Where is the Baby? (18 page)

Just walk in there, start the tub filling, then climb into the hot water with the razor blade and open the nice blue veins running upward from her wrists. Never mind the Oriental carpet or the marble floor in the hall. Dead was dead. Why not keep it tidy so that the poor overworked, undervalued housekeeper would only have to rinse out the tub.

Her thigh was stinging, itchy, irritated. The skin on either side of the twin lines was enflamed, starting to swell. She opened her hand and stared at the blade. There was an entire box of them on a shelf in the utility room in the basement. One hundred single-edged blades, each contained in a neat little protective paper casing. She could kill herself a hundred times.

She laughed, sobbed again, sniffed hard and reached for the glass. About an inch left. What a joke! She didn't even like Scotch. The taste usually made her gag. But there was a certain rightness that had appealed to her when she'd padded downstairs to the liquor cabinet. If you were going to plot and plan and perhaps, ultimately, die, why drink something you liked? Pleasure was completely inappropriate to the occasion. You had to go for a taste that would reinforce all your misery and frustration. If you were going to parade naked through the house in the dark, planning your suicide, Scotch was just the ticket. She gulped down the last of it, returned the glass to the bedside table, opened the drawer and stowed the ashtray.

Time to get this show on the road, she told herself, the blade secure in her hand, eyes again on the bathroom door.

The phone rang. She jumped, heart jolting, automatically turning to look nervously at the phone. It rang again. Her underarms were suddenly damp. She blinked, heart racing now. She couldn't ignore ringing telephones or save letters to read later. She intensely disliked leaving things unfinished.
He
considered this another of her many noteworthy quirks, forever analyzing every last thing she said and did. With a shaky hand, she lifted the receiver and got out a hello, her voice sounding old, crusty.

‘Faith?' A pause. Then, ‘You don't sound like yourself. Are you all right? Did something happen?'

‘Nothing happened,' Faith said tiredly. ‘It's just the same old crap.'

‘Seriously, what's going on?' A worried tone attached itself to the familiar voice on the other end. ‘Talk to me. Are you really okay?'

‘Seriously?' She sat down on the toilet seat and gazed at the tile floor. ‘I was just finishing a cigarette and a glass of Scotch, and making practice runs on sundry parts of my person with a razor blade.'

‘Oh, of course that's it. Silly me for asking.' She was silent for a moment, then said, ‘You're not kidding, are you?' Another pause. Then, ‘You're scaring me. I think I should come over.'

‘I'm
not
all right,' Faith admitted with a shuddery sigh. ‘I haven't been
all
right
for a long time, and you know it. You're really the only one who does know it. But please don't come here . . .' She paused for a moment, then said, ‘Could I come to your house? I need to talk to someone who doesn't want anything from me, who doesn't treat me like I'm a lab rat.'

‘Come right now. I'll get a pot of coffee going. You'll still be drunk, but you'll be more awake. And we'll be able to talk.'

‘I just need to grab a shower first. Give me half an hour. Okay?'

‘Sure. Listen, please don't drive, Faith. Call a taxi.'

‘Don't worry. I would never drive in this condition. I know better than that. I'll be there soon. Thank you, Con. Really.
Thank you
.' She hung up and went to the dressing room to get something to wear. Big choice, she thought grimly, contemplating the primarily black garments hung in a brief, solemn row. ‘Gee,' she said aloud, her voice low and brimming with sarcasm. ‘Should I wear the black, or the black?' She opened her hand to look at the razor blade, the bloodied edge moist-sticky from the heat of her palm. With a sigh, she dropped the blade into the waste basket, then walked heavily into the bathroom.

In the merciless light, she focused on the mirror to see the same old repellent reflection. ‘
Look at you
,' she whispered, choked by the sight of herself. ‘
How did you get to this?
'

One hand braced on the counter, she leaned in close to the glass, scrutinizing her image: the sharp nose, the assertive chin, the high rounded forehead, the misery shining in her eyes like candles in night-time windows.
Jesus! You poor thing. You're a complete disaster
.

