Spider in the Corner of the Room (The Project Trilogy) by Nikki Owen Read Free Book Online

patient.’ I start to feel uneasy, agitated. I scratch the desk with my nail. ‘What tests are you sending to pathology?’
    She unpeels the syringe wrapping. ‘I am sending a full blood count.’ She unwraps the additional four vials and picks up the one already loaded with the needle. ‘Okay?’
    ‘No.’ I shake my head, scratch harder. ‘No. My blood work is normal. And a full blood count request does not require five tubes of blood.’ I scrape the wood of the desk again and again. This is not routine. Over and over in my head, I repeat:
This is not routine.
    Dr Andersson lets out a sigh. ‘Look, Maria, I’m sure your blood work is normal. I’m sure it will come back fine. You are a doctor. A medical doctor.’ She says the word ‘medical’ slowly. ‘But you are here now. In Goldmouth. In prison. And in prison, there are different rules. And the rule, right now, is that I have to take blood. From you. Today.’ She pauses, softens. ‘I know it is a change for you,
not routine,
shall we say, being here. I understand your brain functions differently. And I know that is a struggle for you at times. But this is the way it has to be.’
    I say nothing. The phrase,
This is not routine,
laps around my mind like a motorcycle with the accelerator permanently down, engine screeching, rubber tyres burning. I can’t stop it.
    Dr Andersson bites her lip. ‘Maria, it’s okay. Trust me.’
    This is not routine. This is not routine.
    ‘You’ve been through a lot,’ she continues. ‘Let me takethe blood now. I have scheduled another appointment for you with myself and the Governor. All routine.’
    The monologue in my head pauses, the engines stall. She said ‘routine’.
    ‘See?’ Dr Andersson says, nodding.
    Slowly, I withdraw my hand from scratching. ‘This…this is a routine here, in prison?’ I say, gesturing to the needles.
    ‘Of course. And, with your Asperger’s, I have instructed the Governor that, in my professional opinion, you require extra assistance from me, to help with your need for routine.’ She smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. ‘He has asked to meet you.’
    ‘When?’
    ‘Tomorrow. Is that okay?’
    She has no certificates on the walls, no university degrees. As if she is not even certified to practice. It does not seem right, somehow. Yet, nothing seems right any more. Nothing makes sense. I rub my forehead, try to wipe away the confusion.
    ‘Maria?’
    I point again to the needle, attempt to act like a normal person. ‘This is routine, you are certain?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And you will get me a notebook and pen?’
    She opens a drawer, takes out a fresh pad and pen. ‘There you go.’
    My eyes go wide at the sight and I snatch them, hungry to hold them. Only when I have the items do I allow myself to exhale, my whole body loosening, limbs, bones tired, worn out, and I realise there, in the room, that I haven’t slept in forty-eight hours. Maybe routine is what I need.A routine and my writing. Maybe then I can begin to feel some semblance of humanity inside me, rather than some half-wild, chained-up animal. I roll up my sleeve and hold out my arm.
    ‘Thank you,’ Dr Andersson says.
    Sitting forward and with a slash of a smile on her lily-white face, she taps my vein. The needle pierces my skin and I watch, weary, limp, as my blood floods into the vial.

Chapter 5
    K urt laces his fingers together. ‘So you are saying you simply took the laptop apart and put it back together?’
    I have told Kurt everything, but he won’t move on from this. I can feel my body become rigid, angry. ‘Yes.’ I shift once in my seat. ‘That is what I said.’
    He pauses. ‘And that is the truth?’
    ‘Yes. If I say it, it is true.’ I stay still. Does he not believe me? Why is he asking me all these questions about it?
    ‘You know our memories can play tricks on us,’ he says after a second. ‘What we think we remember cannot always be what actually happened.’
    ‘It happened,’ I