a hog in a heatwave — blanket kicked off, hat crooked on her head, Buster curled up by her knees doin’ his best to comfort her with gentle little bleats and sleepy nudges.
But it didn’t help.
The floor was too still. The air too warm. No hay. No earth. No night sounds but the low hum of building vents and the occasional toilet flush down the hall.
She needed real peace. Farm peace. Dirt peace. The kind that settled in your bones.
Next morning, Tilly sat on the beanbag like a wilted daisy, boots untied, hair a mess, eyes puffy with lack of sleep. Buster was pressed to her side like a loyal lil’ furnace.
Mara found her there.
Clipboard tucked under one arm. Smile already in place.
“Tilly,” she said gently, “Can we chat for a sec?”
Tilly looked up. “If this is ‘bout me not usin’ the bed again, I already warned y’all. That mattress feels like sleepin’ on chewed bubblegum.”
Mara chuckled. “Nope, not about the bed. I’ve got good news.”
Tilly sat up a little straighter.
Mara knelt down so they were eye-to-eye, speaking low and kind.
“Okay, so… I couldn’t get the board to approve a bale of hay in your room. And the drain idea? Well, that’s a definite no-go.”
Tilly frowned. “Figures.”
“But—” Mara continued, her smile growing, “What if we built you a shed?”
Tilly blinked. “A shed?”
“Yup. In the garden. We’ve got that little section off to the side, near the fence. What if we fixed it up just for you and Buster? Straw on the floor, proper ventilation, roof felted, maybe even a little fence for him to roam in.”
Tilly’s jaw slowly dropped.
“And you said somethin’ ‘bout a drain, right?” Mara added, grinning now. “We’ve got some creative ideas for water-safe flooring and cleanup. Might even run a hose setup if we can keep it safe.”
Tilly shot to her feet like a lightning bolt hit her boots.
“Well darn tootin’!” she whooped. “When do I move in and make me a home?!”
Mara laughed. “Well, it’ll take a few weeks. Maybe a month, tops. We’ve got to build the shed, seal the roof, and figure out toilet access. But it’s happening.”
Tilly clapped her hands like a kid on Christmas.
“Ain’t waitin’ another second!” she said, practically vibrating with excitement. “Buster, did you hear that? We’re gettin’ us a real home! Straw and all!”
The baby goat bleated in response, as if he’d understood every word.
Mara stood and offered Tilly her hand.
“Come on then,” she said. “Let’s tell the others together.”
Tilly took her hand with a proud little tilt of her chin and marched down the hall — barefoot, hat high, Buster right on her tail.
And for the first time in a long time…
She didn’t just feel like she belonged.
She felt like she was finally building somethin’ of her own.
Chapter 52 – Blueprints and Big Dreams
The art room hadn’t been this busy since that one time Caleb tried to make a papier-maché punching bag and ended up gluing his sock to the ceiling.
But today?
Today was different.
Today was for Tilly.
A giant sheet of butcher paper was rolled out across the table — taped at the corners so it wouldn’t curl. Markers, crayons, colored pencils, and glue sticks were scattered everywhere like a creative tornado had just passed through.
Tilly stood at the head of the table, Buster curled at her boots like a furry punctuation mark.
“Alright y’all,” she said, planting both hands on her hips. “We got us a job. We plannin’ me a whole dang life out in that garden, and I want ideas. Big ones. Weird ones. I ain’t picky — just passionate.”
Lucy was already scribbling a fence with little flowers growing up the side. “What if there’s a patch for vegetables?” she asked. “Like carrots and lettuce and… those weird stripey beets?”
“Rainbow chard,” Riley added, doodling a mini haybale beside a sun. “We could build a path with stepping stones. And a lil’ sign that says Tilly’s Farm.”
Caleb, chewing on a pencil, muttered, “You should have a pig statue. In memory of Pickle.”
Tilly blinked. Her face softened. “That’d be mighty nice,” she said. “Could put it near the door. Like a piggy guardian.”
Ava raised a hand like it was a real classroom. “Can we paint a mural on the shed? Maybe of a barn, or animals, or like… I don’t know, a big open sky?”
“Oh!” Juno piped up, bouncing in her seat. “You could have a mailbox! Even if you don’t get letters, we could put drawings in it!”
Riley grinned. “A goat-sized hammock?”
Tilly let out a wild belly laugh. “Now that’s just luxury! But I ain’t sayin’ no.”
They worked for over an hour.
Ideas turned into sketches.
