The Murmurings (26 page)

The pucker-lipped orderly deposits me in the courtyard and accepts a cigarette from Robbie’s pack before finding her place in the sun with a couple of other staffers. A quick scan of the space reveals I’m the only patient out here.

I march up to Robbie. He’s the only one I think I have even a chance of getting an answer from.

“Where’s Deb?” I ask, my voice shaking.

“Who?” he asks.

“She means her little friend. The mousy blonde with the googly eyes,” the pucker-lipped orderly says, the lines around her mouth deepening as she releases a crackling chuckle, which triggers a wet, phlegmy cough. I stifle my rage at seeing Pucker-Mouth laughing at Deb’s expense, and refocus my gaze on Robbie while the rest of them look at me like a specimen in a dish.

“Do you know where she is?” I ask with as much humility as I can muster.

But Robbie just shrugs and says, “Look, kid, they don’t tell me anything around here. I just bring you breakfast and make sure you drink the juice.”

He receives a swift slap in his gut from Pucker-Mouth. Then she moves her stare to me, resting her eyes on mine as the lines return to her face, and her lips set in a deep frown.

“Gladys says Dr. Keller doesn’t want you two spending so much time together anymore.”

“Why not?” I ask, then remember one of the first things Deb told me. “Aren’t you interested in, you know, seeing if we can get anything to happen?”

I say this while twinkling my fingers in the air, hoping I convey the possibility of some sort of magic, but I only receive a deeper frown in response.

“Sweetie, if we want you guys to make something happen, trust me, we have ways,” she says, giving in to another phlegm-filled laughing/coughing fit.

I back away and find the bench where I had my first face-to-face conversation with Deb. I pull my knees to my chest and rest my chin on them in the same way she sat. I tell myself over and over that she’s just in her room, that they’re not doing anything to her, that they only want to keep us apart. I am resolute in my attempt
not
to think about the bathroom with the mirrors where the Pigeon took me. I am resolute and unsuccessful.

After the orderlies have finished their inane conversation and I’ve chilled myself to the bone in the shade of the building, Robbie guides me back to my room.

“What are they doing to me today?” I ask him, a little of my former panic seeping back in. The thought of more drugs, more tests, more clipboards, makes me queasy all over again.

He gives me the same tired look he gave me at breakfast and slams the door.

I imagine that doesn’t sound as final as I think it does, and I slip underneath the scratchy covers, curling myself into a ball until the warmth returns to my body. I wait for what feels like hours—my heart speeding with each set of approaching footsteps and subsiding only when those footsteps continue
past my door without stopping. Have they all made a pact to torment me today—to keep me guessing as to what they have in store?

I can’t stop thinking about what they might be doing to Deb. Is it possible they figured out whatever secret she discovered?

I’m pretty sure they’d kill me if they found out I knew about it.

I slow my heart and hug my legs, seeking the warmth that just won’t seem to stay.

After who knows how much time has passed, a set of squeaking shoes stops at my room, and a metal latch slips in its bolt, cracking the door open to reveal a tight bun.

The Pigeon stares at me like I’m her dinner.

“Time for a little recreation,” she says, and I slide obligingly from my cot and follow her out of the room, brushing fresh gooseflesh from my arms.

The lobby is dim with the growing dusk, and my stomach drops like it does every time I see the sliding glass doors. Freedom is only feet away and totally unattainable.

I turn to the Pigeon and immediately regret it. A slippery smile peels across her face, and I know she enjoys tormenting me. She likes taunting me with a glimpse of the parking lot, and the road that could lead me to a gas station, a neighboring house, a phone. To rescue.

“Make yourself comfortable, dear,” she tells me, motioning toward the far corner of the room where Kenny used to sit. “There’s a whole bucket of Legos over there that no one’s using anymore.”

A hot anger spills through me, and I clench my fists to keep my hands from shaking.

I start walking to the opposite side of the room, when from the corner of my eye, I spot a blue-cotton-clad knee poking out behind the chair at the table where Kenny used to sit.

“Deb? Oh my God!”

I rush to her side and take inventory as quickly as possible. Deb’s lids droop over her downcast, glazed eyes. She sits cross-legged, slumped with her back to the wall. Her hair is stringy and loose around her slack face. A cotton ball is stuck to the inside of her elbow, pinched by a strip of white medical tape. Her hands are limp at her sides, palms upturned, fingers curled but loose and unable to grasp my hand when I try to hold hers. In her lap is a yellow bag of unopened peanut M&M’s.

