THE PATIENT IN ROOM 13
THE BURIAL
Friday, October 20th – 9:00 AM
The cemetery was on a hill overlooking the hospital, a small plot of land that had been used for patient burials since the sanitarium days. The headstones were old, many of them unreadable, their inscriptions worn smooth by weather and time. Some of the graves had no markers at all — just bare earth and the memory of bodies placed in the ground.
Sloane stood at the edge of the cemetery, a list of names in her hand. The families of the forgotten had begun to arrive. Margaret Holloway stood with her daughter Greta, their arms around each other, their faces wet with tears. Vincent Cross sat in a wheelchair, his sister Elaine beside him, her hand on his shoulder. Iris Delaney stood alone, her arms wrapped around herself, her eyes fixed on the grave diggers preparing the earth.
There were others. Dozens of them. Families who had been told their loved ones were dead. Families who had buried empty caskets. Families who had spent years grieving for people who were still alive.
Today, they would grieve again.
But this time, they would grieve for the truth.
Sloane walked to the center of the cemetery.
The voices in her head were quiet, respectful.
“They deserve this,” Marian said. “The families. The forgotten. The dead. They deserve to be remembered.”
“They will be.”
“How?”
“By the stones. By the names. By the stories we tell.”
Sloane turned to face the crowd.
“Thank you for coming,” she said.
Her voice carried across the cemetery, amplified by the cold morning air.
“I know this is difficult. I know many of you are angry. Confused. Hurt. You have been lied to for years. Decades. Your loved ones were taken from you without your knowledge or consent. Their names were erased. Their memories were buried.”
She paused.
“But today, we begin to set things right. Today, we remember.”
The crowd was silent.
“We have identified the bodies in the hospital’s cold storage room. They will be buried here, in this cemetery, with proper markers and proper ceremonies. Their names will be carved into stone. Their stories will be told. They will not be forgotten.”
Margaret Holloway stepped forward.
“My daughter was not dead,” she said. “She was alive. In that hospital. For twenty years. And no one told me.”
“Mrs. Holloway, I understand—”
“You don’t understand. You can’t understand. You didn’t bury an empty casket. You didn’t visit a grave that didn’t have your child’s body in it.”
Sloane looked at Margaret.
“You’re right. I don’t understand. Not fully. But I am trying. I am trying to give you back what was taken. I am trying to make amends.”
Margaret’s face crumpled.
She turned to Greta.
Her daughter held her.
The crowd watched in silence.
The first burial was for Arthur Vance.
Sloane had requested it. Not because he was her father, but because he was the first. The first doctor to try to stop the Watcher. The first to sacrifice himself for his patients. The first to be forgotten.
The grave was at the edge of the cemetery, near a grove of old oak trees. The headstone was simple, a slab of gray granite with his name and the dates of his birth and death.
“Arthur Vance. 1948–1982. Beloved Father. Remembered.”
Sloane stood at the grave, a handful of dirt in her hand.
The voices in her head were singing.
Not words. A melody. Soft and sad and beautiful. The song of the forgotten. The song of the remembered.
She scattered the dirt over the casket.
“Goodbye, Dad.”
The crowd dispersed.
The grave diggers finished their work.
Sloane stood alone at her father’s grave for a long time.
She visited the other graves throughout the day.
The bodies had been identified using dental records and DNA samples. Some of the families had come to claim their loved ones. Others had sent letters, unable to face the reality of what had happened.
Sloane did not judge them.
Grief was a journey. Everyone traveled at their own pace.
She knelt at each grave, said a silent prayer, and moved on.
By the time the sun set, she was exhausted.
The cemetery was empty.
The grave diggers had gone home.
The families had returned to their hotels and their homes.
Sloane sat on a bench near the entrance, her hands folded in her lap.
“You did it,” Marian said. “You remembered them.”
“We remembered them. The voices. The tree. The Watcher. We all remembered.”
“What happens now?”
“Now we heal. The families. The patients. The hospital. The world.”
“Can the world heal?”
“It can try.”
Sloane stood up.
She walked to her car.
She drove away.