08 Illusion (6 page)

Now Johnny was scowling, paying full attention.

She sucked the whole thing up her nose and then brought her empty hands away from her face, palms visible so he could see them, and gave a little hum of satisfaction.

Ah. She had him. He was looking at her with intense, head-tilted suspicion, and hadn’t noticed how she stashed the Kleenex down her robe sleeve.

Now for the final effect. She winced in pain, shook her head to jar the Kleenex loose, then brought her hands to her right ear, dug in with her right finger, and found the end of the Kleenex—from behind her head. With a little grunt or groan with every tug, she pulled the Kleenex from her ear a little, then a little more … then a little more … and finally free, letting it hang from her fingers. “Whew!” She sighed with relief.

He actually smiled a little and wagged his head. Well, that was progress.

“Mandy?”

Ah, Dr. Angela appeared in the hallway, a folder in her hand, which had to be the results. She was smiling, which made Mandy smile—for a moment.

As the doctor came into the room, two security guys in navy blue shirts and gray slacks—their name tags said Bruce and Dave—came in with her and not just to visit. With put-on smiles they walked like actors on a stage and took positions on either side of Mandy, close enough to invade her space and make her cringe. As for Dr. Angela’s smile, there was something phony-professional about it, as if she’d taken it out of her doctor pocket and stuck it on just for the occasion.

She could have lent it to Johnny. As he stood to give the doctor his chair, he went back into wall mode, eyes on Mandy, all business. Mandy may have gotten a faint smile out of him a minute ago, but now his face was back on duty and there was nothing to like about him.

“So …” said Angela, flipping the file open. “Things are going in the right direction for you.”

Mandy leaned forward, waiting.

“First of all, we have good news as far as your medical condition. All the tests came back negative. No drugs, no alcohol, no brain damage or injury to your head. All your vitals are just fine. The only problem we still have is …” She looked in the folder at a page that had nothing to do with medical tests. Mandy could see her home phone number among a flurry of notes. “You’ve given us names and phone numbers and we’ve tried to contact these people and as far as anyone can tell”—she looked straight into Mandy’s eyes—“there are no such persons, no such phone numbers, no such addresses. Besides that, there’s no Mandy Whitacre on file with the Department of Motor Vehicles. The Social Security Administration has no record of a Mandy Whitacre with your Social Security number. There’s no Mandy Whitacre enrolled at NIC—and it’s North Idaho College now, not North Idaho Junior College. Your insurance company … well, they were bought out in 1995 and don’t exist anymore as a company.”

It had to sink in a moment. This learned doctor could not possibly be saying such things.
Lies. How in the world?
Somebody just wasn’t thinking. Mandy looked right back into Angela’s eyes. “And no Mandy Whitacre sitting right in front of you? I know my own name, Doctor!”

The doctor was flustered. “We know it seems real to you, but we can’t verify any of it.”

“As if I don’t know my own name and my own father? How dare you say such a thing to me!”

Angela raised her hands for a truce. “That’s not for me to decide, that’s what I’m getting to. It was my job to check you over physically, to make sure you don’t have a medical emergency, and now that’s done and my part in this is over.”

Mandy looked at Johnny, Bruce, and Dave. “So why are these guys still standing here?”

“There are some other people you still need to see.”

“And they’re going to make sure it happens, is that it?”

“They’re here to keep you safe.”

Well. Enough of this.
“I’d like to leave now.”

Dave put a hand on her arm. She slapped at it. “Get your hands off me!”

Bruce took her other arm. Outrage! She reefed and twisted against their grip as her indignity built to a scream. “Let go of me!
Let go!
”

Angela—dear, lying, off-her-ever-loving-nut Angela—came in close, speaking softly, trying to defuse the situation. With what, more lies? More branding
her
a liar?

“Mandy, listen to me.”

She glared at the doctor, every muscle in her body pulling, straining against her captors.
Check my heart rate now, you witch!

Angela kept trying. “You have no clothes, no shoes, no money, no ID. Do you want to go back out there with nothing but those scrubs? How long do you think you’d last?”

“Long enough to go
home
!” The thought made her cry. She twisted and fought some more because she doggone
felt
like it.

Angela got right in her face—
close enough to spit on
, Mandy thought, but didn’t. “If you want to go home, then stop this, right now! Stop.”

Mandy didn’t relax but she held still, angry breath gushing into and out of her nostrils.

The doctor spoke quietly, slowly. “You are here on a police hold, which means by law you have to stay here at least twenty-four hours for evaluation, maybe longer, until everyone is satisfied you won’t be a danger to yourself or anyone else—”

Of all the stupid!
“Well, what—”

“And …”

“—do you think I’m gonna do—”

“AND—are you listening?”

Mandy listened.

“There are people who will help you, they’ll listen to you and try to figure out what’s going on. But they’ll need to see that you can control yourself and conduct yourself safely around others, which means …” The doctor indicated Mandy’s situation at the moment, like a raging animal in a net. “If you want to get out of here, you’ll behave yourself so nobody has to restrain you. Does that make sense?”

Make sense?
This was just so ridiculous! This really was
Planet of the Apes
and she really was Charlton Heston the astronaut and she was the weird one, not them, and nobody could see that.

But why would they, and what could she do about it anyway? These were the rules of the game, like it or not. She was the one in the complimentary scrubs and borrowed robe, and all she had in the world was what she knew but couldn’t prove. She wasn’t the doctor with the totally true and trustworthy folder in the big, intimidating hospital with Johnny, Bruce, and Dave working for her.

Play the game, girl. Do your time. Show them you’re okay.

She gave up and covered her face to shut out these people and this insane, impossible world.

Dave and Bruce relaxed their grip but didn’t let go.

“Bruce and Dave are going to take you to another part of the hospital and get you checked in.”

