Surplus

I drummed my fingers nervously on the dashboard, waiting for a police car to set out that morning to patrol the abandoned, yet manicured hospital grounds. We had been sitting in the car just off campus for about 5 minutes, and each second felt like an eternity, especially in a vehicle with out of state plates in a small town. I wanted to scope the place out a bit to see what the routine was, but no officials were in sight... one could almost think this place was not being surveilled, but I most definitely knew better.

With the chances of being noticed increasing every minute, we decided to just go for it; the excursion relied mostly on luck, which left a bad taste in my mouth. After a long, shameful walk across vast expanses of lawn, not only were we unseen, but managed to find a way inside a large building on campus through one of the many nooks and crannies often overlooked by maintenance crews. Luck was on our side this day.

We had managed to get into some kind of storage building, with just about every room packed full of equipment from the state's mental health and developmental agencies. Some of the furniture looked pretty new and ready to be placed back in service, while others were rusty, antiquated items from psychiatric yesteryear, including some old commitment papers and other devices that have become rather controversial these days.