“What did you do to her?” I demand of the Pigeon, but she’s not paying attention to me.

She strides to the pucker-mouthed orderly, who is settled behind the admitting desk with a magazine.

“What is she doing here? Dr. Keller’s instructions could
not have been clearer. You were to return her to her room immediately following her session.”

The pucker-mouthed orderly leans away from the Pigeon and takes in Deb with one quick up-and-down evaluation, then turns back to the Pigeon.

“Look at her! What do you think she’s capable of right now? Honestly, Gladys, you’re starting to get as nuts as he—”

“You can stop right there,” the Pigeon warns, and Pucker-Mouth leans even farther away. “You forget your place. We wouldn’t want you saying anything that might get you a reprimand, now would we? I think we both know how sensitive Dr. Keller is these days to orderlies who betray his trust.”

I take this opportunity to reach out to Deb again. I squeeze her hand to try to get her attention.

“Deb, I know you’re in there. Whatever they did to you, you’ve fought against worse. Deb?”

But it’s no use. Her mouth hangs slack, her dry lips parted on an unhinged jaw. A tiny trail of spittle slips from the corner of her mouth.

“Deb, you just hang in there, okay?” I tell her, wiping the drool from her pant leg with the end of my shirt. But as I begin to blot away the moisture, I notice something rigid tucked into her sock.

I glance over my shoulder. The Pigeon is still berating
Pucker-Mouth. Turning back to Deb, I place myself in front of her and keep my hands out of view. Lifting her pant leg, I find a stiff rectangular card with a magnetic strip tucked deep into the folds of her scrunched socks. It’s identical to the cards I’ve watched the orderlies pull from cords on their belt loops and drag through readers on nearly every door here at Oakside. I search her eyes for any sort of hint about how she got it, but I receive only a dull stare in response. In one swift motion, I slide the keycard from her sock and into my own, covering it quickly with my pant leg.

Pucker-Mouth’s voice rises defensively, and I glance over my shoulder again to reassure myself that they’re still too preoccupied to be paying attention to us. This time, when I turn back to Deb, her eyes find mine with tremendous difficulty; they look heavy and slow.

“Deb? Can you hear me? Do you understand me?” I squeeze her ankle in hopes of jogging some sort of response from her.

Her mouth closes, then opens, then closes again. She’s trying to say something. Her breath sounds tight in her throat, and comes out in tiny, mouselike squeaks. I lean closer, and at last, I make out two repeating words.

“Linen closet.”

I pull away, shaking my head. “I don’t understand.”

But her lips shape “linen closet” over and over.

Suddenly, I feel an iron grip on my shoulder.

“That’s enough. No more social time for you,” the Pigeon says, dragging me to a standing position.

She pulls me toward the hallway. Then Robbie’s voice calls from the lobby.

“Gladys, you need to get over here!”

“Handle it, Robbie, I’m busy!” she scolds.

“But Gladys, I . . . I don’t know what to—”

“Not
now
, Robbie!”

It all seems to happen at once.

I hear a dull banging that sounds like it’s coming from the end of a long tunnel. But when I turn back toward the lobby, I see the shadows of two figures, one of whom is flailing from behind the glass doors. It’s growing dark outside, which makes it difficult to see who it is. But then the doors part, and a frightened-looking Robbie emerges from the Plexiglas room with the door controls. All at once, Evan and Aunt Becca are standing in the lobby, their eyes searching for the nearest person in white, which unfortunately for them and for him happens to be Robbie.

“Where is she? Where’s Sophie?”

“Please, I need to see my niece!”

“Visiting hours are over. You’ll have to come back tomorrow,” Robbie insists, his voice cracking.

“Please, my sister and I are very worried. You haven’t let us see her since we admitted her, and we’re rethinking—”

“Where is she?” Evan demands, fists clenched.

“Sir, please, you’re going to have to calm down,” Robbie pleads.

“Where is . . . oh God . . . ” Evan gasps.