Sketches into blueprints.
By the end, the butcher paper was a chaotic, colorful mess of everything Tilly loved — straw beds, sun patches, goat toys, wind chimes, a boot rack, and a note in Ava’s curly handwriting that read:
“This ain’t just a shed. It’s a piece of Tilly’s heart, and now it belongs to all of us too.”
Tilly stared at it for a long moment.
She didn’t cry.
She just nodded, slow and grateful.
“Y’all,” she said, voice low and warm, “this is the nicest barn I never had.”
Then she looked at Buster, who had been asleep the whole time, snoring softly into her foot.
“We’re gonna be just fine, baby boy.”
And when she stood back to admire the blueprints, surrounded by her strange little found family of trauma-hardened hearts and glitter-covered hands, she realized something important:
She hadn’t just found a place.
She’d found a home.
Let’s keep this rolling — next chapter, we can kick off the actual shed construction, or maybe do a scene where the kids present the plan to Mara and the staff. You want light and happy, or a little twist of chaos in the mix?
Chapter 53 – The Banana Incident
The garden was alive with noise.
Not the usual kind — no lawnmowers or bird chirps or wind through trees.
This was the sound of progress.
Shed walls were going up. Boards were being hammered (with more enthusiasm than skill), and Buster had already knocked over a paint can twice. Tilly was in the thick of it, hat tilted high, supervising like a ranch foreman with zero patience and a heart full of straw.
“Alright now,” she said, pacing the plot, “we ain’t buildin’ no summer cabin. This here’s a livin’ space. I want a wall that don’t creak, a window that opens proper, and no leaks. I ain’t tryin’ to float off in the next rainstorm.”
Lucy was painting tiny sunflowers on a wooden panel. Riley was carrying a bucket of nails like she meant business. Even Caleb was helping — sort of — by drawing an imaginary blueprint in the dirt with a stick.
Then Tilly turned around, eyes narrowing.
“Oh no. No sir.”
She stomped over to the far corner of the plot, where Lucy had just marked off the vegetable patch.
“This here needs a fence,” Tilly declared, pointing dramatically. “Buster’ll eat ever’ green thing out here and look me dead in the eyes while doin’ it. No afterthoughts. No regrets. Just crunchin’ and fartin’ like nothin’ happened.”
Riley snorted. “He would.”
“Ain’t his fault,” Tilly added, softening. “He’s just built like a food vacuum with legs. Bless him.”
That’s when one of the nurses came out from the back door, smiling, holding a small paper bag.
“Tilly!” she called. “Got something for you.”
Tilly turned. “You bring me a sandwich or a mystery?”
The nurse laughed and handed her the bag.
Tilly peeked inside, then gasped like she’d found buried treasure.
“Well bless ma buttons,” she said, eyes wide. “Somebody been to the sweet field for me!”
She reached in, pulled out a tomato, then a bell pepper, and finally—something long and yellow.
She turned it over in her hand, squinting at it like it owed her money.
“What in the darn pikin’ thing is this vegetable?”
Then, before anyone could speak, she took a massive bite—skin and all.
Lucy and Riley both froze.
Then exploded into hysterics.
Like full-on, diaper-destroying, rollin’-on-the-ground, can’t-breathe kind of laughter.
Lucy wheezed behind her pacifier, tears rolling down her cheeks, and Riley gasped, “She ATE the skin—!”
Tilly chewed with purpose, unfazed. “Hey now... this is a tasty vegetable! What side o’ the farm do these grow on? Tree fruit? Ground root? Sky dangle?”
That did it.
Lucy and Riley both crawled back into the building, laughing so hard they could barely speak, heading straight for the nurse’s station to get their diapers changed.
Meanwhile, Ava stayed behind, trying not to laugh too hard as she walked up to Tilly.
“Tilly… that’s a banana,” she said gently. “It’s not a vegetable. And uh… we don’t usually eat the peel.”
Tilly blinked. “Y’all peel it? What, like a potato?”
“Kinda, yeah.”
Tilly stared at the banana stub in her hand. “Well I’ll be. It’s good both ways. Tastes like if a candle and a dream had a baby.”
Ava giggled. “Want help goin’ through the rest of the bag? Make sure there ain’t nothin’ else that’s secretly a fruit?”
Tilly nodded solemnly. “Yeah. Before I bite into somethin’ what explodes or makes me see God.”
Chapter 53 – The Banana Incident (and Other Strange Produce)
Construction had officially begun.
