IGMS Issue 5 (8 page)

"Are they talking about me?" I pivoted the chair so I could face Eloy. "Is this place a hallucination? Are you a delusion?"

Eloy whuffled at my distress. "No, no. They speak of your sister, Luella. Her mind was always fragile, a weakness she inherited from your father. Your absence was the final blow to sunder an already fractured psyche."

"But Daddy's better."

"Yes. I did my best to ensure that."

I stood and the wall switched off. "That needs an explanation."

Burble-rumble. "Before I sent him home, I fixed the rifts in his self-esteem, giving him the perspective he needed to heal. In time, he recovered."

"You can do that? Wait, how much time? How long has it been?" Without sleep or meals to mark the days and only the constant lighting that never dimmed or brightened, I'd stopped thinking in hours and minutes. Surely, only a couple days, maybe a week had passed in these strange halls, but the white of Father's hair suggested much longer.

"The instrument you saw me with," Eloy said in a rush, "you called it a recorder. It is a tool I use to assist me with the game. It is what allowed me to allay your father's illness. Would you like me to teach you how to use it?"

"How long have I been here?"

"Do not be upset," he pleaded. "Time is different here --"

"How long?" I screamed.

He flinched. "Three years."

My knees buckled, and I floated to the floor. "Three. Years?" The floating was courtesy Eloy, who had caught me when my legs folded.

"Annabel, are you hurt?"

"I've been gone for three years?"

He propped me against the wall and kneeled beside me. "Do not hate me. Please do not hate me. Your father knows you are well. It was a small thing, to give him that reassurance. But I could not ease your sister. She didn't understand or believe him when he talked of me and this place. She worried that your father continued to suffer from delusion. He wonders that too sometimes, but then he looks upon the dress I gave you and is comforted."

"What about Luella? Can you make her better?"

"Do not ask this of me."

"Can you?"

There was such desolation in his eyes. "If I left to tend her, time would steal you away. You would be stranded here, and for each handful of moments I spent there, a decade would pass for you."

"That doesn't make sense. If time goes slower here, then --"

"It is very complicated, and I don't have your words to explain it. It comes to this: though my years are endless, yours are not. I would be gone longer than your life."

My head hurt. "You said you could teach me how to use the recorder. Can you show me how to heal Luella?"

"It is a simple matter --"

"Then let me go to her; let me heal her. I'll come back. The time doesn't matter to you."

"That I have infinite time does not make the passage of it easier," he said bleakly.

"Please, Eloy. Let me go."

"I do not think I can bear being alone again." He cupped my cheek with his hand. "But I cannot bear to be the cause of your unhappiness either." His hand slid to take mine, lying limp in my lap. He wrapped my fingers around the smooth barrel of the recorder, summoned magically from the air.

He lifted me in his arms, and the walls melted. When he put me down, we were in a forest grove. Before us was the tree trunk painted with graffiti. The painting was indeed a window, or rather a portal, and it opened onto the alley between the donut shop and the all-night laundromat.

Eloy nuzzled his chin on my cheek. "Take what you have learned in the rooms of my house. You are a creature of empathy and compassion, my Annabel. You should be with those you love, not a captive to my seclusion. Go to your sister and play for her. Be patient, for minds heal slowly, but she will mend."

"Eloy --" I tried to turn, but his hands on my shoulders wouldn't let me.

"Peace, sweet Annabel. My will is not so strong. Go now. Be with those you love. And if you should think of me, try to remember me fondly."

He gave me a gentle shove. I stepped forward, and I was in the alley. At my back, there was only the graffitied brick wall. I clutched the recorder in both hands and ran home.

My key was in my pocket where I had put it, days or years ago. It slid as easily into the apartment's lock as it ever had.

"Daddy! Daddy, I'm home!"

Father hurried in, open ledger in hand. "Annabel?" Papers fluttered to the floor. We came together in a crash of arms and laughter and tears.

"What happened? How did you get here? And what is that?"

"I don't have time to explain. I need to see Luella."

"She's in the hospital," Father said. "They have her in the psychiatric ward."

"I know. Eloy told me."

Father's forehead creased. "The doctor in that sanitarium you found me in, his name was Eloy." His eyes hardened. "But he wasn't a doctor, was he? He stole you away."

"He also helped you. Do you remember that?"

Father nodded, slowly. "Sometimes, when I'm about to fall asleep, or before I wake up, I remember music, a melody without words."

"It's from this recorder. I have to play it for Luella. Please, Daddy, can you take me to her?"

He was brimming with questions, but he reigned in his curiosity and called a taxi. At the hospital, we bypassed the elevators -- leaving me inexplicably relieved -- and tramped up the stairs. The psychiatric floor was dark, and it smelled of despair. The nurse at the reception desk raised her eyebrow at the hour, but then escorted us through a secured door.

This place was familiar and unfamiliar. The stark whiteness and the doors I knew, but the sounds of people, their movement and smells, that was alien. My disorientation intensified when I saw the room they had given Luella: 417.

My sister wasn't asleep. Her eyes were wide and darting as she lay in four-point restraints. She didn't react to us. The nurse left with a curt directive to press the buzzer when we wanted to go.

I crept to my sister. "Luella, honey, it's Annabel. I'm back."

Her eyes chased after shadows or visions I couldn't see.

"How long has she been like this?"

