Damage (18 page)

My stomach starts to hurt as we follow her down the hall. I suddenly feel guilty for lying to her, and wish this
were
just a goodwill visit to sign up as volunteers. I want her hope to be well-founded. I want to believe that all the kids on this floor are precious to her and that their doctors are fighting for their lives. I want to believe Jesse and I will be coming back here to help out with arts and crafts and read stories and plan movie nights.

But I don’t believe. And I know—even if I find a way to eliminate Rachel as a threat—that I’ll never believe again.

Whoever did this to me and Jesse, whoever is hunting us, they’re after us because of something that started here. In this place where we should have been safe. In this hospital, on this floor, where we slept and cried and prayed to be whole and our prayers were answered by monsters that came in the night.

And monsters with degrees in pediatric medicine.

I move closer to Jesse as we pass a pair of doctors conferring over some X-rays outside one of the private rooms. I’m glad when they don’t turn to look our way.

The doctors have to be in on it. At least some of them.

You’re being paranoid. This is crazy.

But I know I’m
not
being paranoid. That’s the
really
crazy thing.

“I’ll distract her,” Jesse whispers as Coffee Nurse cuts behind the front desk, grabbing her ever-present mug before motioning for us to follow her back into the nurses’ break room. “You make some excuse to leave and go find a computer. We can meet by the car in half an hour.”

I nod, trying to figure out the best place to go. There are computers at the main desk and in the smaller offices at the end of the A and C wings—or at least there were back when Rachel and I made it our business to snoop around the floor after lights-out. The main desk is too public, and the A wing is for the kids who aren’t super sick, so there will be more nurses wandering around checking up on them. I’ve just decided that the C wing is the best place to go when we enter the otherwise empty break room and see the bank of computers against the far wall.

Jesse shoots me a look over his shoulder. Without a word, I know the plan has changed. His new mission is to get Coffee Nurse out of here while I hit those computers.

Unfortunately, Rachel chooses that exact moment to make an appearance.

She materializes on one of the bar stools by the coffeepot and hot chocolate machine. She sits with her baby hands crossed in front of her. Her eyes are puffy and red. I freeze in the doorway, hands squeezing into fists, the terror she inspires a habit I’m not ready to break, though she isn’t doing anything particularly threatening at the moment. In fact, she looks almost … bored.

No. Not bored, tired.

Her red slash of a mouth opens wide, her eyes wince shut, and her tiny jaw cracks softly.
Yawning
. Rachel just yawned. It’s the most normal thing I’ve ever seen her do.

“You two want some hot chocolate?” the nurse asks. She walks past Rachel, close enough for Rachel’s swinging foot to hit the leg of her scrubs. The nurse looks down and brushes a hand across the pink fabric, leaving no doubt she’s felt Rachel even if she can’t see her. She looks up at Jesse and then over to where I hover in the doorway, her smile wrinkling a bit when she sees I haven’t followed them across the room.

“Are you too old for hot chocolate?” She reaches for the coffeepot and refills her mug. “Do you want some coffee instead? I just made a fresh pot. Or some juice? We’ve got orange and apple and cranberry in the fridge.”

“I’ll take some coffee,” Jesse says, catching my eye, following my gaze to the counter where Rachel sits. She’s propped her head in her hands and is shooting me a look that seems to ask why she’s here. As if
I
am somehow responsible for …

As if
I
am responsible. Could it … Could I …

I take a cautious step forward. “Coffee sounds good,” I say, even though it doesn’t. I’ve never tried coffee. It reminds me too much of the hospital, of that last night when Rachel tossed this nurse’s cup to the floor to create a distraction, clearing the way for me to chase her up the stairs to the roof.

It worked then. Maybe …

“Two coffees. Perfect.” Coffee Nurse sets her mug on the counter and grabs two Styrofoam cups from a stack next to the pot. Now’s my chance. Rachel’s chance.

Knock it off the counter. Knock the mug onto the floor.

Rachel’s eyes narrow before she slides her fingers along the counter, closer to the mug, leaving no doubt she’s heard my mental directive. But will she listen? Will she do it?

If she does … if she does what I’ve told her to do, twice in a row, then—

You’re not my boss!
Rachel lifts one of her fingers in an obscene gesture, and I fight a burst of laughter. There’s just something funny about seeing a hand that size flipping the bird.

And there’s something amazing about realizing I’m not afraid. For the first time since that night on the roof, I’m not afraid of Rachel.

Do it.
I hold her gaze, letting her know I’m not going to back down.
Knock the mug off the counter.

Rachel crosses her arms and wrinkles her nose, but one of her Mary Janes flashes out and sends the mug flying into the air. I watch it arc up, up, up with held breath. A breath I’m afraid to let out even when the ceramic smacks into the tile and shatters with a heavy thunk. Coffee leaps out in all directions, dancing weightlessly for a moment before it splatters to the ground and spills out, spreading like a suspicion confirmed.

By the time I glance back to gauge Rachel’s reaction, she’s gone. For once, I’m not happy to see her go. I want to look into her eyes and make sure she knows that she’ll never have control over me again.

“Oh no!” Coffee Nurse slaps her ample thigh. “That’s the third mug this month. I swear I’m going to start using Styrofoam like everyone else. The environment is just going to have to save itself.”