The garden smelled like sawdust and fresh ambition. Shed walls were going up — a little crooked, maybe, but full of love — and the kids buzzed around the space like it was a carnival.
Tilly stood in the middle, hat tilted proudly, hands on her hips. Buster was parked next to a pile of straw, chewing on absolutely nothing like it was his job.
“Alright y’all,” she barked, pacing the perimeter, “I got one rule ‘bout this here garden patch — seal it off. Lock it down. I ain’t tryin’ to grow no vegetables just so Buster can poop ‘em right back out.”
Lucy giggled. “You really think he’d eat everything?”
“I know he would,” Tilly said, dead serious. “He’s a menace in a fur coat.”
Just then, a nurse strolled out of the building holding a paper bag and called out, “Tilly! Got a little something for you from the kitchen!”
Tilly turned fast. “That so? You bring me somethin’ that crunches or fills the belly?”
The nurse laughed and handed it over.
Tilly opened the bag, sniffed once, and reached in.
First thing out: a tomato.
She held it up, frowning. “Now what in the Lord’s salad is this round red balloon?”
“That’s a tomato,” the nurse offered helpfully.
Tilly shook it next to her ear. “It got liquid in it. That ain’t right. Y’all sure this ain’t a prank fruit?”
Next: a bell pepper.
She turned it over slowly, eyes narrowing. “This one looks like it’s flexin’. Like it’s tryin’ to scare me.”
“That’s a pepper.”
“Ain’t no pepper I’ve seen. Pepper goes on eggs. This here looks like a swollen toad.”
Then came an apple.
Tilly sniffed it, poked it, gave it a suspicious glare. “It’s hard. And shiny. What is it, a rock disguised as food?”
“That’s an apple.”
Tilly raised an eyebrow. “Apple? Ain’t never seen one in real life. Thought those was a myth, like unicorns or polite roosters.”
Then she reached in one last time.
And pulled out a banana.
She stared.
“Now what in the deep-fried circus fair is this?”
“That’s a banana,” the nurse said with a smile.
Tilly squinted. “It’s curved. Got a skin like a sunburned snake. Y’all sure this ain’t a trap?”
Before anyone could stop her, she bit in — skin and all.
Lucy and Riley, who’d been painting fence posts nearby, froze.
Then absolutely lost it.
Like, diapers instantly gone, wheezing, crawling, tears-down-their-faces kind of laughing.
Lucy dropped her paintbrush and hit the grass. Riley was holding her belly, half-crying, half-yelling, “SHE ATE IT WHOLE!”
Tilly stood there chewing like a confused squirrel, eyes narrowed.
“Hey now… this is a tasty vegetable,” she said through the peel. “Kinda sweet. Like corn’s cousin what went off to college.”
Lucy and Riley were howling, dragging themselves back inside, begging staff for changes between fits of giggles.
Ava, still in the garden, stepped forward, smiling gently.
“Tilly… you’re supposed to peel it. The yellow part comes off.”
Tilly blinked. “You undress it first?”
“Yup. The soft part’s inside.”
She looked down at the half-eaten banana, thoughtful.
“Well I’ll be. Fancy food got layers now. Y’all ever find somethin’ that just shows up plain and honest like a tater or a cob o’ corn?”
Ava giggled. “There’s a lot you’re gonna love once you try it right.”
Tilly grinned. “Reckon y’all better teach me before I eat a dang pineapple whole and break a tooth.”
Chapter 54 – Born Under the Stars
The sun was high, warm but not cruel, and the garden smelled like fresh paint, wildflowers, and pride.
It was Opening Day.
Tilly’s Shed — or, as the hand-painted sign read in colorful, uneven letters:
TILLY MAE’S LITTLE HOMESTEAD
(Goat Welcome. Boots Optional.)
Everyone was there.
Lucy wore a paper crown. Riley had smudges of glitter on her nose. Ava had brought a stack of hand-drawn posters. Even Caleb, who usually only showed up for snacks and chaos, was carrying a ribbon-cutting stick (they didn’t have scissors big enough, so he’d taped a plastic knife to a broom handle and declared it “ceremonial”).
Tilly stood at the entrance of the shed, one hand on Buster’s head, the other holding her hat against her chest like it might fly off from the wind inside her.
The shed was perfect.
Wooden walls. A roof with a slight lean. A bale of hay fluffed in the corner, with a real, actual drain installed just nearby thanks to a very confused maintenance worker and some creative plumbing.