Okay, she decided, pushing away from the counter. She'd been given a last-minute reprieve from the governor.
But don't kid yourself
, she told the mirror.
It's just a stay of execution.

If things didn't change, and soon – maybe tomorrow or a week from tomorrow – she'd climb into the tub and damned well do it. She had ninety-nine more razor blades and plenty of time. After all, according to the birth certificate the Doctors Lazarus had arranged for her all those years ago, she was only a few months away from turning eighteen. Those hundred-odd days felt like forever. But she could keep her razor date with the tub any time at all, so long as the Lazarus clan was out for the evening at one of their ‘functions.' And it was a given that the doctors were booked months, years in advance. Their book and the lectures they so liked to give about their adopted victim,
The Stolen Child
, had made them celebrities. So there'd be no shortage of razor blades or of opportunities. All she had to do was check Stefan's diary, decide which evening would work, and then, before getting into the tub, she just had to be sure to take the goddamned phone off the hook.

‘This isn't like you at all.'

‘Oh, Con' – Faith sighed, too weary and too tipsy to put on the usual happy-go-lucky show – ‘it
is
. It's
exactly
like me. I've come to the end . . . of something. Lately, I've been feeling as if it's the end of
me
. I don't know.' She was about halfway back to being sober and she felt terribly tired, too worn down to keep on pretending things were all right.

‘Talk to me,' Connie urged, anxious to perpetuate the girl's atypical openness. Only infrequently in recent years was she given to confiding any specifics about her life with the Lazarus family and her feelings about it. ‘I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong.'

‘Everything.
Everything's wrong
.'

‘What's “everything?” I thought you were enjoying school.'

‘I am. I love school. It's the best part of my life. I mean,' she added quickly, ‘I love you and Lucia, her mom and dad. The captain, too. But the Lazarus family. Oh
God
.' She stopped and closed her eyes tightly for a moment, made a face as if she'd tasted something horribly bitter, then opened them again. ‘They're making me crazy, Con. I just can't do it anymore.

‘It wasn't so bad at the beginning when Monica was around. She was nice, you know? Kind of a lightweight, but sweet. She was good to me, took me places, did things with me. We went shopping and out to lunch; we saw movies. She even took me to the circus, which scared me. She saw that it did and said she was sorry, and we left right away. She had a
heart
, Con. We did coloring books together and she made my school lunches; she came to parents' night at school. But Stefan barely noticed her. He paid more attention to me, not in any kind of parental way, but like I was an endless research project. Asking what I thought of this, how I felt about that. It made me nervous 'cuz I knew it wasn't fair; it wasn't
right
. She was always doing nice things for him and he just didn't get it. He treated her like a potted plant he could never remember to water.'

Connie smiled. ‘That's vivid,' she said.

‘It's true!' Faith insisted.

‘I know it is, sweetie. I was there, remember? I used to come visit you when they were still married. I knew Monica.'

‘I was a little kid and it made me feel awful, the way he treated her. Here's this man, this
doctor
, and he's got this lovely wife who cares about him, buys him presents, cooks great meals, does everything she can to make him happy and half the time he forgets to come home or he eats an entire meal without even looking at her, never mind saying this is good or thank you. He was so busy trying to impress his parents. And once he got them involved in the book, that was it. He had no time for Monica. There were endless sessions with his parents, working up each chapter, discussing this and that about me, always about me.

‘I watched Monica get sadder and quieter and she just started staying in bed all weekend. I'd go sit beside her on the bed and read my story books to her.' She emitted a damp little laugh. ‘I thought it would make her feel better. And sometimes it did. She'd smile all at once and say, “I guess I'd better take you out to buy some more books,” or “Let's go get chocolate sundaes,” and she'd get dressed and we'd go out. But I could tell she was just doing it for me; she wasn't happy.

‘I can't believe she stuck it out for three years.' She opened her bag, saying, ‘Con, I really need a cigarette. Do you mind if I smoke?'

‘Go ahead.' Connie got up and went to the kitchen, returning with a small crystal ashtray, then curled up again on the sofa beside Faith. ‘Tell me all of it, sweetie. Get it out of your system.'

