Still Waters (19 page)

Startled, Hannah screamed and thrashed away, instinctively releasing her grasp. Colin coughed and choked. Hannah pedaled her arms, kicking wildly. If Colin was awake, then he was dangerous. As fast as she could, she struck out for shore. It was like swimming through mud. Her sweatshirt and shorts dragged. Her sneakers seemed to weigh thirty pounds each. She tried to kick them off as she swam but they were cemented to her feet. She pulled hard with her arms, coughing each time the rank lake water splashed her face. She could hear Colin swimming behind her.
He was coming for her. Dear God, he was coming for her. Faster. Faster. Just a little bit more. Come on, there’s the shore now. Just a few more strokes
.

Her feet found the muddy bottom, and she staggered, trying to swim and run through the last remaining feet of water. Colin was close behind. She could hear his heaving breath.
The sand.
She was on dry ground.
Run, run, run.
She took two giant steps before her feet tangled. She fell to the sand and rolled on her back just as Colin’s figure rose over her. She squeezed her eyes shut.

Then his hands closed over hers, tightening on her fingers. Hannah’s body tensed, waiting for whatever happened next. She felt a firm tug on her hands and her eyes flew open. With a heave, Colin hoisted her to her feet. The moon shone on his face, and he stared into her eyes. His own eyes were alive again and clear. She could see all the way to the bottom.

The fear that had consumed her for the last hours drained away, and she was filled only with exhaustion and, at the back of her mind, the tiniest glint of hope. She searched Colin’s face
for any sign of the cloud that had covered him for the day. She found none.

Hesitantly she squeezed his fingers. She felt him squeeze back. His eyes burned into hers, and then he pulled her to his chest, hugged her against him, and burst into tears.

The room was cool and white. In the hallway, the nurses’ rubber-soled shoes squeaked against the linoleum. Outside the large window, Hannah could see a neat, green lawn, framed by distant trees. A gardener was slowly pushing a hand mower from one end of the lawn to the other, leaving behind wide green stripes, as if he were vacuuming a rug. Hannah could just hear the distant whine of the motor.

Colin lay in bed, a rough white sheet pulled up to his chest. His eyes were still closed. The lump and bruise on his forehead were now covered by a large white bandage. His hair was dry and swept back from his forehead, and he wore a clean white T-shirt.

Hannah leaned back in her chair. She felt much better since shedding her wet, smelly clothes. One of the nurses at the tiny county hospital had lent her a spare sweat suit she’d had in her locker. It was a little big, but smelled pleasantly of clean laundry, and the soft gray fabric brushed her arms and shoulders like
rabbit fur. She rolled her neck around, feeling each kink in her sore muscles.

Soft early-morning sun filtered through the window, turning the room into a light box, but the events of the night before loomed in Hannah’s mind—black and cold and windy. Colin, barely able to walk, staggering and sobbing, clutching at her. She’d managed to get him to the truck and into the seat before he passed out. She’d bumped down the dirt road as fast as she dared, shivering in her wet, muddy clothes while Colin sat slumped next to her with his eyes closed and his head lolling on his shoulders.

Out on the main road, she’d had a moment of panic, not knowing whether to drive to Oxtown and hope to find a doctor there or to turn the other direction and drive the forty miles to the interstate. In the end she took a chance and sped through the lonely night toward town, almost fainting herself when she spotted the small blue sign with the
H
. At the tiny cinderblock hospital, floating with exhaustion herself, she’d managed to choke out a version of Colin’s symptoms before he was wheeled away. She prayed they wouldn’t call the police. Even if he was still dangerous, he needed medical help—not jail.

Her thoughts were interrupted as Colin turned his head back and forth restlessly in the hospital bed, then he groaned a little and opened his eyes. Hannah inhaled, tensing. Colin looked around blearily.

“Hi,” Hannah said softly. “How do you feel?”

“Okay,” Colin said raspily. He licked his dry lips, and Hannah offered him a glass of water with a bendable straw. He took it
and swallowed thirstily. He was so white. The dark circles stood out like charcoal under his hunted eyes. He leaned over in the bed. “Han, what’s wrong with me?” he whispered. “Am I crazy?” He put his palm to his forehead as if feeling for a fever. “I remember the lake and the water was so cold, and you were there …”

Hannah laid a tentative hand on his arm, covered by the sheet. “It’s okay. Shhh. You should rest.”

Colin shook his head and pushed himself up in bed. “No, I want to talk.” His voice was stronger now.

