Chapter Text
Epilogue
Gavin woke up staring at trees. He was laying on his back in the dirt and he hadn’t escaped, he was still there, he-
Then he realized he could see stars. There were stars above instead of just a moon. In Sally’s world there had been no stars. Turning his head, he couldn’t see the huge dome of the asylum.
Realizing that, he started to cry. There were big, hot tears that ran down his cheeks but they were quiet. He had to stay quiet just in case. Geoff wasn’t here to protect him right now.
Walking through the forest wasn’t as scary. He knew that before he had feared going in here even in bright daylight but after everything this was laughable. The darkness had covered him, had helped him hide.
After a while dawn broke. It had been so long since he had seen daylight and for a while he just stood there and felt. The light was wonderful and warm as it reached his skin. He looked terribly pale, he realized but he didn’t care.
After what felt like hours he reached the edge of the forest, he found a street and stared at it. The fact that it was there, that there was dew on the tarmac was such a strange concept to him, that he didn’t know how to react. A part of him wanted to step closer and touch it to make sure it was real but before he could get his legs to move, someone was calling him.
There was a car now that hadn’t been there before. A man was standing in the open door and on the backseat were two young children staring.
The man asked him something and it took Gavin a while to find his voice. It took so long that the stranger had asked him a couple more times and when Gavin asked him where Geoff was, somehow the man got confused and thought his name was Geoff.
Gavin didn’t have the strength to correct him, he just sat down right where he was and held his head in his hands. The kids got out of the car, he could hear how they were asking questions but the man was on the phone.
Maybe Gavin had dozed off because the next thing he knew he was surrounded by other people. A nice woman explained to him that they were doctors and would get him to the hospital. Her voice was a nice up and down and he liked to listen to it.
She took his hand to lead him away. Just like Geoff had done and thinking back to Geoff made him so sad. He just held on tighter and the woman didn’t let go, even when they sat down in the ambulance.
When they reached the hospital though, she had to go away. He cried a little over that but she told him that he was brave and that made him feel a bit better.
Later, when he laid in a bed after eating some soup, he could tell them his real name and then he asked after Geoff.
Geoff had surely come out by now, right? He got the generator running and got out.
Yeah.
Gavin fell asleep and when he woke up his mom was crying. He also started crying and they hugged and she kissed his face and his bruised hands. Then he fell back asleep.
The police asked a lot of questions and it made his head hurt. He told them over and over again what had happened but they didn’t believe him. Stress, shock, a defense mechanism, they said. A fantasy to cope with what happened or something like that.
So when Gavin figured he wouldn’t get anywhere with the truth, he began to ask for Geoff.
“He looked after me,” he told his mom who always sat by his side. “He protected me and he got me out. He said we would get out together but… but the hatch closed, I think. He couldn’t follow me but he will also flee soon, right?”
“I’m sure of it,” she told him and then she went to some police officer who was tall and talked in a really deep voice that intimidated Gavin. But his mom yelled at him, angry and loud, telling him to find this man.
Later, he didn’t know how much later, his mom sat down and took his hand. She was holding a photo.
“Baby, that’s the only Geoff in this area here that’s missing.”
It wasn’t his Geoff. The Geoff on the photo was a really old man, without any hair and Gavin pushed the photo away.
“Do you know his last name, Gavvy?”
He didn’t. He had never asked and so he hid beneath his blanket to cry.
A while later his mom introduced him to Mister Hodge. She explained to him that once a week he and this Mister Hodge would sit together to talk. He could talk about everything he wanted to, even the worst of the things that happened. He would help him remember everything correctly.
Gavin was pretty sure that he remembered everything correctly but then his mom brought in a christmas tree. It was a small one to stand on his bedside table in the hospital and he stared at it with wide eyes.
He had been missing for eight months and knew that it couldn’t be true.
Sometimes he nearly believed that Mister Hodges was right. Mister Hodges was his psychiatrist and Gavin had to visit him each week even after he got home from the hospital. The visits often left him very tired and exhausted.
