Chapter Text
Thunk,
thunk,
thunk,
A small red rubber ball smacked against the room door in a continual rhythm. Gary did this everyday like clockwork, mainly because it was one of the very few personal belongings the psych ward allowed him to have.
He thought he’d get used to this by now. The boredom–but the familiarity only made him feel like he was reliving the same day over and over, and that if he did anything of consequence everything would just reset the following morning.
Still, he’d be dense not to notice that the shitty things he did made things around the place change sometimes–and that was the only thing that brought him any comfort.
Thunk,
thunk–”Ow!”
One of the orderlies opened the door, and was promptly hit square in the nose. “How many times do I have to tell you to stop smacking that stupid ball by the door?”
“How many times are you gonna get hit in the face before you learn how to catch it instead of whining like a little girl?”
The orderly frowned, “Just get up. It's time for your art class.”
Gary lunged out of bed, placing the ball on the desk next to his pillow.
The orderly groaned, “You know that if you keep hitting me in the face I'm going to confiscate it, don't you?”
“Oh no! Whatever will I do without my red rubber ball! Anything but that!” he cried, “You can't! It's the only thing keeping me from killing myself!”
The orderly just sighed, grabbing Gary by the shoulder blade and shoving him out of the room. “You really need to learn when to shut up.”
“No shit Sherlock, If I knew how to do that I wouldn't be in here.” He pushed Gary through the narrow corridors, “One of these days Gary you're gonna get socked in the face by another inmate, and I'll be happy the day that they do.”
“As if that hasn't happened already.” Gary whispered quietly to himself.
With enough shoving, Gary was led to the little crappy room they called the art room; but in actuality It was just an old bathroom that they converted into extra space. He could tell because there were still metal rods jammed into the walls that used to hold toilet paper rolls, and the room still vaguely smelled of urinal water.
A man placed a block of play dough in front of him, then quickly paced back to the front of the room.
“Create an animal that you feel represents you best.” He said, with a mouthful of words Gary refused to comprehend.
Gary already grabbed the clay before the man started talking. He really didn't care what they were supposed to make. It seemed to him that as long as you made something before the hour was up, they'd constitute it as productive. The man proceeded with the rest of his instructions, but Gary had entirely tuned him out. Yap yap yap yap yap.
He balled up the play dough and formed what was roughly a head, pushing two fingers into it to make eye sockets. The clay forming fingerprints from the very slight warmth emanating from the tips of his hands.
It didn't take long before it actually formed something familiar. And Gary didn't realize the time was almost done until he heard a voice over his shoulder; “What is that?” The voice asked.
“It's a skull.” Gary replied.
“And how is a human skull an animal?”
“People are animals.” Gary said, “We're in the same family as great apes. Not that I need to tell you that, considering the fact that you own a mirror.” He placed his palms on his desk. “And it's an animal skull, so I don't see what the problem is.”
The man sighed, clearly giving up; “Alright then. How does this,” he flailed his hand around the project trying to make sense of it, “Represent you?”
Gary leaned his chair back, smacking his lips obnoxiously, “What can I say? I liked that scene from The Karate kid. It's what I forced Jimmyboy to wear during Halloween last year.” After a certain point, Gary didn't need to clarify who Jimmy was.
He still remembered when he managed to convince Jimmy to wear it. It's interesting now, looking back at it. Jimmy surprisingly hadn't seen the movie at the time, but he’d forced him into it anyway. He’d told him what the movie was about while putting the makeup on him (He stole the makeup from Mandy in the girls dorm. He was sure she probably wouldn't notice at least not for a few weeks.) and he looked so stupid in it. He couldn't believe that Jimmy was dumb enough to wear it willingly. He expected it from Petey, but Jimmy….
Gary was pulled from his thoughts when he and the orderly in front of him heard a knock at the door. The man ushered him to stay in his seat, and he hurriedly walked to the door when Theo (probably the only orderly he remembered the name of) whispered something in the other man's ear that he couldn't for the life of him hear properly.
“Gary, come with me.” Theo then said.
“...alright.” Gary said, before smashing the clay skull with his fist. The unnamed orderly clearly looked upset, but ignored it and got back to observing the rest of the class.
He was already used to being maneuvered around the place like a ragdoll, so he destroyed what little things he could even if it was something of his own.
Theo led him to an empty room, his straitjacket hanging by a chair inside. “What, do I have an extra therapy appointment this week that I'm not aware of?” This was a bit strange, since Happy volts staff generally hated going off schedule.
Theo said nothing in response, only signaling Gary to turn around to face him so he could put the straitjacket on him. “The silent treatment, reallll original.” Gary drawled as Theo slipped his arms into the jacket, turning him around again to buckle the loops at the back.
