It was the coldest Halloween I remembered. At that point I was 24, 25? Not a long memory, sad to say. Trick or Treaters bundled up in heavy coats against the cold, and the campus parties were going to be rowdy. As a grad student with clinical hours to complete I wouldn't be out chasing undergrads, so the cold weather was a good karmic payback to all the guys I RA'd for mocking me. They'd be drinking in their dorms wishing they could see some skin, and I'd be here...

Last Ditch. Aka The Lara Dirch House. Named for the Dirch family heiress that decided to start collecting orphans like 19th century Pokémon, and needed a place to shove them. The kids who had passed through gave us our nickname on account that we were the final stop before juvie or a psych placement for most of our clients. Even so, I liked it. Last ditch effort, make it count kids.

Yellow Jim was working dinner and showers, so I knew I had time to burn one before settling in for night shift. 15 minute rounds, making sure no one was bed-hopping or had snuck a length or rope or something sharp to put themselves out of their misery. The Ditch wasn't my worst placement during my licensing, but it was rough on the kids. A lot of them had been through serious shit to get them there. Mental health crises, runaways, criminal cases, sometimes all three.

Then there were the hard calls. They came in smelling of smoke and blood, patched up in the County ER. Dad got drunk and decided to paint the apartment with Mom, or their older brother treated them like a punching bag for not being a good sibling and letting him have what he wanted. They all had that glassy sedated stare as we filed them away. These weren't frequent flyers; Hell, half the time they were great kids, straight As and all that. The world just broke under their feet that day, and here we were.

"You got anything left in that bat?" Jim asked, a tone that really meant why are you getting stoned on property. Jim was clean and sober, but nobody told his liver he was out of the game. He got the Yellow nickname from his eyes, always jaundiced, his skin that sickly near green cast you get in end stage failure. "I got some drops in the office, spray yourself down. We got an intake coming in hot in 30."

Shit. Shit shit shit. What little buzz I got from the crap I confiscated off a freshman left me as I rushed into the staff bathroom, washing my face and brushing my teeth with the cheap throwaways we kept for kids whose parents didn't have money or care to send one with them. Two blasts of Visine and some gum made me look tired rather than high, and I sat down to take review just as Nancy walked in.

She was pretty. I don't mean that in a weird way, she was just a pretty kid. The kind boys chased after and thought about as the Girl Next Door. Clear skin, tall, a tomboy haircut, an ugly duckling who just came into her swandom. Sixteen on Halloween, and sitting out her birthday in the loving embrace of Dirch House. Tony brought her in, and the old cop's eyes told me this one was bad before we even got her settled into the tank to await intake.

"Damn place was a bloodbath Jimmy." Tony was the only guy I know who had the seniority to call Yellow Jim Jimmy around here. "Her sister, mother, two little brothers..." the old man. Heh. Old man. Tony couldn't be much older than I am now, and 50 is the new 30. "Whatever happened, it was bad. They found the littlest's head... it was bad Jimmy."

Jim put a hand on Tony's shoulder as the beat cop wept into his hat. Those Yellow eyes stared a hole in my chest, telling me to get in and check on the girl, and I bolted out of there as fast as toxic masculinity could carry me. It was the 90s, and I wasn't exactly touchy feely when it came to male emotions.

Nancy was holding herself in what I came to know as the EF post. Everything's fu... well, you know. Her knees were to her chin, arms wrapped around them, her fingers idly picking at the hospital scrub pants she was wearing. If she was in scrubs they had to take her clothes. I don't know if you've ever been unfortunate enough to be stripped in a vulnerable moment, but it hurts. Our clothes are like our armor to the world, and the oversized City Hospital shirt and scrubs were salt laid on an open wound. I treated my new intake like any case, giving her a wide berth and flopping into the leather chair behind our desk. I checked the file Tony had sat beside him and dug in looking for a wedge.

"So, Nancy. You go to Clairmont? My roommate in college went to Clairmont, class of 89. Good guy, you were the Cardinals right?"

She pulled her head out of the EF and stared at me. There was no glassy sheen of comforting medication behind those eyes. She was stone sober, pillar to post. Her life was crashing down around her and I was the idiot who was half-buzzed trying to make it better.

I filled out the intake forms in uneasy silence, Nancy not responding to me at all. I'd glance up at her every once in awhile, as silence was louder than screams when it came to dangerous things with a traumatized teenager. I was looking at her when the window creaked, and Nancy let out a loud scream.