GarniGal's Journal:

Title: Institutionalized
Fandom: Original
Prompt: Colourless
Warnings: None
Rating: G
Word Count: 574
Summary: The hardest lesson.

*****

Four years. Four years of gray.

The walls were gray, the floors and ceilings all painted the same dull, inoffensive shade. The mattresses were gray, the bedding gray from repeated washing and hard use. The bedsteads were cold gray metal, and the furniture in the common areas was covered in a nubbly gray fabric, guaranteed for optimal discomfort.

She assumed the sky was still blue but she never looked up to check. She assumed the grass was still green, but when she went outside, she stayed to the concrete paths. Gray concrete, of course, showing the fastest possible route from one gray stone building to the next.

Her thoughts were as depressive as the surroundings. Four years, contemplating her sins. Four years, at the mercy of the masters. Four years, waiting for freedom. It didn’t make for a cheerful outlook on life. She suspected her mind had gotten slower over the past four years, as well as sadder.

She knew her words had.

She rarely spoke now. So much time listening, contemplating, focusing on the subject at hand to the exclusion of all else. Others spoke, she simply absorbed.

But today was the end of it. She was done, finished, released. Free.

Gray suitcases (guaranteed not show the dirt) sat on the gray bed, half filled with her things. She’d accumulated little in the past four years; papers clipped together, a few books. Most of her possessions were things she’d brought with her four years ago, items she’d rarely looked at or used.

They weren’t gray.

Tee-shirts in every colour for every mood (she used to have moods). They’d been pushed to the back of the gray metal locker and replaced with unrelieved black. Photographs of people she once knew (swore she’d never forget). She remembered the names of perhaps half a dozen. Knickknacks she couldn’t live without (gifts from people she couldn’t remember). Jewelry that proclaimed someone loved her (once, in the past).

All these things she’d pushed aside in favour of wallowing in the gray colourlessness of this place. Her past, ignored until it was forgotten, the better to make space for something new.

She wasn’t here as a punishment for something terrible. This had been her reward. She’d worked hard to get here, to be deserving enough. She’d worked hard to stay here, cutting herself off from distractions.

For the first time, now that it was too late, she wondered what she’d missed. For the first time, she admitted to her loneliness. For the first time, she looked, really looked, around.

In the hallway (gray carpet), she could hear emotional leave takings. Voices that she should recognize (but didn’t) saying “I’m going to miss you so much”, “call me when you get home”, and “I’ll never forget you”. She could hear excitement about their futures. Voices saying “I start work right away”, “traveling on my own for the first time”, and “we’re getting married”.

The voices she heard weren’t gray. The voices had succeeded, just as she had, but had ignored the grayness and brought their own colour and life to this place.

She could have done that too.

She should have.

She’d chosen to live this segregated life, to ignore what was going on around her. It was impossible to go back, but on this, her last day, she’d finally learned something worth taking forward.

She put on a bright red tee-shirt and blue jeans and walked out the door.