With shaky hands, Faith got a cigarette lit, saying, ‘I know these are really disgusting, but they help me feel better . . . because smoking is something that's just mine. You know?'

‘I understand.'

‘So.' She blew out a plume of smoke, then went on. ‘After she left, Monica tried to stay in touch with me. She phoned every week or so and sent little cards – goofy cartoon things, but I loved getting them. Then Stefan got on the downstairs extension one day when I was talking to her, and he told her to stop calling. He said her calls were “counterproductive.” As if she was doing something criminal. She went quiet for a few seconds, then said, “She's a
little girl
, Stefan. She needs friends and attention, and people who care about her. DCF should
never
have given her to you. You're not human. You only
look
human. Faith, honey,” she said, “just remember that I love you,” and then she hung up.

‘I never heard from her again . . . She was good to me, Con. The only other person who's paid any real attention to me in all the years since he moved us into his parents' house is Rosa, the housekeeper. If the clan is out for the evening, she'll make her wonderful Mexican food and we'll sit in the kitchen and eat together with good music playing on the radio. I've even been to her house a bunch of times over the years, to hang out with her kids and do dumb stuff like hide-and-seek or play Snakes and Ladders. The rest of the time I'm stuck in the house and the clan studies my every move, my every word – still,
forever
– like a specimen or a TV documentary or something.

‘I thought things would change when I started university but it's the same as it ever was. When they got me the car, I thought I'd be free; I'd be able to go places, do things. But no. I drive to Yale every morning, and I'm expected to come back to the house every afternoon. I can't stand it. If I don't get away from them I'm going to lose my mind. I can feel it happening. I can't
eat
in that house; I can barely
sleep
there. The sight of them gives me a stomach ache so I can't eat, and hearing them talking downstairs makes me nervous, so I can't fall asleep. I go to bed at eight o'clock and watch TV with headphones on so I don't have to hear them.

‘And weekday mornings, I'm up at five and out by six so I don't have to sit at breakfast with them. I get my class work done at a donut place near the school where nobody bothers me, even if there's a rush on. I have a toasted bagel and coffee while I work and they don't even charge me for refills.'

She took a hard drag on her cigarette, her eyes glossy with unshed tears. ‘I feel like I'm dying, Connie,' she said softly. ‘I
will
die, if I don't get away from them. What can I do?'

‘Getting drunk isn't the answer,' Connie said, remembering telling Brian Kirlane all those years ago that the last thing the child needed was to be placed under a microscope. There was no satisfaction in knowing she'd been right. But the damage was so much worse than she could have imagined.

‘The booze is part of getting the psychopathology just right,' Faith said.

‘How?' Connie asked, perennially fascinated by the depth of this girl's intelligence.

‘The Doctors Lazarus need empirical evidence to justify every single thing they do or think about me, no matter how insignificant it might seem to anyone else.'

‘And?' Connie prompted, brow furrowed, not following.

‘If I can convince Stefan he'd be doing the right thing by sending me away, if he thinks he's doing something professionally ennobling, he can be persuaded.'

‘What are you
saying
? Please don't make me drag this out of you, sweetie. Just tell me what you have in mind. I will help you in any way I can. You must know that by now.'

‘I do. I do. It's just that I have to be very convincing, entirely credible. These people have studied me under their personal microscopes for the last thirteen years. So I can't just pretend . . . it has to seem entirely authentic to them.'

‘What does?
What?
' Connie was becoming frustrated.

‘This, for one thing.' Faith lifted her skirt up to show the rows of cuts on her thighs.

‘My God! What are you doing to yourself?'

‘I'm turning myself into a textbook case for them. I've been studying up on the long-term effects of my kind of abuse. The cutting is part of it, so is the drinking. They have to
believe
it, Connie, or they'll never sign off. And I want the guardianship ended. I want their status as executors of my trust fund ended.
I
want to live my own life
. If they doubt any part of my behavior for a single moment, they'll keep me tied to them forever. And just the
idea
of that makes me want to slash my wrists.'