He restrained Gary's arms through the front loops, double checking if anything was tied down and secured.
“Snug.” Gary added. He was once again pushed into one of the therapy rooms, but it felt off because it wasn't what he would consider ‘his’ therapy room. There were about 3 used at any given time, and this empty one was one he’d never seen the inside of before.
“Bring him in.” Theo finally said, seemingly breaking his vow of silence.
This makes sense, Gary thought, He still freshly remembered attacking his therapist (or was it his psychologist? He didn't recall.) So he had already expected a new one one these days. He made a game of trying to drive his doctors insane. Asking them personal questions, calling them gay. It was nice seeing new faces from time to time. And fun figuring out what buttons to push.
But when he looked up, he did not see a new face.
He saw an old one.
Jimmy had been working at Happy volts for about a week and a half at this point. He quickly memorized the layout of the place, and out of habit headed for the stock room to check if everything was well stocked and arranged properly.
The place actually started to feel kind of nice in a weird way. Theo was slightly less of a douche than he expected, and he was free to talk to some of the Happy volts patients in between tasks. One of them he met when Theo was teaching him how to properly wheel patients around in a wheelchair (In case he had to either fill in for another Orderly or had to ‘transport’ Gary for any reason.) and he told Jimmy that his buzzcut reminded him of his days in the army. Jimmy kind of assumed that he was in this place because of the PTSD, especially because he never seemed to want to talk about it outside of acknowledging that he went.
He was in the middle of stacking boxes of gauze before Theo opened the door, “Hey, Kid.” he said a little out of breath.
“What do you want Theo.” Jimmy said as he slipped another box onto the shelf.
“You’re ready.”
“For what?” Jimmy asked.
“For ballet–what do you think?”
Jimmy quickly gripped tightly at what he was holding, “Now?”
“Yes, now. I even gift wrapped him for you.”
It was not a reassuring thought.
Honestly, he’d almost forgotten why they wanted him specifically to work here.
“Now hurry up, you need to finish ‘introducing’ each other before lunch.”
Jimmy hurriedly put everything down, running to catch up to Theo. His heart was racing, and it made him nauseous not knowing why. It's not like he was scared of Gary…Jimmy knew he could very easily beat him in a fight. But this felt…personal, after everything that happened. Like seeing your very first bicycle again after years and years.
The trail of silence that followed as he walked with Theo to the therapy room was the quietest it ever had been for the two of them. Knowing that the easy part was over.
“Ready?” Theo asked.
“Fuck no.” Jimmy replied.
“Well you're gonna have to suck it up.” Theo said with a laugh, twisting the knob of the door.
Some very scarred eyebrows and pretty baggy eyes greeted him.
God he looks terrible, Jimmy thought.
Gary stumbled, trying to stand up but Theo shoved him back into his chair. “What kind of sick perverted power play is this??” Gary said,
Theo rolled his eyes, “We told you if you didn't stop acting up we'd find you someone that would make you behave.”
Get Gary to behave? They really had Jimmy's work cut out for him.
Gary looked Jimmy up and down, eyeing his orderly uniform. “You could've at least sent in Petey. He seems more like the nanny type.”
Jimmy had wondered for weeks what would've happened if Crabblesnitch forced Petey to go instead of him. He could've believed that Petey would've actually let himself be expelled at this point.
“Well, your stuck with him”
“He’s stuck with me?” Jimmy said to Theo.
“Yes, me, I couldn't walk out of here if I wanted to.” Gary said wriggling in his straitjacket.
Theo cut them off, “Now, now ladies. Let's just say you're both stuck with each other. And I'm stuck here with the both of you. We get that out of the way?”
Jimmy crossed his arms a bit frustrated, but didn't say anything.
“What exactly is the thought process here? That ill see my bestest friend in the whole wide world and I'll see the error of my ways just for him, and that'll make me want to kiss puppies and watch rainbows?” Gary asked.
Theo sighed, “No. Because he's the only one in here that has and can still, beat the crap out of you.” Theo slapped Jimmy's shoulder. “You’d do well to remember that.”
For once, Jimmy actually seemed sort of proud at that response.
Gary grit his teeth, then quickly put on a smug smirk. “Im a lover not a fighter.”
“Are you sure I can't beat him up now?” Jimmy added.
“As much as I'd love to see that, no. Its–” He looked at his watch “Time for Lunch.”
Gary's eyes widened, but Jimmy didn't really understand why until Theo spoke again. “It's time for your first job Jimbo.”
Theo looked condescendingly at Gary, “Open wide! Are you hungry? It's time for you to eat.”