She rose to her feet, ably assisted. “What part?”

“Behavioral Health. Don’t worry. They’re great people.”

chapter

6

H
i, Mandy. I’m Bernadette Nolan, from Health and Human Services. How are you?”

Mandy squared up the deck of cards she was playing with, set them aside, and stood to shake hands. Bernadette, a young lady with fiery red hair in big, beautiful curls, took the only other chair, on the opposite side of the table. She did it so professionally, as if she’d said “Hi” and “I’m Bernadette Nolan” to a zillion souls before this, maybe at this very same table in this very same little room with no windows except for the one in the door.

Mandy answered, “I’m clean,” which was about all she could say for sure. The Behavioral Health Unit had loaned her soap and shampoo for a shower and a toothbrush and toothpaste for her teeth and took them back when she was finished so they couldn’t become a means to harm anyone, including herself.

“You look great,” said Bernadette, opening a valise and pulling out a writing pad and some forms.

Right.
Clean, but with no way to fix her hair and wearing nothing but hospital scrubs and another pair of those one-size-almost-fits-all slippers. Mandy sent a message with her face:
Oh, come
on! She thought better of it and stowed the look, but not before Bernadette saw it.

“Go ahead. Say it.”

Mandy looked into those friendly green eyes. “
I
look clean.
You
look great.” And Bernadette did look great. Nice jacket, cool jeans, slick pumps.

Bernadette nodded, even chuckled. “I’m the one in the civvies and you’re the one in the scrubs.”

“Right on.”

“How does that make you feel?”

“How should I feel? You weren’t locked in your room with a camera trained on you. You didn’t have to take a shower with Nurse Baines watching you. You got to fix your hair this morning and pick out your own clothes. You even get to wear a bra because nobody thinks you’ll use it to hang yourself.”
Mandy, you’re getting angry.
“But you do look great. And I like your lipstick.”

“Thank you. It’s called Deep Blush.”

“It goes with your complexion.”

“So how do you usually fix your hair?”

“Oh, straight, with combs and sometimes a clip. I have some headbands, they’re kind of a trip—hey, I made a rhyme!”

Mandy had no grudge with Bernadette and Bernadette was sweet enough. They talked—maybe a little testy at first, checking each other out—but they got on a roll, and every once in a while Bernadette would jot a note on her writing pad or circle an item on a form. Mandy settled within herself that Bernadette was only doing her job; it wouldn’t be fair not to like her.

“So,” Bernadette finally said with a little clap and rub of her hands, “let’s do the questions and the games. What’s my name?”

“Bernadette.”

“Do you remember my last name?”

Mandy had to work a bit. “N … Nolan?”

“Right. And you know where you are?”

“Behavioral Health, Spokane County Medical Center.”

“And what year is it?”

Mandy had to think about that one. It depended on who you asked, so she asked, “Is it 2010?”

“That’s right,” Bernadette answered, but she jotted something down. “And when were you born?”

“January fifteenth, 1951.”

It was fun watching Bernadette trying not to react. She looked at Mandy and smiled, studying her a bit. “Do
you
think it’s 2010?”

“That’s what I’m told and that’s what I’m seeing.”

“But you were born in 1951.”

“That’s right.”

“That would make you …” Bernadette had to work it out on her pad. “Fifty-nine. Are you fifty-nine?”

“No, I’m nineteen.”

She chuckled. “Does that puzzle you at all, your being born in ’51 but you’re only nineteen?”

Mandy threw up her hands. “I am
completely
puzzled!”

“That’s good. That’s actually very good.” Jot, jot. “Okay, I’ll give you three words: cadillac, zebra, purple. Can you say them back to me?”

“Cadillac, zebra, purple.”

“Can you count backward from one hundred by threes?”

Oh-oh.
Mandy and numbers didn’t get along. She counted down as far as fifty-two before Bernadette let it go.

“What were the three words I gave you?”

“Cadillac, zebra, and purple.”

“How about the days of the week? Can you say those backward?”

Mandy felt nervous about that one, but they tumbled out just fine.

“Got a favorite TV show?”

“Carol Burnett. And Daddy and I always watch
Gunsmoke.
”

“On DVD?”

“Uh … no, Channel Four.”

Jot jot. Hopefully she jotted something positive.

And it went on and on.

“Spell the word
world
backward.”

“Explain what happened yesterday. What do you think should have happened?”

“Can you tell me my name again?”

“Can you name the last four presidents?” Jot jot.

“What were those three words again?”

“Can you give me two different definitions for the word
right
? How about the word
bit
? How about
left
?”

“What do people mean when they say ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss’?”

Mandy had no trouble answering the questions and doing the thinking, but it was getting tedious. She never thought to pick up the deck of cards; she just noticed she was shuffling them as she spoke.

“What do you think people mean when they say ‘When the cat’s away the mice will play’?”

Brrrriiiip!
Riffle shuffle on the table. “When the authority figure is absent, people push their boundaries and see what they can get away with.”

“What about hallucinations or delusions? Have you experienced anything like that?”

Brrrrrriiiip!
Riffle shuffle off the table, hands in the air, like a skilled cardsharp. “You mean, besides thinking I’m living in 2010?”

“Well, aren’t you?”

Fffffoooot!
Waterfall, the cards cascading through space from her raised right hand into her waiting left. “You think I’m living in 2010 and think I’m from 1970. I think I’m living in 1970 and think I’m living in 2010. That’s the difference.”

Jot jot. “Wow. Does that scare you at all?”

“Very much.”

“Do you feel afraid right now?”

Ribbon spread, the cards spread out across the table like a long ribbon, perfectly lapped and spaced. Mandy had to pay attention to the cards for a moment, it looked so good. “I’m making lemonade.”