There was a tiny fence around a vegetable patch (Buster-proof, of course), a mural painted by all the kids — one side a sunrise, the other a bunch of animals wearing party hats — and a little wooden mailbox labeled Farm Mail Only.
And that’s when it hit her.
All of it.
The effort.
The paint.
The silly tools and goofy planning and the weird banana incident that started it all.
The fact that they cared.
She sniffled once. Then twice. Then started crying like the sky had cracked open right behind her eyes.
“Aww shucks,” she said, voice wobbling. “I never thought y’all cared this much.”
Lucy stepped forward, pacifier bobbing. “Of course we care.”
Riley added, “You think we were gonna let you suffer in that boring warm room with no goat, no air, and no proper ground under your butt?”
Ava chimed in, smiling, “We care because you care. About us. In your weird, barefoot, goat-whisperin’ way.”
The others all nodded, voices overlapping:
“You’re family now.”
“You made this place softer.”
“You make the monsters in my head quiet down.”
“You’re weird, Tilly. But the best kind.”
Tilly was full-on sobbing now, cheeks blotchy, nose running, hat clutched tight like it was the only thing keeping her together.
“Thanks, y’all,” she whispered. “I was splittin’ hairs in that warm room you folks call home. I know y’all are used to it, but me? I was born under the stars. I never knew air could be so still indoors. Made me feel like I was drownin’ in comfort.”
Then Lucy stepped forward and hugged her.
Then Riley joined.
Then everyone.
One big, tangled, straw-scented, goat-bleating group hug.
And somewhere under the layers of hands and arms and soft breath and laughter, someone whispered:
“Please never change, Tilly. We all like you a lot here.”
Tilly sniffled, hugged tighter, and said:
“Well… reckon I ain’t plannin’ to.”
Chapter 55 – Like Home
The shed was quiet that night.
Not the kind of quiet that pressed in like the ward walls used to — too still, too clean, like air with no life in it.
This quiet breathed.
Outside, the wind rustled through the garden, brushing past the little fence and the mural-painted walls. Somewhere beyond the trees, a distant owl called out once, then fell silent again.
Inside, the soft sound of hay shifting.
Tilly sat on her straw bedding, hat placed gently by her side, her white frock peeled off and folded in the corner like she actually gave a damn about neatness — which, for once, she did.
She fluffed the hay beneath her with both hands, spreading it just the way she liked. Some thick under her head. Some mounded behind her back. A little extra down by her toes.
Then she lowered herself into it — bare as the day she was born, same as she’d always been under the stars back home. No fabric. No weight. Just air, skin, and straw.
Buster, already curled up nearby, let out a little sleepy grunt as she settled in beside him.
Tilly exhaled.
It wasn’t a tired breath. Not a sad one either.
It was peace.
Real, bone-deep peace.
And then — without warning, without drama — the tears came.
Not loud.
Not sharp.
Just soft, steady drops that slipped down her cheeks and into the hay, like little pieces of the girl she used to be… finally lettin’ go.
Buster raised his head, bleary-eyed, and blinked at her.
Then he leaned in — slow, gentle — and licked one of the tears off her cheek.
Tilly smiled through the salt.
“Don’t worry none,” she whispered. “Ain’t cryin’ ‘cause I’m hurt. Just... feelin’ like I belong for once.”
Buster nestled closer.
Warm and solid and just the right amount of goat stink.
She draped an arm over him, nuzzled into the hay, and let her eyes drift shut.
And for the first time in her whole life — not just since the ward, or the farm, or the night the motors came — but in her whole dang life…
Tilly slept through the night.
Not sweating. Not restless. Not afraid.
Just home.
Chapter 56 – All Tuckered Out
Dawn broke easy that morning.
The sun peeked over the garden fence like it was shy, slipping golden light across the grass and the little handmade sign on the shed: Tilly Mae’s Little Homestead.
Inside, it was warm and quiet.
Tilly lay sprawled across her straw bedding, hat covering one ear, arms wrapped tight around Buster’s belly. The baby goat was snoring just as loud as she was — soft little wheezes, legs twitching in a dream.
They looked like two lumps of countryside peace, tangled in hay and dreams and the safety of belonging.
At 9 a.m. sharp, Mara gently knocked on the shed door.
No response — just a loud, snorty snnnrrrk! from inside.
She cracked the door and peeked in.
Tilly, bare as a breeze, was face-down in the straw, hair a mess, mouth slightly open, Buster’s hooves sticking out from the bundle like misplaced broomsticks.
Mara smiled.
She didn’t say a word.
