“I don’t know.”
She turned on David. “Get these people out of my face!”
As she tried to make her way back into the main house, Katrina dropped a leather strap around her arms and pinned them to her sides. Even fighting as hard as she did, she could not free herself.
She did a little method acting, imagining what it would be like if this were real, if she were actually mad and being trapped, and terror exploded through her with such intensity that she just burst out screaming, surprising even herself with the ferocity of it.
The sounds of the struggle echoed up and down the corridor, and the cries of other patients were soon added to her own screams. As patients came out of the art room and other public rooms, some of them laughed, their voices warbling high with hysteria, while others shouted for help, or came rushing forward to do battle on her behalf.
Susan Denman watched, amused and appalled at the baroque antics.
But before any of this chaos could resolve itself, she was dragged backward hard, there was a great crash and sudden silence, and she was on the floor looking up into David’s dear, empty face.
“Okay,” he said, “she’s controlled. Now, Caroline, can you hear me?”
She continued her act. “Bastards!
“All right, all right. You’re angry and I would be, too. Now, I want you to get yourself together, Caroline. Can you do that?”
Despite all that she knew, she could not help being genuinely furious, if not at his ignorance, then certainly at his condescension. “I’m not one of your patients,” she wanted to say, “I’m part of your heart.”
She managed a choked, “Yes, Doctor.”
This was hideous, to see him like this.
“I’m going to have Katrina here release you. Is that all right? Are we able to calm down now?”
“I’m calm! So get me out of this damned thing!”
“Uh, Doctor, is this wise? She’s very agitated.”
“Do it. But step away. Step
“I’m not going to do anything,” she said as Nurse Katrina freed her. “Just keep that other guy away from me. Sam. I mean, what is that, a giant dwarf? A troll?”
“The hell…”
“Leave it, Sam. Caroline, we’ll address all of these issues in our intake interview.”
“I thought we did that.”
“No. No, not entirely. We did not.” David pranced toward her, all officious professionalism. He took her elbow and in a moment they were in a small room, sparsely furnished with a cot and a recliner that took up far too much of the space.
“Now,” he said, “you can collect yourself. Get in the recliner, it’s great! I mean, you talk about relaxing, these things—all the patients just really love them.”
“It’s a chair, for God’s sake.” But she sat down. After a moment, she pulled the lever and leaned back. She noticed that the ceiling lights were protected by wire cages.
“What is this, one of the cells? Am I a prisoner, because I better not be. I did a voluntary commitment, remember that.”
“This is a safe room. We call it a safe room. Now, close your eyes.” He began rubbing her temples and she let herself drift, let the distant sounds of the institution die away, let the world drift and drift… on a quiet ocean… ocean of silence.
“I have a little something,” he said.
“I don’t want anything.”
“You’re very agitated.”
“Oh, it’s just this sun business! I can’t quit thinking about it.”
“Take deep breaths, let it go, let the trembling go.”
She was trembling? Yes, actually shaking like a leaf. She could feel the dark gods coming, smelling her weakness, coming with their jaws clicking, their obsidian eyes flickering with inner fire. Xipe Totec, the Flayed One, skinned by the sun, dead but alive, and coming out of the bloody mouth of Mack the Cat.
She was aware of movement in the room, the clink of glass. When she opened her eyes, a nurse was there with a small paper pill cup and a glass of water.
“What is it?” she asked David.
“A mild sedative.”
“No.”
His hands were gentle, insistent. She felt his subtle power and liked the feeling. She saw plumes of red and blue around him, feathers in the wind.
“And he will descend into hell and gather the bones of men, and he will spread them on the earth, and his wisdom will make them dance.”
“And that is?”
“The work of Quetzalcoatl. The bringer of peace, the builder of heaven.” She saw him in David’s eyes, just as she had when they were children, and she had thought him the most beautiful creature that God had ever made.
He touched her temples again. “Take it easy, Miss. Right now, you’re agitated. Let’s cross this bridge first.” He took the pill cup from the nurse and handed it to her.
She pretended to take what she recognized as a Xanax. She did not take it, though. She needed her wits.
“Good. That’ll help.”
“David?”
“Dr. Ford. I’m Dr. Ford.”
“Okay,” she said, fighting to keep the pain out of her voice. “Dr. Ford, I want you to humor me. Indulge a little innocent paranoia. Don’t tell anybody my last name. Can you do that?”
He blinked as if surprised, and she wondered immediately how much he did remember. Clearly, he wasn’t entirely clueless.
“Patient surnames are confidential. Nobody gets your surname except from you.”
His hands caressed her temples so gently, so firmly, that this time when she closed her eyes she did indeed drift away.
Then, seemingly without more than a moment passing, she came to understand that he had not been rubbing her temples, not for some time. In fact, not for a long time.
With a shocked gasp, she opened her eyes. At first, she couldn’t see anything at all—and then she could, a line of light floating ahead of her. A line of light… which she moved toward.
She understood that she was on a low bed. And naked, she was also naked, or rather, in one of those loose hospital gowns that tie in the back. She leaned down and touched the line of light, running her fingers along it. A faint coolness brushed them—air, she realized, from outside.
Once she understood that this was the door, her disorientation resolved itself and she stood up, feeling for the doorknob. She found it and turned it, but it was locked tight.
She called, “Hello, I’m awake! Hello!”
Not a sound came in reply.
She tried to look at her watch, but couldn’t find it on her wrist. Taken. Not stolen, of course, she didn’t think that.
They’d overdone this, and she saw a chance to put on a performance.
“Hey! HEY!” She shook the door, then hammered on it.
Nothing.
She felt the walls and found a quiltlike surface on them. She ran her palms along it. Soft. So was the floor, soft, quilted. There was no window. The ceiling no longer had caged lights on it, but rather flush glass fixtures that emitted a faint nocturnal glow.
He’d doped her with something more than Xanax, that clever David, good at every job he’d ever done. And she’d thought she hadn’t swallowed the pill. She hadn’t been meant to—or rather, it hadn’t mattered. Whatever had
