Chapter 64: Chapter 64: The list of withdrawals

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Chapter 64: The list of withdrawals

Mrs. Hargrove raised her hand one last time, and the room’s lingering noise died away completely.

“Good evening, children,” she said, her voice carrying effortlessly to the farthest tables. “Now it is time for the selections. Dr. Grimsdyke will read out the names.”

She stepped back, letting the man take center stage. Grimsdyke pulled a sheet of paper folded into quarters from the pocket of his lab coat, unfolded it with slow movements of his pudgy fingers, and began to read.

His voice was low, almost monotonous; every name was pronounced with the exact same cadence as the last no pauses, no inflections betraying any interest in the person being called. Children stood up one by one as they heard their names, rising from tables scattered across the hall none of those names belonged to Room 290.

Kairan counted involuntarily, following the rhythm just as he had learned to count an opponent’s footsteps in a dark corridor. Thirty. Thirty-five. Thirty-eight.

At the fortieth name, Grimsdyke said, “Kairan.”

He didn’t look up from the paper as he said it. His voice remained exactly the same as before, devoid of any particular emphasis.

At his own table, seven heads turned toward him in unison a movement no one had coordinated, yet one that happened as a single, unified action. No other name from Room 290 had been called.

“Just you,” Peter said, his voice lower than usual.

Gregory turned to look at the other tables, as if seeking confirmation that this was truly the case that no one else from their room was among the fifty. “Just you,” he repeated, unsure of what to make of the discovery.

Amara placed her hand over his, her fingers gently tightening around his own. “Relax,” she said softly, her eyes seeking his. “Okay?”

Kairan nodded.

Amara leaned in and planted a quick kiss on his cheek a gesture that seemed more like an attempt to keep him there for a second longer than a genuine public display.

Grimsdyke went on reading. The list continued ten more names following the same rhythm until the fiftieth, when the man folded the sheet and tucked it back into the pocket of his coat.

“Those I’ve called, follow me,” he said, turning away without waiting for confirmation and heading toward a side corridor Kairan hadn’t yet seen that day.

The fifty of them rose as a group faces from all over the room, none of whom Kairan truly recognized forming an uneven line that moved behind Grimsdyke. Kairan stood up with them, still feeling the spot on his cheek where Amara had kissed him; for a moment, he caught Peter’s eye, and Peter gave him a nod no words, just a gesture that conveyed meaning without needing to be spoken.

Grimsdyke slowed his pace as Kairan approached the front of the line, as if he had been waiting for him specifically. When Kairan reached him, the man stopped completely, his dark eyes traveling over him with the same deliberate slowness they had used to scan the entire room moments earlier.

“A pleasure,” he said, his voice remaining flat even in what seemed an attempt at friendliness. “Kairan. You’re the new boy.” A pause; his eyes lingered longer than necessary. “You have beautiful eyes.”

Kairan looked at him for just a moment. He didn’t reply. He didn’t look away hastily, but neither did he hold the gaze longer than necessary he treated it with the same controlled indifference he had shown Griselda that morning: an acknowledgment of presence without the concession of a reaction.

He walked straight ahead, passing Grimsdyke and joining the rest of the line moving along the corridor.

That was when he recognized the door.

It was the same one he had noticed on his first night at the far end of the main hallway the one with the latch on the outside. The very door regarding which Mrs. Hargrove had told him, in that voice devoid of any concession, that it was none of his business, that one shouldn’t go near it, and that questions weren’t asked.

Now the latch was undone, the door stood ajar, and inside one could glimpse a light different from that of the rest of the orphanage whiter, colder, the kind of light Kairan hadn’t encountered in any other room.

Grimsdyke went in first and, one by one, began calling the children inside.

Kairan remained in line, surrounded by unfamiliar faces, watching. Each child would enter, stay inside for a duration that varied shorter or longer depending on the individual and emerge with a white bandage wrapped tightly around their arm, just above the elbow, before walking toward the common room without stopping to speak to those still waiting.

Time dragged on. The line grew shorter, child by child; the names Grimsdyke called out from inside the room reached him muffled through the ajar door names Kairan had never heard, faces he had never crossed paths with before that evening everyone who walked past him without a glance, too caught up in their own relief to notice the new boy standing at the end of the line.

The line emptied out all around him, one by one, until only Kairan remained, standing before the ajar door with white light spilling from within and the now-empty corridor behind him.

From inside the room came Grimsdyke’s voice slow as ever, devoid of any haste.

“Kairan.”