Just closed the door again, shook her head, and walked back inside.
Meanwhile, back in the ward, Lucy and Riley were stretching awake.
Lucy let out a soft yawn around her pacifier, rubbing her eyes with the back of her sleeve. Her diaper squished with that telltale soggy heaviness, and she blinked down like she’d forgotten it was even there.
Riley rolled over, groaned, and mumbled, “I think my diaper tried to drown me in my sleep.”
They both giggled.
After a quick clean-up and fresh changes — thanks to a very patient nurse with coffee in one hand and wipes in the other — they made their way to the dining room.
“Where’s Tilly?” Riley asked, already scanning the tables.
Mara poured some cereal, casually replied, “Still fast asleep in her shed. Sounded like a tractor caught in a dream.”
Lucy’s eyes lit up. “Dawww, she all tuckered out still!”
Riley snorted. “Bet Buster’s sleepin’ harder than she is.”
Mara laughed softly. “Neither of them even stirred when I checked. It was like a hay tornado hit the inside of that place.”
Lucy hugged her lamb tight. “She finally got real sleep.”
“Yeah,” Riley nodded, smiling. “The kind with air that moves.”
They all sat down, quiet for a second, just picturing her out there — straw in her hair, goat on her chest, snorin’ like she’d finally exhaled the past.
Chapter 57 – Bleats, Bowls, and Barefoot Legends
The dining room was alive with the usual morning murmur — the soft clinks of cereal spoons, the occasional juice box misfire, and Riley trying to convince Caleb that toast didn’t need to be weaponized.
Then the door creaked open.
Heads turned.
And in came Tilly.
Hair a mess. Hat barely on. Hay stuck to every inch of her skin like she’d just rolled out of a scarecrow’s dream. She was barefoot, eyes half-open, one boot in her hand and Buster slung under her opposite arm like a sack of potatoes with opinions.
She looked like she’d been hit by a tornado made of sleep and straw—and had loved every second of it.
“Mornin’ y’all,” she yawned, voice scratchy but sweet. “Don’t mind me, I’ll be back in a few. Gotta squirt in a bowl.”
Lucy nearly dropped her pacifier.
Riley spit a little juice.
Caleb choked on a waffle.
Tilly continued like she hadn’t just reset the breakfast atmosphere entirely.
“But here’s Buster,” she added, plopping the goat down in the middle of the room. “Y’all pet him good now. He’s in a cuddlin’ mood and prone to steppin’ on toes.”
Then she turned and walked out, humming a tune that sounded like it came straight from a back porch on a Sunday afternoon.
And Buster?
Well.
The moment her foot hit the hallway, he froze.
Ears perked.
Eyes locked.
Then—BLEAT!
He launched himself forward like a bleating rocket, hooves clacking against the floor as he chased after her.
“Tilly!” Ava called out. “You forgot—”
But it was too late.
“MAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH—”
Buster tore down the hallway after his human like a goat on a mission, slipping around corners, nearly knocking over a rolling breakfast cart, and sending one very confused nurse into a panic spin.
Lucy leaned back in her chair, giggling so hard her eyes were watering.
“She said ‘squirt in a bowl,’” she whispered, clutching her lamb.
“I know,” Riley wheezed. “I think she meant pee.”
Caleb grunted. “I’m keepin’ that phrase forever.”
Meanwhile, in the hallway, Tilly was shuffling toward the bathroom, humming, still not quite awake.
Behind her: the unmistakable thunder of hooves.
She didn’t even turn around.
“Buster,” she said, without looking. “You better not be—”
BLEAT!
Tilly sighed. “Lord give me patience.”
She stepped aside just in time for Buster to skid past, legs flailing like a bowling ball on legs, tail wagging, tongue out.
“Can’t leave you alone for ten minutes, can I?” she muttered, marching into the bathroom with goat in tow.
One of the nurses just stared from down the hall, wide-eyed.
Tilly poked her head back out, voice sleepy but proud.
“Don’t worry none. He don’t judge.”
Back in the dining room, the rest of the kids were losing it.
“I wanna be like her when I grow up,” Riley said, dead serious.
Lucy nodded solemnly. “Barefoot goat queen energy.”
Even Ava smiled. “You can’t make that kind of magic up.”
Ten minutes later, Tilly returned.
Still barefoot. Still covered in hay. Now slightly more awake.
She walked straight to the table, plopped down beside Lucy and Riley, and picked up someone’s half-eaten muffin.
