Spin (16 page)

Oh crap.

“They know Amber’s not in bed, and they’re coming this way.”

Connor springs into action. “Amber, try to clear the smoke. OK, let me think. We’ll stay here, but you two need to get.”

Amber picks up the towel and begins waving it vigorously.

“Connor, I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Henry says.

“We’ll be all right. But she’ll get kicked out if she’s caught.” He points at me and gives Henry a meaningful look.

“Henry, he’s right,” I say. “Amber’s been able to get away with all kinds of things that I never would . . .”

There’s another noise in the hall, closer this time.

I grab Henry’s arm. “Let’s go, Henry.”

A frustrated noise escapes his throat, and we move together toward the French doors. I try the door but it’s locked. Henry pulls his wallet from his pocket and slides a credit card between the door and the frame. He wiggles it in an experienced way and the lock gives.

“Quickly!”

He pulls me outside and along the building so we’re a few feet away from the door. I’m sweating with fear and the cool breeze sends a chill down my spine.

“Shh,” Henry says. “Your teeth are chattering.”

I clench my jaw shut. Henry wraps his arms around me, pressing my face into his chest. He rests his chin on my head and places his hands loosely on my waist. I can smell his expensive, spicy aftershave and the same soap I’ve been using.

“Quiet on the set!” Connor hisses loudly.

The door to the game room opens. Someone flicks the light switch, and light falls out the French doors, illuminating the ground next to us.

“Amber, Connor, what are you two doing out of bed?” Carol says.

“Fuck,” Henry says so quietly I can barely hear him. “Come on, Amber.”

“I’m sorry,” Amber says in her best
The Girl Next Door
voice. “I was having some really bad cravings, and I needed a cigarette. I thought it was better to smoke in here than in my room.”

“Mmm . . . and what about you, Connor?”

“What can I say,” he drawls. “Great minds think alike.”

I can imagine Connor’s charismatic smile spreading across his face.

“We had some things we needed to talk about,” Amber says. “I asked him to meet me.”

“You know that’s not allowed, Amber.”

“Please don’t tell on us.”

“I’m sorry, but I have to report this. And you’ve both lost your outside privileges for two days.”

“Car-ol
 . . .”

“Enough, Amber. Get back to bed immediately.”

They shuffle away from the door, and for a moment, I think we might be safe.

“Carol, someone tripped the alarm,” a man says.

Uh-oh.

“Amber, Connor, did you go outside?”

“I opened the French door,” Amber says faintly. “To let the smoke out.”

“John, can you make sure these two get back to their rooms? I’ll take care of it.”

Henry grinds his teeth together into the top of my head. “We are so fucked,” he whispers.

I can hear Carol walk across the room. Henry pulls me deeper into the shadows, closer to his chest.

“However . . . ?” Carol mutters, then shuts the door firmly. We both start at the sound of the lock clicking shut. Her retreating footsteps echo faintly. The light snaps shut and we’re left in darkness.

We stand there for what feels like a very long time, breathing in and out, waiting. My breathing falls into a rhythm with Henry’s. We breathe well together.

“So, what do we do now?” I say eventually.

“I’m guessing they’ve put the alarm back on, so it looks like we’re stuck out here until morning.”

Shit, I was afraid of that.

He loosens his arms and I step away from him. I hug myself to keep out the cold.

A sweater seems like a better idea than makeup at this juncture.

“We can’t stay out here that long.”

He gives me a reassuring smile. “’Course we can.” He shows me the face of his watch. The glow-in-the-dark dial says it’s 2:12. “It’ll be light in a couple of hours.”

“But what if someone sees us?”

“We should probably go to the woods. There’ll be less chance of us getting caught there.”

“Right, good point.”

I follow him away from the building, my flip-flops slapping softly. It’s extremely dark under the trees and it’s difficult to pick out the path. I’ve always found woods at night particularly creepy. Every crackle sounds like the pad of a hungry bear. I try to raise my feet high as I step like my dad taught me when I was little, but I trip and stub my toe on a large root.

Henry catches me before I hit the path and sets me right, his strong hands holding my forearms tightly.

“Thanks.”

“No problem.” He releases me. “Maybe we should stop here. I doubt anyone will find us.”

And if they do, at least I’ll be able to tell Bob I got kicked out in pursuit of his two favorite targets.

Henry sits on the ground against a large rock. His white legs and arms are the most visible thing about him, and I notice that he’s wearing shorts and a T-shirt.

“Are you cold?”

