The Reach

withdrawing in her therapy sessions and refusing her medication. She hasn't spoken a word in over three months now.'

Wasserman's gaze kept slipping from the tiny window in the door, to Jess's face, to some point in the corridor beyond her head.

'What about her parents?'

'Sarah has no surviving relatives, as I believe I told you. That's the case with so many of the children here, unfortunately. They've been either orphaned or abandoned, and the foster care system is simply not well equipped to handle those with more severe mental disorders.' Wasserman glanced at his watch and then dug a set of keys out of the pocket of his white lab coat. 'Now, Jean and I agreed that your first contact with her should be alone. Our intent here is to shake things up, draw her out, expose her to someone she might eventually be more comfortable with and who is not associated with me or my staff.'

'I'd still like to see her file.'

Wasserman blinked at her from behind his glasses. 'You're persistent, I'll give you that. I've made my decision. If you need assistance there's a button on the wall. Maria will let you out.' Wasserman fumbled the key into the lock as if he couldn't get a handle on it. Then the key turned and the metal door swung open.

--3--

The girl crouched in the middle of a padded room. The restraint jacket that pinned her arms over her chest seemed to swallow her slender, boyish frame. Her black hair hung down far enough that Jess could not get a good look at her features.

If Sarah heard the door open, she gave no sign. Her breathing came slow and deep. A thin line of spittle hung trembling from a strand of hair to the floor.

Jess stopped just inside the door and listened as it swung shut behind her. The noise was enough to make her jump, but she caught hold of herself inside like the clenching of teeth.

'Hello, Sarah,' she said firmly. 'My name is Jess Chambers. I'd like to visit with you for a while, if that's all right.'

There were two ways to go about this: pretend to be occupied with something fascinating, and see if she became curious, or try to engage immediately. Either way it could take days, weeks, to break through. Both options assumed that Sarah was even reachable at all.

The girl had not reacted to her presence, and Jess found herself staring. Were the restraints really necessary? How violent could a ten-year-old possibly be? Perhaps she had tried to harm herself; Shelley had mentioned that she was suicidal. Jess had heard of psychiatric patients tearing at their faces, pulling out their own eyes, digging out their throats. It was difficult to kill yourself with your bare hands, but that didn't stop some of them from the attempt.

She did not want to appear threatening and so she sat down on the floor against the wall, keeping a good distance, but getting into the girl's line of sight. She had worn loose clothes specifically for this, a soft suit in neutral colors that covered her wrists and left only her hands and part of her neck bare. She wore contact lenses, her hair held up by a plain, white-cotton Scrunchie.

Remember what you have learned. Finding the real world too much to bear, Sarah had formed her own. It was up to Jess to interpret it. She would be a translator of sorts. To do this she would have to form a bond, allow herself to let the girl in and hope that Sarah would trust her enough, be lucid enough, to let her in too.

She opened her briefcase and removed a lined notebook and pencil. At the top of the first page, she wrote interpersonal contexts, and then, under it: Interaction with peers? Foster homes? Teachers? As she did this she spoke quietly, repeating her name, and why she was there.

It was like talking to herself. When she was a small girl her grandmother Cheryl had a stroke, and the family visited her at the Maine Medical Center in Portland. It was a place she was already well familiar with from various visits with Michael. They had gathered around Grandma Cheryl's bed, and everyone spoke as if she could hear them, as if at any moment she would sit up and answer their questions. Her grandmother died three days later, having never uttered another word.

But this is different. Obviously Sarah was in a catatonic state, but that did not mean she had always been that way, or that she would not come out of it again. Studies indicated that catatonics were often aware of their surroundings and simply unable to respond. Jess had to believe the girl was listening, that whatever barrier she had erected in her mind did not entirely cut her off from the world.

After a few minutes of note-taking on her observations of the surroundings and Sarah's condition, she risked a glance, saw that the girl had not moved. The buckles must be hurting her. She thought about loosening the jacket, decided against it. She did not know exactly what Sarah was on. Tranquilizers, Wasserman had said. Neuroleptics.

'I wonder if you could help me come up with some fun things to do,' she said, scribbling on the notepad. 'We could try painting. I used to paint a lot when I was your age. I still do, like sometimes when I'm feeling sad or lonely. It's like I'm putting those feelings down on paper where they can't hurt me.'

Had the girl moved her head? This was silly. Damn you, Wasserman, for leaving me in here alone. She continued, feeling like a fraud, forcing the anxiety from her voice. This was a familiar, unsettling discomfort. Sarah is not Michael. She was much older than her brother when he died. The two were nothing like each other. Just keep going.

'There are other things I like to do when I'm lonely. I like to watch old movies and eat popcorn. I'm a sucker for a classic romance--Bogart, Grant, Bacall.' She talked some more about the world outside the walls, keeping her voice slow and steady. She held up the notepad to show off a few sketches. After a while she tried a different approach: 'Dr. Wasserman told me you've been here a long time, Sarah. How do you feel about this place? Do you like it?'

This time she was sure she saw movement, a slight trembling. It could be nothing more than muscle fatigue. Keeping her voice calm and smooth, she said, 'I've seen places like this before. Most people don't want to be here. Most people need a friend. I can be your friend. I'll come visit you whenever you'd like. We can talk about anything you want.'

She shifted, up onto the balls of her feet so that she was mirroring the girl's crouch. 'A place like this would make me upset. All those kids upstairs having fun while you're stuck down here alone. I wonder if you've ever been to the zoo, or a ball game. We could go to those places, if Dr. Wasserman says it's okay.'

She was concentrating so hard that when the rattling came at the door she jumped. Gaining her feet, she went over and peered out the little window, but could see nothing except the opposite wall of the corridor. The noise did not come again. The button that would bring Maria was at eye level, housed in a small plastic casing, but she did not press it.

When she turned around again, Sarah began to shake. The shaking started in her lower body and spread upward. The buckles on the straitjacket made a slight tinkling sound.

The line of spittle attached to her hair danced and curved, but did not break.

'I know you can hear me. I know you're in there. I'm not going to hurt you.' Jess approached the girl and crouched, showed her open hands. 'What are you afraid of, Sarah?'

When the ringing began, she at first thought it was a distant noise of the clinic, or the lights humming over her head. But then the ringing grew louder, and with it came a buzzing as if the air itself were electrified. Jess felt a familiar disorientation, her mind growing heavy and sluggish, and thought of alcoholic haze, those dim nightclub dreams of her undergraduate days rushing back like a distant train coming at her through a tunnel. And something else, a memory so old and fragmented it was like a part of her she had forgotten was there.

Dimly she felt herself falling, felt the impact from the floor run up her spine.

Then Sarah raised her head. Instantly Jess knew that everything she had assumed about the girl was wrong. Her eyes were like flecks of white lightning surrounded by darkness, gathering themselves for a storm. Jess lay half on her back and could not move, watched as the girl stared back at her and continued to shake, as the ringing grew louder and Sarah's lips moved in a silent, pleading prayer.

Help me.

Somehow Jess gained her feet and stumbled to the door, laying her hand against the button and her forehead against the glass of the window. She felt a cool looseness deep in her belly.