“Y’all ever notice food tastes better when you sleep in hay?” she mumbled.
Caleb stared. “You slept in straw.”
Tilly shrugged. “Straw, hay, dreams, same thing when it’s under your butt.”
Buster nuzzled against her leg, content and calm now that his human was seated.
Mara came by, smiling, setting down a proper plate for Tilly.
“Rough morning?” she asked.
Tilly grinned. “Best mornin’ I ever had. Got chased by a goat, took a squirt in peace, and now I got bread in my mouth. Ain’t nothin’ wrong with today.”
Mara laughed and walked off, shaking her head.
Lucy leaned over, whispered, “You feelin’ like a queen today?”
Tilly smiled around a bite of muffin.
“Darlin’, I feel like a raccoon that found a donut under the stars. I’m thrivin’.”
The Bucket Bath Incident
An hour later, after a breakfast full of chuckles and hay-flavored muffin crumbs, Tilly returned to the shed with a plan.
Buster had rolled in something. Again.
“Alright you little mud magnet,” she said, hands on her hips. “Time for a bath. I warned ya last night if you rolled in compost again, you were gettin’ the bucket.”
Out back behind the garden fence, she hauled over a plastic tub, filled it halfway with warm water from the hose, and added a generous squirt of the lavender soap the nurses used in the ward showers.
Buster eyed the tub like it might eat him first.
“Oh hush,” Tilly said. “It’s a bath, not a dang swamp. Now git in!”
After three false starts, one near-disaster, and a lot of bleating, Buster plopped into the tub, legs splayed, eyes full of betrayal.
Tilly scrubbed him gently, humming as she worked.
“There now,” she said. “You smell like a flower with hooves. Ain’t that better than butt-scented straw?”
Fencing Day Mayhem
Later that afternoon, Lucy and Riley came outside to help fence off the veggie patch.
“He ate two radish tops already,” Lucy whispered, pointing at Buster, who stood nearby looking suspiciously innocent.
Tilly nodded. “Told y’all. He’s a destroyer of crops. Fence line starts here. We’ll use the zip ties from Ava’s craft stash. She thinks they’re for art. They’re for war.”
The three of them spent an hour trying to stretch mesh wire and garden stakes across a ten-foot patch of soil.
They argued, laughed, tripped, and got tangled more than once.
But by the time the sun began dipping, the veggie patch had a proper border.
Buster sniffed it once.
Tried to jump it.
Failed.
The girls cheered like they’d won the Olympics.
Surprise from the Staff
The next day, Mara came out holding a laminated card and a lanyard.
“Tilly,” she said with a smile, “we have something official for you.”
Tilly raised an eyebrow. “Official? Like court official or fun official?”
“Definitely fun.”
She handed it over.
GOAT LICENSE Name: Tilly Mae Issued for: Outstanding Emotional Goat Support Expires: Never Approved by: Literally Everyone
Tilly stared at it, stunned.
Then beamed.
“Well butter my corn and call me queen, I’m licensed now!”
She wore it around her neck all day.
Barn Manners 101
That afternoon, Tilly dragged a milk crate into the middle of the courtyard and stood up on it like a preacher.
“ALRIGHT Y’ALL,” she shouted. “It’s time I taught ya some BARN MANNERS.”
The kids gathered, curious and confused.
“Rule One: Don’t yell near animals. Unless yer tryin’ to get kicked.”
“Rule Two: If somethin’ poops, you scoop.”
“Rule Three: No cryin’ over spilled milk unless it’s the last of it.”
Caleb raised a hand. “What if you are the one that pooped?”
Tilly pointed at him without missing a beat. “Then you especially scoop.”
They laughed, cheered, and at the end, Lucy made her a certificate with glitter glue:
"TILLY MAE, PROFESSOR OF BARNOLOGY"
Tilly taped it to her shed wall like it was her diploma.
Chapter 58 – Sticky Sugar Cubes and Silent Grief
Tilly Mae was out in the garden, barefoot in the dirt, watering’ her baby sprouts like they were kin. Straw hat tilted low, dress hiked up to her knees, her voice hummin’ some half-forgotten tune that probably belonged to a porch swing and a lost summer.
The sun was still risin’, stretchin’ golden light across the yard, and Buster was nearby, chasin’ a beetle like it owed him rent.
Then the shed door creaked, and out came Lucy and Riley, hand in hand, pacifier bobbin’, diapered but confident like two little marshmallow rebels strollin’ into battle.
Tilly looked up, smirked, and tilted her head with a slow blink.
