Welcome to Gaia! ::

Authors Note: I personally think this is one of the worst prison's someone could live in. This character is majorly OCD and Schizo. It's a fate worse than living with the consequence of your own actions, almost.





I bite away at the edge of my thumb nail, tearing away the nail to the skin. Blood blooms around the edge and I stick it in my mouth, sucking at the redness until it stops bleeding. That was my last nail. It’s just stumps of ragged skin.

I stand up from the bed and turn back to face it, tucking in all the edged again, making perfect hospital corners in the bottom and overturning the white sheet hem over the white scratchy blanket. Perfect. The desk has a few notebooks on it. I go over to them and straighten them in the right corner. But they aren’t organized. I fan them out and then stack them by thickness. Put them in the left corner.

The windows curtains, filled with dust bunnies, are wide open. In three strides, I’m over there. Closing them. Opening them. No, closed. I peek through the small crack in the two pieces of fabric. The cat, Granger, is licking it’s paw on the brown fence. She looks up at me and I back away. She’s going to tell.

I sit down at the desk, pulling out the bottom notebook and throwing it open, using a black, almost dry, pen to scratch away what the cat is thinking about me.

Devon threw away Kari’s teddy bear. The teddy knew his secrets too. And now I’m going to tell his mom. Because bad boys need to be punished.

I close the notebook and stack them according to color and center them in the middle of the desk. They want the curtains open, they do. I open them, close them, and open them once more.

“Dev! Dinner is ready!” Mom calls from downstairs. I have to wash my hands. Germs are all over food and they want germs to get on me to eat me at night. I know it. I stop by the bathroom and wash my hands. Dry them. Wash them. Dry them. Wash them again. Dry them one last time. With a squirt of hand sanitizer, I rub it in while going down the stairs.

They think I don’t know about the cat. She is, after all, on their side. Kari is sitting in her booster seat, squishing play-dough together through her fingers and giggling. The cat talked to her.

I sit on the opposite end, not touching the table. They put germs there as well. Lizz sets the table, putting the design of the plates any which way and just tossing the forks and spoons on plates. I move my plate so the flower is sprouting from the end of the table and the fork is even with the spoon on the left side.

“How was school today Dev?” Mom asks as she stirs the milk and cheese powder into the noodles.

“Fine.” I move the fork and spoon to the other side.

“Any homework?”

The cat. Only she saw me pull out my text book from my backpack. She told on me. I’m going to ring her neck. “No.” I respond, moving the fork to the opposite side of the spoon.

Lizz passes by me and messes up my hair. She knows it bugs me. The damn cat told her. I run my hands through it, smoothing it back down against my skull. Now there are some hairs and dandruff on my fingers. I wipe them on my pants. Smooth down my hair. Wipe my hands.

“Here you go Dev.” Mom pours some of the Toy Story shaped mac and cheese onto my plate. They tell her not to put it on the side. They know it will piss me off. I know they communicate with her too. I push it all to the right side with my spoon. Lick it off and put it back where it belongs on the side of the plate in perfect position.

That’s okay they know though. I’ll give the cat a strangling message to give to them tonight. Maybe they will leave me alone then. I think about where I will send the message as I eat two noodle at a time. Always matching either Buzz to Buzz, Woody to Woody, or Rex to Rex. Chew three times. Swallow.

I leave the table as soon as allowed and go upstairs. Close and open and close the curtains. Taking care of the cat tonight will tell them to let me escape. Give me the key to get out of here. I straighten the notebooks by content in the right corner and get into bed, waiting to send the message.

did you mean edges?

it's should not have the apostrophe

When she is putting the macaroni and cheese on the plate could you maybe say that she put it in the middle of the plate? I think that would make more sense when you say that dev didn't want it on the side.

when you talk about sending the message did you mean how or was where the right word? I though where was a little funny, but it is your story. (noodles after that needs an s)
(Out of curiosity. What happens when you get to the end and Buzz doesn't match up with the left over Rex)

I would change the first sentence of the final paragraph to be after he had eaten or something instead of after he swallowed.

Overall I liked the story. The imagery and the repetition were amazing. I loved it and it made me feel a little OCD and like fixing something that didn't need fixing ninja
Only those small grammar things and those few small parts that were a little confusing for me.

That is a very interesting story! Well done.