Fifty-Five

The hallway she brought me down was eerie and off-putting. The white walls were bare, and the off-white laminate flooring was scuffed and dirty. We passed several doors, but no people. I continued forward. My anxiety got significantly worse when a man in a lab coat rounded the corner ahead of us before turning off into one of the rooms, only for me to discover it was an office as we walked past.

It made sense that they wouldn't keep their patients in the front of the building, but the fact that they had to keep them here against their will at all made me feel nauseous.

"Is Detective Sullivan doing okay today?" I asked, and the woman looked over her shoulder at me with a small smile. There was a tightness in the corner of her eyes that told me I wouldn't be able to take her words at face value.

"He hasn't been here long but is doing a little better every day." She lifted her hand, gesturing me to turn to the right as we reached the end of the hallway. There was another door we had to