“A little. Will you sit here?”

I can’t see where he’s indicating, but I know what he means. It seems like a bad idea, but what other options do we have? Hypothermia or huddling together for warmth. The choice seems obvious.

I sit down in front of him and scoot backward. He bends his legs so his feet are flat on the ground, making a little cage around me. We’re both shivering.

He slips his arms around my waist. I lean my head against his chest. I can hear his heart thudding.

“So, is tonight making your career-change decision any easier?”

He sighs. “Tonight is just one of the many things in my life that isn’t quite right.”

“What? Cuddling in the woods with a strange girl you met in rehab while trying to avoid detection isn’t what you wanted to do when you grew up?”

“Cuddling in the woods, yes. Hiding from the authorities in rehab, no.”

One out of two ain’t bad.

Chapter 16

Technical Difficulties

I
wake up in Henry’s arms at dawn.

Moments before, I was dreaming. Something about escaping from a mental institution with James Bond. Only this Bond has red hair above his black tux. He still likes martinis, though, and I flirt with him outrageously to get one. It’s dry and feels like fire as it slides down my throat. When it’s gone, I feel warm and bold. I throw my arms around his neck and press my mouth to his.

“You taste like cigarettes,” he says.

My eyes flash open. I can see the reddish-blond hairs on Henry’s arm. “What?”

“I said, we smell like cigarettes.”

“Oh . . . right.” I push myself gently away from him and stand stiffly. My mouth tastes like three olives, straight up.

Christ almighty. If I have to have user-dreams, couldn’t they at least come with a breath mint?

“What time is it?”

Henry checks at his watch. He looks tired. “Just before six. We should get back.”

“How are we going to get into the lodge?”

“They unlock the doors around now.”

I brush twigs and dirt from my backside. “How the hell do you know that?”

“I tend to wake up pretty early.”

“Come to think of it . . . how did you know how to use your credit card like that? And how come you know when bed checks are?”

He smiles. “I picked up the credit card trick as a teenager, and as for the rest of it, well . . . I have an awful lot of time on my hands in here, so I’ve been tracking the staff for fun.”

“For fun, or so Connor can meet up with Amber?”

His smile drops. “You sure call me on my bullshit, don’t you?”

There you go again. Always saying just the right thing to make sure you’re alone.

“I’m sorry, Henry, I don’t know why I do that.”

“It’s OK, you’re right. I’m the perfect little enabler. Shit, I just slept in the woods to prove it.”

“I thought you were out here to keep me from getting kicked out.”

“Maybe I am.” He brushes his hand across my cheek. I think for a second that he might kiss me, but then the moment passes.

“You go first,” he says. “I’ll follow you when the coast is clear.”

“All right. Thanks.”

“For what?”

I don’t really know, so I shrug and walk away.

A
fter a nap and a shower, I take out my iTouch to send Bob my daily update. Only this time, when I hit the little icon that’s supposed to connect me to the Internet, nothing happens. I notice I’m not connected to the network, so I use the steps I memorized nineteen days ago to locate the Oasis’s network. It prompts me for a password. I type in the word “catalyst.”
Invalid password
says the screen. I type it in again, more slowly this time, watching each letter turn into an asterisk.
Invalid password.

I feel a clutch of panic. They must’ve changed the password. What the fuck am I supposed to do now? There’s no way Bob can last twelve more days without his daily fix of The Rehab Lives of Camber. This is an emergency.

Right. It is. Good. Wishes-he-was-a-field-officer-running-CIA-agents Bob has a plan for emergencies.

I check the “Notes” section of my iTouch and there it is, a little note called
In case of emergency.
I open it. It contains a ten-digit phone number. Perfect. Just perfect.

I spend lunch (which I’m happy, for once, to eat alone) trying to figure out how to call the number. The obvious route is to use one of the pay phones on the wall outside the cafeteria. We’re allowed to use the phone for ten minutes a week, using tokens that last five minutes each.

But the phones are in the most public part of the lodge. Patients, staff, doctors, Saundra—everyone walks by those phones all the time. It’s impossible to have a private conversation, which is probably the point of their location. Like the one phone in the house when I was growing up, which my parents put in the kitchen. No kid would be stupid enough to plan a wild night of drinking within earshot of their mother, right? Hah!

Fuck. I wish I could pull a Matthew Broderick in
War Games
and get myself sent to the principal’s office. Then, while he was distracted, I could sneak his desk drawer open and steal the new password. What could go wrong?