Mister Hodges said he had imagined everything because it was easier to pretend that it was a monster keeping them in that old building, than an actual human. That it seemed that this nurse was teleporting because it had been more than one person but his brain had stopped distinguishing between them.
To protect him, Mister Hodges said. That was normal, Mister Hodges said.
Gavin nearly believed him until Mister Hodges offered that maybe that was the case for Geoff as well. A guardian angel, a friend, he had imagined when he needed one. Someone to talk to, who would protect him.
Just the thought alone enraged Gavin so much, that he screamed in the little room. Screamed and kicked his feet and threw things from the table. The room was soundproof or something like that but somehow his mom still heard him and rushed in. She brought him home and sat him down and comforted him. It took long and then she told him that it was just a theory, that it didn’t have to be right.
It didn’t help because the thought that he was waiting for no one… that Geoff didn’t exist terrified him.
He began to have nightmares, worse than before. Where he was alone in the forest and the asylum and there was no Geoff. Where the nurse, good ol’ Sally, was hunting him through dark corridors.
He woke screaming while thrashing around. He began to wet his bed again which he hadn’t done since he’d been four years old.
But if Geoff had never existed, then there was no one who would protect him.
On some days he sat in his bed and just watched through the window. On these days he didn’t want to talk, didn’t want to eat but sometimes he did anyway because it would make his mom smile and he loved her very much.
She believed him.
He didn’t go to school anymore.
Large crowds made him nervous because he saw her in the corner of his eyes. Saw her standing between friends he had before, knew that she was standing behind him.
Without Geoff, he wasn’t safe.
Also the kids looked at him all strange. They whispered and some laughed.
He didn’t like them.
His mom taught him and she told him he was smart. Geoff had done the same and Gavin still remembered some of his exercises.
Wasn’t that proof enough?
Maybe his kidnappers had left his books behind, Mister Hodges said. Maybe he had taught himself.
He was sitting on the couch, staring at the TV. Some show was running but sometimes it was hard to concentrate for him, so he stared at the bright colors on the screen and thought nothing.
The door rang, he guessed. At least his mom went by him to answer it. She had just collected laundry and had the wooden basket pressed to her hip to open the door.
It could be Miss Holly, who was their neighbor. Or a reporter. In the first year after Gavin had returned they had swarmed him like flies. They had talked so loud and fast and there was greed in their eyes. They had scared him.
“I’m sorry for disturbing you, Ma’am.”
The voice cut through Gavin’s empty head and he turned around. Like this he couldn’t look outside because his mom was blocking the view. She never opened the door fully anymore because there had been some reporter who had just barged in to get a picture of them.
Those had been terrifying.
“How can I help you?” his mom asked but even though it was a polite question, she said it with a sharp voice.
“My name is Geoffrey Ramsey,” the voice said and Gavin got to his feet to come closer. “But most people call me Geoff.”
“So? What doe-” his mom began but then stopped. The door opened a bit further because she let go of the handle. The basket with the laundry fell from her other hand and now Gavin could see Geoff.
He looked different. Clean and shaved and without scratches. It made him look younger even when he looked too thin, too tired, too haunted. He was holding Gavin’s bag up. His old school bag that was dirty and ripped apart but certainly his.
His mom tried to say something, Gavin could see how her mouth opened but nothing came out.
It was Gavin who called, “Geoff!”
Blue eyes darted past his mother, found him and then Geoff opened his mouth as well. He also got nothing out because his knees buckled. His mom tried to steady him but by then Geoff was already on his knees, tears in his eyes and Gavin darted towards him.
“You got out,” Geoff sobbed as Gavin threw himself in his arms. “You got out, you got out, oh God. I prayed every second but I couldn’t find you. You were so far away and I- God… ”
His voice broke and Gavin was pulled tightly. It hurt and he could barely breathe but he clung to Geoff like his life depended on it.
“She isn’t here,” Gavin told him. “The white lady isn’t here, Geoff.”
“I know. God, I know!”
“We’re awake! We woke up! The nightmare is gone!”
The End