“Do you remember anything more?” Hannah swallowed. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to hear the answer.

Colin nodded, his eyes searching her face. “I wanted to hurt you,” he said slowly. “More than that … I wanted to kill you.” He sat up, and his face was agonized. “Oh my God, Han, what’s wrong with me?
Am
I crazy?”

Hannah hesitated. “I … don’t know.” She made herself look him full in the face. “You look like yourself right now. But a lot of awful stuff happened. Maybe the doctor can explain it.” She could see the tears brimming on his eyelids. She leaned forward and put her hand on top of his. “Do you
feel
like yourself?”

Colin looked at her straight on. “Yeah, I do. That’s what’s weird. I would never, ever want to hurt you.” His eyes were still his own, and Hannah felt a powerful rush of gratitude.
Thank you. Thank you for letting him be okay right now.
She didn’t know if he was going to stay himself or relapse again, but for right at this moment, at least, her own Colin was here. She reached out and clasped Colin’s hand with both her own. Hannah leaned down
on the bed, bowing her face to hide the tears that welled suddenly to her eyes.

But before she could say anything more, the door behind them opened and a ponytailed young doctor walked in, holding a chart and a legal pad. “Awake, I see?” She smiled, taking a small flashlight out of her pocket. “I’m Dr. Morris, the psychiatrist on call. How’s the head feel?” She shone the light briefly in each of Colin’s eyes and then flipped through the chart. “The attending says you have no skull fracture and no concussion, Mr. Byrd. Physically, you’re in good shape.”

She stuck the chart on the end of the bed and came around next to Colin, settling herself in a chair identical to Hannah’s. “It’s the psychological symptoms I want to talk to you about, but perhaps you’d rather wait until your parents arrive. We’ve called them, by the way. They should be here shortly.”

A shudder ran over Colin at the mention of his parents. “If you don’t mind, I’d rather talk now. And I want my girlfriend to stay too.” He squeezed Hannah’s hand.

Dr. Morris shrugged and flipped to a page of dense notes on her legal pad. “Well, you’re eighteen, so the decision is yours.” She squinted down at the notes. “Now, from the history your girlfriend gave us last night, I have a rough idea of what happened to you and why.”

“What’s wrong with me? Am I—,” Colin broke in. He looked up at Dr. Morris and faltered a little, then forced the word out. “Crazy?”

Hannah looked anxiously at Dr. Morris, trying to divine her
answer, but the doctor only smiled a little and shook her head. “Colin, it’s clear you’ve gone through a terrible experience—and you too, Hannah. But it’s also clear to me that you’re not crazy.” She paused a moment to let her words sink in.

Relief passed over Colin’s face. Hannah exhaled a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.

Dr. Morris went on. “I believe what you experienced was a period of psychosis, a psychotic break, if you will. An episode like this can be brought on by many things but usually it is some sort of sudden trauma or the reminder of a past traumatic event. It can also be triggered by the sudden resurfacing of repressed memories.” She looked down at her notes. “Now Hannah said that you began behaving oddly after a storm, out at your vacation home, is that right?”

Colin nodded.

“And do you remember anything that happened that night that was out of the ordinary?”

“Other than a tree crashing through a window?” Colin laughed a little and glanced at Hannah. His face grew serious. “Yeah, I found something. A newspaper clipping.”

Hannah flashed back to Colin crouched on the floor of the child’s bedroom, the wet papers in his hand.

Dr. Morris poised her pen over the pad. “And what about that was upsetting?”

“Um … I can’t remember.” Colin didn’t meet her eyes.

The doctor gave Colin a sharp look but apparently decided not to pursue the question. “Well, perhaps you’ll recall later. To
continue, psychotic breaks can also be triggered by contact with the place of trauma—for instance, if you were kidnapped and held in a certain place, returning to that place years later could cause this sort of episode.”

Hannah interrupted. “But what about the way Colin was acting? He was so strange—calling me ‘Buggy,’ making us sleep in the other room—even talking different. Why would just remembering something bad make him act like this?”

Dr. Morris settled herself more deeply into her chair. “Well, psychotic episodes can also include delusions, which I believe Colin was experiencing. People who have delusions can spend extended amounts of time believing they are another person. Then they take on the personality of this person. Delusions are a coping mechanism when the person cannot handle the memories of the extreme trauma they’ve experienced. Delusional people may also hear voices in their heads, directing their actions.”

