Maybe nothing was ever going to change. Maybe a handful of pills and some white walls weren't the answer after all. Maybe time didn't heal all pain. Maybe the answer was not Allenwood, maybe it never was.

Emily Thorne sat in front of a handheld mirror in her room, a course bristled brush scraping her scalp with each stroke. She felt dirty but no amount of scrubbing had ever made her feel clean. She had felt dirty ever since the mass murder that took place in her childhood home. She had no answers about that either. Hearing a knock on her door she glided over to the handle and let the man on the other side in. Forbidden fruit she called him in her head because even though they were of age and were consenting adults, this type of fraternizing was not allowed. Boys were not allowed in with the girls, but she made an exception for him.

He looked forlorn and she could see it around his eyes. He looked older than usual which immediately worried her.

"What's wrong?" she immediately asked, the words slipping from her lips faster than a seal greased in baby oil.

"Oh never you mind Ems," he purred as he sat in the empty cot across from her, the one yet to have sheets placed upon it.

"Nolan, really…" she coaxed.

"I was denied transfer," he finally admitted.

"Transfer to where?" she asked perking up and almost feeling a critical hit to the chest like the wind had been knocked out of her.

"Out of here," he said simply and somehow almost elegantly like a proper gentleman.

"Out of here then where?" she asked almost about to babble and spit up all over him.

"I want out of here, I've been in here too long and it's only making me more depressed," he complained.

"If you want to leave…"

She was cut off. "I don't want to leave but what other choices do I have? Like I want to leave you? Hell no little lady," he murmured.

"Why me?" she asked. "What makes me so special to you? I'm just some girl…"

"You're not just some girl Emily, you're my girl," he told her and she believed him.

She believed him, she finally trusted someone, the first time in years and he wanted a way out.

"You hardly know me," she retorted. "I won't be your girl for long," she replied.

His eyes lingered to the doorway, not knowing what to say next but when he did it was something beautiful.

"Come with me."

There was a long pause and they could practically hear the building shift as if it was alive beneath them.

"When I get permission granted to get outta here, my grand exit, leave with me. I can take care of, we can take care of each other," he proclaimed as if he was in the middle of some royal gesture.

"Nolan."

She was the logical one; she had to stay, didn't she? Her thought process was jumbled. Nothing was fixed. Maybe she had grown stronger with his help and support but when she thought of everything that had happened to her, the taste of copper in her mouth overwhelmed her.

She could remember every smell, every sound, every image, and every detail. As much as she remembered, she always wanted to forget.

That was not an option.

On a Tuesday an old friend named Mary Winston came to visit Nolan for a while, an allotted time. Mary had hair so yellow it was almost like cheap gold from a knock off vender. Mary had a mole above her lip that reminded him of Cindy Crawford. Mary had hips that could take a table out if she swung them the wrong way. Mary, turns out, was a bitch.

Nolan looked up from his corner desk where writing was not allowed. The little green detective lamp gave the room a glow that made him almost heated. Eyes turning up he noticed Mary in the frame of the doorway. Everyone who visited him during his days seemed to stand there before coming in as if they were asking for permission or deciding on whether or not he was stable enough for them to talk. There was a smile on her face but it didn't last long when she remembered why he had landed himself in here in the first place.

"Nolan, what have you gotten yourself into?" she asked with little concern.

"Way to make an introduction Mare," he said with a scoff.

"You have your family worried sick, your Aunt Carole is beside herself," she told him to which he already knew from her incessant phone calls.

"Don't I know it, and you? How are you holding up with my less than graceful departure?" he wondered.

She finally came in after lingering in the hallway. She found her ass comfortable on his bed as he sat on the metal chair that was clunky and loud when rearranged in the dormitory styled room that he did not share at the moment.

"Nolan, you definitely did not have a graceful departure, you tried to become a dearly departed. Nolan you tried to kill yourself," she said but he cut her off.

"Yes, we all know this story we can all tell it ourselves with gestures and details; what's your point?" he asked, not wanting to deal.

"Why kill yourself, because your parents didn't love you enough?" she asked thinking he was stupid.

"You have no right to judge, unless you're there Mary, you have nothing to say on the subject of suicide."

"Did you learn your lesson at least?"

There were so many life lessons to learn but only so much to give of yourself, how could you give 100 percent if you weren't sure there was still 100 percent of you left inside?

Spring had finally come around after a long snowy winter that left fingers cold to the bone and lips almost a shade of blue. Skin was no longer dry from the temperature inside of Allenwood and hot chocolate poured out from a box was no longer on the menu. It was not lemonade season and more of the people there would start wearing floral prints to match the blooming garden outside.

Nolan was feeling a bit better even though his plans to escape from Alcatraz were on hold, maybe it was the change in the season after all or the upped dosage on his medication. Nolan even wore brighter colors too, a pair of teal denim pants and a band t-shirt that made him look like an udderly beautiful cow mama. At Allenwood you didn't have to wear hospital clothes, it was available but not required.

The patients were brought outside to get fresh air and to pick dandelions, to make wishes that would probably never come true. They could wish on a falling star or a lucky penny, a wishing well or a four leaf clover but if they prayed for recovery, it was only going to happen to less than half of them. That was just statistics and fact.

When Emily spotted Nolan across the courtyard she was immediately drawn toward him like he was a glowing magnet. Walking toward him she thought of past conversations before opening that big mouth of hers.

Tucking hair behind her ear she hovered and lingered next to him for a few seconds before asking him a question, "So, Mary stop by for anymore visits?"

There was little else to talk about at this point.

"She has, here and there. I haven't told you because well, she's condescending and I'm too weak to tell her not to come here anymore and to kindly fuck off," he said.

"Do you want me to?" Emily asked, trying to be strong for him. Some people just couldn't do things on their own. They needed to get by with a little help from their friends.

"I need you to be my friend, not my press secretary, just sayin'…"

"Okay."

"Just like that, you aren't going to fight me on this?" he asked as he turned to view her in all her glory, the sunlight catching her face and making her cheekbones stick out like they had never before.

"Just like that," Emily proclaimed as she crossed her arms.

Looking into the sun till her eyes hurt she turned back to him, her whole body shifting to bring him closer.

"So I was thinking…"

"OH you do that?" Nolan asked with a sly little smile on his face.

Emily bumped him with her shoulder nice and hard. "Stop, I'm serious and usually I'm not so much with that. I, you were talking about getting out of here a while back…"

His heart raced for a second, a sudden overwhelming sense of paranoia but also anxiety twitching within him. "I was but that's in the past," he told her as his head suddenly felt itchy like lice had found a new home.

Emily leaned back onto her heels and a smile spread over her face like wildfire. "Well, now it doesn't have to be."