For nearly a week, the screams came at the same hour.
The orderly worked late shifts on the geriatric wing, a place usually wrapped in fragile quiet once evening medications were handed out and the lights dimmed. Wheelchairs stopped rolling. Televisions went dark. The air smelled of disinfectant, old linen, and a faint trace of antiseptic soap. Peace reigned—or so she thought—until the screams began.
They didn’t echo down the hall. They weren’t sharp or sudden. They were muted, strangled, like someone was trying not to be heard. And they always came from the same room: Room 7.
At first, she assumed confusion. Elderly patients sometimes cried out, nightmares tangling with memory. She paused by the door, mop in hand, listening for a moment, then shook it off when the sounds faded.
But night after night, the pattern repeated.
By the fourth evening, she couldn’t ignore it anymore.
The patient in Room 7 was an eighty-two-year-old woman recovering from a fractured hip. Polite to the point of apology, grateful for every glass of water, every small adjustment of her blanket. She never raised her voice, never complained, never caused trouble. But recently, the orderly had noticed small changes that didn’t make sense.
The woman flinched when doors opened. Her hands trembled at the lightest touch. She avoided eye contact, fixing her gaze on the floor or the edge of her bed. Once, while helping her wash up, the orderly spotted bruising along the inside of her arm—finger-shaped, fresh, impossible to ignore.
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