The Pigeon’s remarkably strong arm slips across the front of my shoulders while her palm clamps over my mouth with so much force that I nearly bite my own lips. I shake off my shock, and adrenaline shoots through my veins. I pull against the Pigeon’s grip with everything I have. But at the moment, she seems to have more strength, and my struggles are in vain. She tries to jerk me around the corner, but I manage to keep my feet planted in the hall.

Evan ducks out of view and then starts shouting.

“Oh my God . . . it’s Deb. Deb? Deb! It’s me. It’s Evan. Do you recognize me?”

I try to scream but the Pigeon’s hand stifles the sound before it can leave my mouth.

“Evan, are you sure?” my Aunt Becca says.

“Please, this is highly inappropriate. You really have to leave. This is against policy,” Pucker-Mouth demands, the strain in her voice on the verge of panic.

“What did you bastards do to her? What’s wrong with her?”

“Sir, if you’ll just follow me outside, I can explain,” Robbie says, fear popping in his voice like tiny sparklers.

“Please,”
Aunt Becca repeats. “I just need to see my niece. We’ll leave tonight. We’ll come back tomorrow during normal visiting hours. I just need to see her tonight.
We
need to see her. To make sure she’s okay. Then we’ll go and come back tomorrow per regulations.”

Good ol’ Aunt Becca. Always the diplomat.

I feel the Pigeon lean toward my ear.

“You’re going to go out there, and you’re going to put on a nice little show for us, or your friend Deb’s going to develop a permanent drooling problem. Do we understand each other?”

She pinches the muscle on top of my shoulder as punctuation, and I nod, blinking back tears.

“Good. Now get rid of that look on your face, and let’s go.”

She marches me to the lobby, releasing my shoulder just in time for Aunt Becca’s worried gaze to find me.

“Sophie!”

She nearly knocks me over with a hug so tight, she cuts off my air. I’ve never in my life been happier to suffocate.

I try to open my mouth, try to say something, but I can’t set aside the knot that’s formed in my throat. Instead, I just squeeze her back, trying to make my hands do the talking my mouth can’t.

I smell a sweet musk and feel the shadow of Evan close to us, and when I pick my head up from Aunt Becca’s shoulder, I see his faded football jersey, still stained with grass. Even after re-creating him in my nightly dreams, nothing compares to the real thing. He looks better than I’ve ever imagined him.

Aunt Becca holds me at arm’s length and examines me. It takes every ounce of willpower to not burst into tears. Evan watches me, then turns to Deb in the far corner of the room, then turns back to me again. I give him the faintest nod, and he returns it. In that one exchange, I feel sane for the first time in over a week.

“Sophie, are you—?”

“I’m fine, Aunt Becca,” I lie.

Evan stiffens beside Aunt Becca, and I twitch my head to create a tiny shake, warning him not to pursue it. He seems to get the hint, because his shoulders settle back to a level below his chin.

“They treat us well here at Oakside Behavioral Institute,” I say, hoping they both catch on to the formality of my speech and the un-Sophie-like delivery. “They’re giving me the help I need.”

I’m forcing a calm over myself, and I’m surprised to find it’s actually working. My voice betrays only a hint of strain, the
quavering only recognizable to the closest observer, which frankly could be anyone in this room except for Robbie. He and Pucker-Mouth stand near Deb, watching in silence. I can feel the Pigeon’s stare on my back. I know the second she gave the command, Robbie and Pucker-Mouth would cart Deb away for another heavy dose of drugs and a visit to the mirrored room.

“Your mom and I . . .,” Aunt Becca starts to say, her voice catching in her throat. She swallows and tries again, Evan’s hand providing support on her shoulder. “We’ve been so worried about you.”

Her voice collapses under its own weight. In those few words, I understand everything. That they’re sorry. That they made a mistake in letting Dr. Keller keep me here. That they’re trying to get me out. In Evan’s touch on her shoulder, I see that he’s told them at least some of what we know. I see that he’s forgiven how I betrayed his trust by coming here without him. As with Aunt Becca and my mom, he’s only focused on getting me out, and getting Deb out. And that makes me realize that I have this one chance to communicate with them. And it doesn’t take me long to figure out what I need to say and to whom.

I lock eyes with Evan to make sure he understands the significance of what I’m going to say, and when he leans slightly
forward, I say, “Dr. Keller is just like family. Like a long-lost father. He’s so . . .
charming
.”