Father shook his head. "It's hard to say. She never truly recovered from having to move downtown, and there's a time in there that's all jumbled in my head. But she got to be in a pretty bad way, hearing things, convinced people were watching her through the cracks in the walls." He rubbed his eyes. "I tried to take care of her. She seemed almost lucid sometimes. I don't know how she got the knife. She attacked Ian, cut him before we could wrestle it away from her. She kept shrieking he was going to kidnap you."

"Who's Ian?"

"Sorry, Pumpkin. I forgot how long it's been. Ian is our landlady's son, the woman with purple hair, you remember? He'd taken to helping Luella when I was sick -- errands, the occasional fix-it job, that sort of thing. I'm pretty sure he wanted to ask her out."

"Is he okay?"

"He needed stitches, but he's fine now. He stopped coming around after that, of course."

I rubbed the recorder's satin finish. "When Luella's better, you'll see she gets out and meets people, won't you? Maybe even see if Ian will consider giving her another chance?"

"You say that like you won't be here."

I lifted the recorder to my mouth so I wouldn't have to answer. But then I didn't know what to do. How did I start? What if I did it wrong? I inhaled and thought of Eloy in the elevator, delighted by my glee. He'd called me a creature of empathy and compassion.

A steady note filled the room, my breath transformed into sound. A melody began, grave and thoughtful. It reminded me of Luella as a little girl, always serious and so afraid of getting into trouble. But as her sister, I had also been privy to her mischievous side. The tune turned lilting and joyous. When we were little, the world had not been a place of demons and sorrow, but one of wonder, to explore unshackled by phantom terrors. They were such absurd things, her fears, monsters out of proportion to any reality. Wouldn't it be better if they could be put aside like ill-fitting garments she had outgrown?

When the music was done -- I knew when, somehow -- I set the recorder aside. Luella slept. It was a tranquil slumber, without dreams, without grief. Eloy had said minds heal slowly, but swiftness didn't matter. That she would get better was the important thing. And she would, for I'd given her the clarity and serenity she needed to find her way.

Slumped in a chair, Father slept too, a smile curving his lips.

I should buzz for the nurse and go. Eloy was waiting for me. How much time had passed for him, alone in that place of endless rooms? My heart ached, thinking of him drifting among the scenes of his people, reminded of the comfort of family and the camaraderie of friends, and never able to be part of it. But I was so tired. After all, I hadn't slept in three years.

I dreamed. I had the certainty sleepers get when they're trapped in the landscapes of slumber. In my dream, I ran along a white corridor, calling for Eloy and crying. He was in room 417, but I couldn't find it. I threw open doors, and inside each room, a blanket of dust covered solitary chairs -- bar stools, futons, hammocks, benches.

When I came to the last door in the long hall, it was clearly numbered, 417. Inside, Eloy curled around the recliner from Father's den. His beautiful eyes were closed, and he was still as death.

"Annabel?" Father jostled my shoulder. "Annabel, wake up." The concern in his voice swept away the haze of sleep.

"What is it?" I mumbled.

"You were crying in your sleep."

I jolted awake. "What time is it? How long did I sleep?"

Father checked his watch. "It's a little after five a.m. What's the matter?"

I jammed my finger on the call buzzer and held it down.

"I fell asleep!" I wailed. "And he's waiting for me all alone! It's years and years for him. Oh, God, why did I let myself sleep?"

Father pulled me from the buzzer. "Pumpkin, this Eloy makes you happy?"

I stared, wild-eyed. "Yes."

"Then run to him. As fast as you can." He took out his wallet and dumped bills into my hand. "For the taxi."

I hugged him. "I love you, Daddy."

"I love you too, Pumpkin."

At last, the nurse came, grumpy and cross. She unlocked the gate, and I bolted down the stairs and out into the emergency admittance bay. There was a cab in the circle drive, depositing an old man in a wheelchair and his fretful wife. I all but shoved them aside.

I rattled off the address and waved my handful of cash at the driver. "You can have it all if you hurry."

He stomped the gas pedal, and we careened away. Thankfully, because of the hour, traffic was light. The driver, my wonderful, reckless cabbie, ran stoplights and took corners at full speed. When he turned the wrong way down a one-way street, I sank my fingernails into the upholstery, but I never considered telling him to slow down. I chanted under my breath for him to hurry, please, please hurry.

He braked so hard I was hurled against the back of his seat. Bruised and stunned, I recognized the donut shop out the window, and beside it, the brightly lit, all-night laundromat. I shoved money at the cabbie and scrambled out. Stumbling like a drunk, I ran to the graffiti-portal.

I lunged for it.

Pain stabbed through my arm and shoulder, and the world went twisty and sick. I lay on my back in the alley, head throbbing, pain filling my temples and rolling down my skull. Had I broken something? I groaned and levered myself to my knees. With my good arm, I reached for the portal. Except it wasn't a portal; it was hard bricks and paint.

"Eloy!" I pounded my fist on the wall. "Eloy, I can't get in!"

Far away, someone shouted at me to shut up.

Pain coursed through my arm, and I cradled it. "Think, Annabel. Calm down and think!" The antique ring on my finger gleamed in the grey predawn, and I knew what I needed.

I rushed to the apartment, each footstep like a hammer to my skull. Out of breath and with a stitch like a searing needle, I burst in. I ricocheted off the wall -- had I concussed myself? -- on the way to the bedroom and wrenched open the closet. I flung aside blouses, skirts, and pants until my fingers closed over the sleek coolness of silk, the rose-colored evening gown Eloy had given me.