Colin inhaled a little, as if in recognition, but Dr. Morris, focusing on her notes, did not notice.

“But wait,” Hannah said. “If the night of the storm was what caused the um, psychotic-whatever-it-was, then why did Colin get so weird earlier? He had a freak-out during a hike to this old church …”

“Well, I can’t be completely sure,” Dr. Morris said. “But my best guess is that if this vacation house—”

“Pine House,” Colin supplied.

“Yes, Pine House—was the place of a past trauma for Colin, any contact with this place caused tiny cracks in the memory
façade you, Colin, maintained within yourself. These cracks would widen the longer you stayed at the house. Does that make sense to you?”

Colin nodded. “Yeah, it does. And then the night of the storm—”

“Everything just blew wide-open,” Hannah interrupted.

Everyone was quiet in the room for a moment—so quiet that Hannah could hear the wheeze of the automatic doors out in the hallway.

Dr. Morris clicked her pen closed and stood up, tucking her legal pad under her arm. “The good news, Colin, is that this kind of psychotic episode is usually isolated and without aftereffects. I expect you will recover fully, though I do recommend you begin some sort of counseling when you return home. You’ll need help to process this experience.” She patted Colin’s shoulder. “I’ll check back later. Let me know if you’d like me to speak with your family when they arrive.”

After the door whooshed closed behind her, Colin gripped Hannah’s hand more tightly, like he was holding a lifeline. “Han, I didn’t want to say too much in front of the doctor, but I’m completely freaked out. It’s so strange what’s happening in my mind right now.”

“What? Colin, what is it?”

Colin shifted restlessly in the bed. “I’m remembering things.”

“Like what about happened in the lake last night?” Hannah asked.

Colin nodded uncertainly. “That part is kind of hazy still.
But … I’m remembering things from my past. Things I never remembered before—about Jack.” He squeezed her hand tighter.

“Your brother?” Hannah blinked. “Why?”

Colin stared at the ceiling. “You know Jack was eight years older than me.”

Hannah nodded.

“And that he disappeared hiking in the mountains seven years ago—at least that’s what my parents always told me.”

“Wait,” Hannah broke in. “What do you mean, that’s what they always
told
you?”

Colin seemed to force himself to look her in the eyes. “The fact is, we never talk about it at home at all—I mean like never. My parents hated it if I ever brought it up. I learned pretty fast that Jack was one of those subjects you just don’t discuss.”

Hannah nodded. In the back of her mind, she wondered where this was going.

Colin went on. “Han, this house—Pine House—that was another thing we never discussed in my family. I mean, I knew we used to come up here when I was little, but I didn’t remember it. My parents always said what I told you—that it was just a decaying old wreck of a place and they’d rather not come up here. Ever.”

“Okay …” Hannah felt a vague sense of foreboding. “But why didn’t they just sell it?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe they tried and couldn’t. It’s not exactly prime real estate.”

Hannah nodded. “Go on.”

Colin pushed himself up on the pillows and reached out for Hannah again. He held both her hands in both of his and stroked her palms with his thumbs, looking down. Hannah waited. Outside the window, the mowing noise went on and on.

After a minute, he spoke again. “I felt weird when you showed me the picture and the old map up in the attic and in the car. I felt like there was something wrong, something nibbling at the corner of my mind. I knew it was stupid though, so I tried to ignore it.”

Something clicked in Hannah’s mind. “You left the photo of Pine House by the side of the road on purpose, didn’t you?”

Colin nodded. “Yeah. I just felt like I didn’t want them in the car with me—they were like a box of cockroaches or something. Maybe it was the start of one of those cracks in my memory. But once we got to the house, things were fine. We were having a good time, right?”

Hannah nodded. “Until the night of the storm.” She waited, holding her breath a little.

“Right, the storm.” Colin traced a little pattern on the bedspread. “I woke up in the middle of the night, and I couldn’t go back to sleep. So, I thought I’d go in and clean up some of the mess from the tree branch. But I never got around to it because when I started picking up the papers from the desk in there—the room that used to be mine—I saw this old newspaper clipping. It was a little article from the county paper about the Eat n’Meet café, dated seven years ago. Just an interview, but they had a shot of the dining room with Mike, the owner. And in the
background at the counter, there was this dark-haired young guy. Jack. When I saw that article, it was like something broke open in my mind. And that’s the last thing I remember really clearly. After that, things get kind of hazy. And this next part is why I didn’t want to talk about this in front of the doctor.”