“Can I get your attention, everyone?” Carol says from the front of the cafeteria. “Now, as you all know, Gerry and Keith are leaving us today . . .”

She gives her usual spiel about The Lawyer and The Producer’s departure, winding her way toward the group singalong . . . Hold on a sec. This is good. In about thirty seconds, everyone in here is going to be singing their lungs out for about three minutes. The perfect diversion.

I stand up and walk briskly from the room, ignoring Saundra’s look of disapproval. I’m sure I’ll hear about my lack of connection to the other patients in my next session. Again.

I pull my two tokens from my pocket and thrust them into the phone, then punch in Bob’s number, my heart in my throat.

The phone rings three times, then, “This better be an emergency.”

“It is.”

“Has she left?”

“No.”

“Are you in a secure location?”

“No.”

“Can you give me a hint?”

I cup my hand around the receiver. “Password.”

I hear a hand slam into a desk.
Whack!
“Damn it! I was worried about that. How much time have you got?”

“Not long.”

“What’s that godawful noise?”

“It’s singing.”

“What the fuck?”

“Don’t ask.”

There’s silence on the other end of the line. I think I can hear his slightly wheezy breathing, but it’s hard to tell over the really bad singing.

“You still there, Bob?”

“Don’t use my name.”

“Sorry.”

“OK. We can get the new password. Can I call you there?”

“No.”

“Can you call me again?”

“Not for a week.”

“Fuck. Any thoughts on how to get it to you?”

Like I’m not doing enough already.

I wrack my brain. “Send me a care package.”

“Don’t they check those?”

“Sure, but only for the obvious.”

He clucks his tongue three times. “Yeah, OK, I don’t see a better alternative. Do you have a friend you trust?”

“Why?”

“So she can send it. It can’t come from here.”

Right. That would be bad. But who the hell can I trust with something like this?

“I’ll see if I can get my friend Greer to call you.”

“Tell her the minimum.”

“Of course.”

The phone clicks and my ear is filled with the sound of a dial tone. So pleasant to talk to you, Bob, as always.

The singing in the cafeteria stops as I hang up the phone. What the fuck did I just agree to? Even assuming I can get my hands on some more tokens, there won’t be another singing diversion until Mary leaves in three days. There’s no way I can explain myself to Greer on these extremely public phones.

“Who’s Bob?” Amber asks behind me.

I start in surprise and my already racing heart finds an extra gear. I turn toward her curious face. “Jesus Christ, you scared the life out of me.”

She grins. “Sorry, but you looked so secretive, I couldn’t help it.”

What do you say when the F-word doesn’t cover it? Because right now, all my head is making is white noise.

“Nn . . . no secret.” I clear my throat. “It was just someone from work.”

“Are you in trouble?”

“Sort of.”

She scrunches her face. “Tell me about it. I’m supposed to be filming a remake of
Rebecca
right now.”

“Sucky. Anyway . . .”

I turn away from her to try to make my escape. I need a couple of hours in a rubber room to calm the fuck down.

She grabs my arm. “Oh no you don’t, Missy.”

Make that several days.

“What?”

“No way I’m letting you get away before I hear all about,” she leans toward me and lowers her voice. “Your night in the woods with E.”

Endorphins rush through my body and I work hard to suppress a hysterical laugh. She just wants to gossip. In the good, between-girlfriends way.

I give her what I hope is a coy smile. “Not here. Come by my room after group, OK?”

She winks at me. “Got it. I want full details, though.”

Don’t we all.

A
n hour later, I’ve got a new plan and a new rush of adrenaline coursing through my veins. I feel like I did when I was flying through the air on Trust Day: terrified and exhilarated.

I’m walking through the flower gardens looking for Zack. Really. Actually seeking him out rather than hiding from him. Is that progress? Only time will tell.

I find him where the edge of the lawn meets the woods, shoveling fertilizer onto a big patch of lilies that haven’t bloomed yet. His arms are muscular and tanned. His eyes are shaded by a pair of Oakleys.

“Hey, Zack.”

He lowers the shovel and rests his arm on it like it’s a crutch. “Hey, yourself. Haven’t seen you around much lately.”

“I’ve been . . . busy.”

“Sure enough.”

I lace my hands together. My palms are slick with sweat. “Do you think you could do me a favor?”

“I don’t know. Depends.”

“Could I borrow your cell phone?”

He pushes his shades up onto his forehead. His eyes look cautious. “What for?”