Jesse grabs some paper towels from the counter. “You want me to—”

“Oh, no.” She waves her hands in the air as she heads for the doorway I’ve just vacated. “I’ll get the broom and the mop. You two go ahead and fix your coffees. I’ll be right back.”

She’s barely stepped into the hall before I’m hurrying across the room to the bank of computers. I wiggle each mouse, rousing the screens to life, sighing in relief when I reach the third one. Whoever signed in last hasn’t signed out of the hospital’s back portal. Just a few clicks and I should be able to find my way to the records.

“Did you … did Rachel do that?” Jesse whispers, coming to stand next to me.

“She did. I told her to do it and she did. Then she went away, just like in the car.”

“Wow. So … okay … you want me to lock the door?” Jesse’s voice is careful, but his doubt still reaches out to wipe the smile from my face.

He doesn’t believe me. But he will. As soon as we’re out of here, I’m going to do whatever it takes to make him see that he has to believe me and he has to try. He
has
to. If he doesn’t take control, the Thing is going to kill him. Or somebody else. Maybe even me, because I’m not going to leave him.

I can’t ditch him to save myself. It’s impossible. Even if I didn’t suspect that my dad had something to do with making Jesse this way, I owe Jesse for saving my life half a dozen times this morning. And even more important than owing him, I care about him. A lot. A whole lot. Life without Jesse is starting to seem like not much of a life at all.

“Seriously, Dani. She could be back any—”

“The janitor closets are at the end of wings B and D.” I type in my last name, then my first, and hit enter. One click, two, and now I just have to search for the right printer from the list. “It’s going to take her at least ten minutes.”

“Can you be finished in ten minutes? I—” He breaks off as the printer behind him roars to life, paper wheels rolling before the top page catches.

“That’s my file,” I say.

“That? Already printing?”

I smile again. I like his impressed tone a lot better than his disbelieving one. “Yeah. It’s thirty pages, but that printer seems fast.” I open up a new tab, type in his name, and hit enter. “And I’m betting yours will be shorter since … ” I trail off, staring dumbly at the page that announces there are no results for my search. “This is weird.”

“What?”

“It’s not showing any record for you.” I type his name in again, just in case I misspelled it the first time. “Nothing. Did you go by a different name when you were little?”

“No.” He leans over my shoulder, staring down at the screen. “Let me try.” He fingers find the home keys and he punches his name into the form with obvious concentration. He isn’t much of a typist. His hands seem too big for a normal-sized keyboard. It makes me think of how much he said he’d grown while he was here, how he’d thrived despite his cancer diagnosis.

The idea creeps in slowly, like wisps of smoke. A smoke screen. Something to cover up the ugliness.

“There’s nothing there.” Jesse stands with a sharp, angry sound. “It’s like someone erased me.”

I click back, finding my own records and hitting the tab marked “medications.” I scan the list, ordered by date, all the way back to the day I first checked into the hospital. I know most of the meds. There isn’t anything strange or experimental there, nothing but the same scripts I’ve been taking on and off for years. “They didn’t erase you,” I say, throat going dry. “They erased the treatment. It’s not on my chart, either.”

“What the hell?” He drives a hand through his hair. “You were right. We had to be taking the same thing. That’s why they erased me altogether. I wasn’t taking anything else. They only gave me that one medication, in a drip through my IV every afternoon.”

“Mine came through a drip, too.” I sign out and hurry to grab the pages that have just finished spewing from the printer. They’re useless to me now. I drop them into the shredder and listen to the razors buzz. “Let’s go. I don’t want to be here when she gets back. I don’t think I can lie anymore. I’m not as good at it as my dad.”

“Are you going to call him again?” Jesse asks, leading the way across the room.

“Yeah, I’ll call him … eventually. But I was thinking we could go to my family’s cabin by Seneca Lake first. It’s about an hour’s drive and gets cold up there in the winter, but we could—”

“I don’t think we should go anywhere your family’s been before. We don’t know how much Vince knows.” Jesse pauses by the door and turns back to me with a pinched look on his face. I know right away that I’m not going to like whatever he has to say next. “And I think it would be better if we split up for a while. I could drop you at a hotel and then—”

I shake my head. “No. I won’t leave you.”

“You have to,” he says, his tone taking on a hard, stubborn edge. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You would never hurt me.”

“No, but the Thing in my head could kill you. It came pretty fucking close in the car.”

The Thing in his head
. In our heads. In our minds, our—

“I can’t risk your life like that,” he says, rushing on before whatever realization is tickling around between my ears can fully form. He takes my hand, squeezes my cold fingers. “I’m going to take you to a hotel a few towns away. Then I’ll find someplace to hide and call you with—”

“Sir! Sir!” The woman’s shout comes from just outside, near the front desk. “Sir! You have to sign in. And visiting hours are over. Sir, stop! You can’t go down there.”

“I’m looking for two missing children, ma’am,” comes a deep, syrupy voice I recognize immediately. “I have reason to believe they might be on this floor.”

Jesse’s grip on my hand turns deathly. He’s recognized the voice, too.

Agent Bullock has found us.

Jesse

Dani and I press our backs against the wall just inside the break room door, holding our breath as Agent Bullock describes the two teenagers he’s looking for. I close my eyes and cross my fingers, hoping the nurse at the front desk doesn’t know we’re back here. There wasn’t anyone at the desk when we walked by. Maybe she’ll send the agent off to roam the halls and Dani and I can make a run for the elevator.