He pointed at the door on the right and said to the guard, “May I see my father, please?” The guard smiled and rose from his chair. “Of course, Henry.” Hesitantly, he entered and began his trek through the winding halls toward his father’s room. He had already been feeling a little queasy by the thought of the upcoming conversation he needed to have with him, so the fact that last decade’s mayor began pounding relentlessly on his own door as Henry passed only worsened the jitters. The doors to the individual rooms for each of the societal figures were locked with a special keypad and thumbprint scanner. Studies had shown that where the cells had most resembled rooms of the patients’ homes, they were more at ease and had far less episodes. For this reason, these rooms all had doors, unlike the barred cells of the west wing and the Plexiglas barriers in “The Alley.” Equal opportunity was not a common conviction of most in town.