“I need to make a private phone call, and that’s kind of hard on the pay phones inside. It’s not for anything bad. I mean, I’m not ordering drugs or anything like that.”

“Gee, I don’t know, Katie. We’re not really supposed to do stuff like that.”

“I know. Forget I asked, OK?” I lower my head and kick my foot at the ground in the way I remember doing back when I could get Zack to do whatever I wanted.

I’m actually sad to say, it still works like a charm.

He sighs. “It’s really not for anything you shouldn’t be doing?”

I keep my head down. Lying is easier this way. “I promise.”

“I guess that’s all right then.”

I look up at him, smiling brightly. “Thank you, Zack, you’re a lifesaver.”

He doesn’t look so sure, but he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his cell phone.

“I’ll be back in a sec.”

I walk the phone far enough away so he can’t overhear my conversation and lean against a tree, hiding myself from the lodge. I dial Greer’s number, praying she’ll pick up. Instead, I get her voice mail.

“This is Greer. Make it short.”

Fuck. Well, here goes nothing.

“Hey, Greer, it’s Katie. Thanks again for visiting me the other day, that was awesome. Anyway, I, um, need a favor. I know this is going to sound weird, but it would really help me out if you could call this guy. His name is Bob. He needs to send me something here, but for reasons I can’t get into, he can’t send it to me directly.”

I pause. That totally sounded like I’m asking her to make a drug-connect. Shit.

“OK, that came out kind of wrong. It’s something for work, not drug or alcohol related, I swear. And I’ll explain it all to you when I get home. For now, I’d just really, really appreciate it if you could call Bob and do what he asks without asking any questions. I totally get it if you don’t want to, but if you don’t, please just call Bob anyway and let him know, either way. Anyway, sorry for the long message. Bye.”

I hang up the phone, shaking my head in disbelief. This was such a stupid fucking plan. No way Greer’s going to call Bob, particularly not after that message. Shit, she’s probably never going to call me again.

Plus, you didn’t even give her Bob’s number.

Motherfucker.

I check the time on the phone. It’s 2:50. I need to be in group in ten minutes. I look over my shoulder to where Zack is halfheartedly moving the earth around the flower bed while watching me. I signal to him that I’ll be a minute.

I hit redial.

“Hey, Greer, me again. Crazy Katie. I forgot to give you Bob’s phone number.” I recite it. “Anyway, you would really be doing me a huge favor if you called him, so . . . OK, I’m hanging up now.”

Oh, well done. Now you’ve just guaranteed that she’s not going to call him.

Will you fuck off, I’m under enough stress here.

I click the phone shut and cup it in my palm as I walk back to Zack. He takes it from me and slips it back into his pocket quickly like I’ve just passed him some little packages filled with dope.

“Thanks, Zack. I really appreciate it.”

He nods. “You doing all right?”

I try to smile. “Some days are better than others.”

“No, I meant . . . you look pale and you’re sweating. Are you sick?”

I wipe my arm across my forehead. I feel like I’m burning up. “I don’t know. Maybe. Anyway, I have to get to group.”

“Sure. See you around.”

I start to walk away, but something stops me. I turn back.

“Zack?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks. And . . . I’m sorry.”

He frowns. “What for?”

“For leaving. For all of it.”

“That was a long time ago, Katie.”

“I know. I’m sorry for that too.”

He gives me a half smile, his hands stuffed in his pockets. Eighteen-year-old Zack isn’t far from the surface.

“Goodbye, Zack.”

“Bye, Katie. Don’t be a stranger.”

“I won’t.”

T
wo days later, there’s a package waiting for me in my room when I return from breakfast. The packing-tape seal has been broken, and there’s a “cleared” stamp on it in red ink. Inside, there’s an envelope above several items wrapped loosely in newspaper. I pull out the card first. It has a stick figure drawn on the cover with a balloon coming out of its mouth.
So, you’re in rehab. What’s a girl to do?
I open the card. The stick figure is sitting in a lounge chair, reading a book and smoking a cigarette. Its hand is reaching into a box of candy. The caption above it says:
Smoke, eat, and read trashy novels. Love, Greer.

I unwrap the newspaper packages, unveiling a carton of cigarettes, a large package of red licorice, and three romance novels with bodice-ripped covers, but no password.

Shit. She must’ve called Bob, right? Why else would she have sent me this package? So, where the hell is the password? OK, OK, calm down. It can’t be in an obvious place; that would defeat the purpose. There must be a code in here somewhere. But where?