“Well I’ll be,” she said, drawl thicker than a gumbo stew. “Y’all sure y’ain’t sticky sugar cubes stuck together? I cain’t tell where one ends an’ the other begins.”
Lucy burst into giggles, nearly droppin’ her lamb.
Riley elbowed her playfully, but it was Lucy who fired back, “You sure you ain’t poopin’ out here in the garden again, Tilly?”
Tilly blinked, deadpan. “Hey now, at least I bury it, unlike y’all in them fancy draw’rs you carry 'round. Y’all poop like it’s a luxury resort.”
The three of them cracked up — loud, unfiltered laughter floatin’ through the breeze, nothin’ mean about it, just kids bein’ safe enough to tease like sisters.
But then Riley got quiet, and Lucy reached into her pocket, pullin’ out a folded paper.
“We were wonderin’,” Lucy said, a little softer now, “if you wanted to help us with the Pickle monument. We thought maybe a paintin’ or a stone or somethin’ special.”
Tilly went still.
Real still.
She stared at the dirt like it might answer for her.
Then, slow as syrup, she wiped the sweat from her brow and said, “Nah... nah, I reckon I’m happy for y’all to do it without me.”
Her voice didn’t wobble, but her eyes looked like they’d wandered somewhere far off — maybe a pigpen, maybe a memory.
“I don’t think I’m strong enough to talk ‘bout him just yet,” she said. “Not out loud. Not today.”
Lucy and Riley didn’t say nothin’ back.
They just nodded, gentle and quiet.
Then turned, together again, and walked back toward the building.
Tilly watched ‘em go.
Then knelt, stuck her fingers in the warm dirt, and whispered so low even Buster didn’t hear:
“I still remember how ya snored, ol’ boy.”
And the watering can dripped slow beside her — not from her hands, but from somewhere deeper.
Chapter 59 – The Memory of Pickle
Night fell quiet over the garden.
The shed glowed soft with lantern light, the faintest flicker against the dark. Crickets sang in the grass. Somewhere far off, a car rolled past, but it never came near.
Inside the shed, Tilly lay curled in her bed of hay, bare and warm, arms around Buster like a lifeline made of hooves and heartbeat.
The little goat snored softly, his head rising and falling with Tilly’s breathing.
But she wasn’t asleep.
Not yet.
Her eyes were open, fixed on the roof, watching dust float in moonlight.
And her mind… it was back there.
Back on the farm.
Back when she still smelled like dirt and smoke every night, and Pickle—her fat, stinky, beautiful pig—was the only soul who knew the shape of her sadness without askin’.
“Y’know,” she whispered, voice tremblin’ just a little, “Pickle weren’t no regular pig.”
Buster didn’t stir.
“He kept me clean,” she went on, barely a breath. “Wouldn’t let me waller like the others. He’d grunt when I tried. Nudge me away from the filth. Like he was sayin', ‘That ain’t you. You better’n that.’”
She smiled, sad and soft.
“He taught me where the outhouse was. Sat there, watchin’, every time I squatted in the wrong spot. Snorted real loud and stared at the toilet. Like he was sayin', ‘Use your brain, Tilly Mae.’"
Her chest rose, fell, hitched.
“I didn’t have no teacher but him. No school, no ma readin’ books to me, no Sunday learnin’. Just Pickle. Tryin’ to make me less pig.”
She wiped her face with the back of her hand, but more tears came.
“Pa didn’t like that.”
Her voice dropped into a whisper meant for ghosts.
“Said Pickle was messin’ with me. Said pigs don’t teach, they eat. And when I started actin’ more… human... when I stopped crawlin’ all fours and started wearin’ my ma’s old smock instead of runnin’ bare, he got real mean.”
The lantern flickered as the wind kissed the walls.
“I remember the day. The shot.”
Tilly shut her eyes tight.
“I’d never heard nothin’ louder.”
Her breath shook.
“I was screamin’. Not words. Just sound. Tryin’ to cover his body. He was still breathin’. Still tryin’ to get up. Tryin’ to protect me.”
Her fingers gripped the hay.
“I didn’t even notice the police cars till they were right there. Sirens screamin’, lights blindin’. Pa grabbed me by the arm, yellin’. Draggin’ me.”
Then she blinked hard.
“I fought. I fought him. And that’s when they jumped him. Took him down hard. But I don’t remember cheerin’ or feelin’ safe. I just remember the shoutin’.”
Her whole body trembled now, curled tighter around Buster.
