In this place, people could have jobs if they wanted to. It was actually quite nice, because it kept one's mind active when they were bored out of their minds. And since patients could choose their jobs, well, Cody had decided to work with the only friend he had in this place.

He was extremely curious about her. They'd spoken every day at lunch, and played cards a few times. She always beat him. "Mr. Lewis, it's time for your medicine." The nurse addressed the group who was about to clean up around the perimeter. Hugo and another guard had to be with the patients, because they had large trash bags, which could potentially be used as weapons against one another. Cody didn't know what would happen if someone acted up with a bag, but he just hoped that everyone in the group would follow the rules.

The nurse handed everyone a small, clear cup of water, and the pills they had to ingest. He'd been placed on some anti-psychotic he didn't remember the name of. Big deal. Everyone here had something to take. Cosette had some sort of anxiety medication, or maybe it was a schizophrenic thing, he didn't remember.

Out of the corner of his eye, the man thought he saw an old man in their group pretend to ingest the pill, instead of taking it. The nurse checked everyone's mouths though, so there was no way he saw that correctly. The group was only four people large, and they'd each clean near to each other. He put it out of his mind, and walked over to Cosette.

The group were escorted by the guards outside. They had a yard to clean up, after all. It was mostly a pudding cup here, a ripped card there, maybe a dropped plastic spoon from the few who swiped them from the cafeteria and brought them outside. Someone had a weird pile of fourteen spoons that was piled up in the middle of the yard near a bench.

Cosette threw an old card in her bag. She appeared disappointed, because she enjoyed playing cards so much with Cody. He'd acknowledged that her favorite game was Blackjack. It was short, sweet, and to the point. If a game ran long, it was easy to clean up when they had to move to groups or their rooms. Plus, she was exceptionally good at it, after eleven years of practice.

Her hair looked like some sort of movie star's hair. It had beautiful waves rippling throughout, and her makeup accentuated her baby blues. This woman was the exact opposite of his wife. Brown wavy hair, blue eyes, tiny, possibly occasionally-insane, but something about her reeled him in like a fish caught on a line. She blew a puff of her hair, folded just away from her eye, out of her face, and smiled at him. Her smile was warm, and unassuming.

Cody didn't realize he wasn't cleaning anything until she spoke. "Careful when you watch people around here. You never know who might explode at you." She chortled, and lifted a small red cup off the grass to throw away. "Ah, right." The man muttered, embarrassed. He didn't want her to think he was some sort of creep.

"I was just curious, why do they let you do your makeup?" The man asked, walking alongside her. She appeared to ponder the question for a minute, before grinning at him. "The same reason the receptionist is forced to ask you what you want to be called. Part of it's to see if we're so out of our mind that we have to be put in straightjackets, and part of it's because... makeup makes me feel good. It makes me feel my best. So not having that opportunity takes that feeling away from me. They can't afford that. I may die in here and never tell anyone if anything bad happens or if I was ever upset in here at all, but they still get paid to make me feel as human as they're willing. Makeup is a part of that." She dropped a strange-looking matt of hair in her bag.

The woman placed one spoon in his bag, and Cody tilted his head to the side, a little confused for a few moments. He was about to ask her why she'd done that, but she answered before he got the question out. "The nurses. Don't you remember how we met? I'm surprised you haven't picked it up by now." She chirped quietly.

It was the first time he'd seen her body slump, her eyes dim, and her smile fade. It sparked a painful memory, of his wife just weeks before she died, when he asked her how she was feeling. "Cody, every single thing you do here isn't a rational choice. Going to the bathroom? The way you hold your spoon? Asking if you have any letters from family? Those are all 'symptoms'. You're not a human here. You're a guinea pig. We all know it." She sighed, and glanced down at the ground, pretending to look for more trash. "At least in prison, you can decide whether you go to meals, or go to your own room. Sure you have to wear clothes that are all the same, but at least if you wear the same thing twice in a row, it's seen as a choice, not a symptom of some illness or insanity." Her words struck with depth, the kind of thing he didn't want to think about. It was the first time he thought with certainty that going to prison would've been a better alternative. It was a fleeting thought, but still a very real one.

He quickly pushed it from his mind, and smiled at her. "If either of us went to prison, we never would've met. I'm glad you stabbed the dog and got stuck in here with me." He noticed his words caused her face to fall. "I stabbed my brother, because one of those 'delusions' I used to have made me think that our hostile dog would be impressed. Accurate facts are very important here. You never know who'll flip a lid at even an accidental white lie." The woman explained, nonchalantly waving a hand. "I haven't had a delusion like that in years. Doesn't matter to them, though. Until a psychologist says 'go on ahead and set her free!' which won't happen, because the psychologist seems to think that if I go off my meds then it'll all start up again, then I'm stuck here. Delusions or not."

"Hey! You two. You better keep working. You don't want to know what happens when you stop. I ain't talking 'bout the yoga group, either. Punishment's worse when you don't do your jobs, ain't it?" A familiar, large man addressed the two, though his eyes were trained on Cosette. The woman sighed through her nose, irritation visible in the wrinkling of her forehead. "Yes, Hugo. I've been here long enough to see... to see..." She seemed suddenly distracted, peering around the guard.

"Hugo, we've got a situation!" The other guard on duty called back to his partner. Cody watched as the rotund man turned and ran for the excitement. That elderly patient he saw skipping on his medicine had his trash bag around the head of the other patient on duty. It was the first time Cody had seen that sort of violence since... himself, really. It was startling, to say the least, watching an attempted murder. Maybe he'd said something to tick the old guy off.

The guards pulled the two apart. Hugo had the flailing old man, and the other guard helped to calm and secure the victim of the attack. "Work time is over! Go get your money and go to a group!" Cody heard the guard, but his eyes were drawn to Hugo dragging the deranged patient inside.

He followed Cosette in, but didn't see any sign of the two, like they'd disappeared. "Where'd that old gentleman and the guard go?" He asked Cosette in a hushed voice. She ignored him, currently turning in both of their trash bags for a dollar per item collected. Cody was allowed to have one dollar for his spoon, and she had three dollars. What they did with that money, Cody still wasn't sure. He bet that Cosette had a pile of cash somewhere that she could do nothing with, since no family visited her or even spoke to her.

She didn't speak often about her family life, which he could respect. He could only imagine that a bunch of the people here were so messed up in the head because 'uncle Jerry always hit me' or 'mommy left me in a baby box at a fire station'. It was pretty common for the criminally insane to have a tragic backstory that other people would just sulk about or better yet, they'd overcome their troubles. Not here, though. With these people, some lever in their heads flipped in the wrong direction. They never recovered, or never wanted to. Some didn't have anything go wrong in the first place, they were just born differently.

Why was Cody here? What made him start doing what he did? He could blame that horrid doctor all he wanted for that first kill, the VA for some of the others, maybe some other reason or another he hadn't thought about for the rest. They were happy people with happy lives, just like he and his daughter were. Maybe it was some psychological basis around not being able to live a great life when one's love died, or something. Even then, that wasn't a reason to make someone else suffer the same fate.