“That’s why I hate it,” she whispered. “The shoutin’. The snappin’ tones. Don’t matter what’s bein’ said—when folks yell, my bones think they’re back there. My ears think he’s comin’ back.”
Buster shifted, pressing closer to her chest, warm and calm.
Tilly exhaled.
And in that dark little shed, with nothing but a goat and a bed of hay to hold her together, she finally said it:
“I miss him.”
A pause.
“I miss my pig.”
The wind picked up outside, rustling the veggie patch, brushing against the shed walls like it was tryin’ to comfort her.
And maybe it did.
Because Tilly finally closed her eyes.
And slept.
Chapter 60 – Goodbye, Pickle
Morning cracked open soft and sweet over the garden.
Dew clung to the veggie patch. Buster trotted through the wet grass, kicking up droplets like he was makin’ his own little storm.
Tilly sat on the step of her shed, boots pulled on but laces loose, watchin’ the sun crawl across the sky.
She hadn’t said much yet today.
Just listened to the world breathe.
Then Lucy and Riley came out, hand in hand again, grinnin’ like two kids holdin’ a secret they could barely keep in.
“Tilly Mae!” Lucy called, pacifier bobbin’ in her excitement.
“C’mon, darlin’,” Riley added. “We got somethin’ to show ya.”
Tilly stood slow, stretchin’, brushing hay off her knees. “What y’all cookin’ up now? Somethin’ sticky or somethin’ sweet?”
“Both,” Riley grinned.
They led her to the far side of the garden, near the fence where the sun hit first in the mornings.
And there it was.
The Pickle Monument.
It wasn’t fancy.
Just a simple wooden sign, hand-painted in bright colors.
IN MEMORY OF PICKLE
Best Friend, Best Pig
Teacher of Hearts and Bathroom Etiquette
“A Pig Smarter Than Most People.”
Underneath the sign, there was a little patch of flowers Lucy had planted — rough, messy, but stubborn and proud. Beside it, a small, round stone painted pink with a curly tail doodled on it.
Tilly stared.
Hands hanging limp at her sides.
Hat tipped low to hide her eyes.
Lucy and Riley stood close, waiting, not pushing.
Then — slow and steady — Tilly stepped forward.
She knelt in front of the sign.
Ran her hand across the painted letters.
And spoke, clear enough for all the kids, all the staff, everyone nearby to hear:
“I reckon it’s time y’all knew what happened.”
The words didn’t break her. Not this time.
She kept her hand on the sign. Steady.
“My Pickle... he weren’t just a pig. He was my family. He was my whole heart when the world thought I didn’t need one.”
Her voice was thick, but it didn’t crack.
“He taught me how to be more’n what I was raised in. Taught me to stand. Taught me to do my business where it belonged. Taught me to eat proper an’ love gentle.”
She drew a shaky breath.
“My pa... he ain’t liked that. Said pigs was for butcherin’, not buddyin’. One day, he got drunk mean. Took a shotgun to Pickle while I was tryin’ to hide him in the shed.”
Murmurs rippled through the group.
Tilly kept goin’. Stronger now.
“Police come after. Took Pa away. I reckon that was the first day I ever saw a door open where before there was just walls.”
She wiped her nose on her sleeve, smiling through the tears now.
“And Pickle... even after he was hurt, he tried to protect me. That’s the kinda love I had. That’s the kinda love I still carry.”
She stood up.
Facing everyone.
Hands on her hips. Chin up.
No shame.
Just Tilly Mae, the wild girl who slept under stars, loved a pig like kin, and taught a whole broken ward what loyalty looked like.
“So today,” she said, voice ringin’ clear in the morning air, “I ain’t sayin’ goodbye to Pickle. Not really.”
She grinned, crooked and proud.
“’Cause I reckon when you love somethin’ honest, it don’t die. It just plants itself deep inside ya and keeps growin’, stubborn as a sunflower in a sidewalk crack.”
Lucy stepped forward first, wrapping her tiny arms around Tilly’s waist.
Riley hugged her from the other side.
One by one, the others came too — Ava, Caleb, even some of the shy kids who didn’t usually come near crowds.
A pile of arms and hearts and muddy boots.
A family born not from blood, but from survival.
And standing there, in the morning light, surrounded by more love than she ever thought she deserved, Tilly finally said it:
“Thank y’all. For lettin’ me keep him alive.”
No fancy speeches.
No long goodbyes.
Just the truth.
And that was enough.
Always had been.
Always would be.
THE END.