distressing
associations
in
Wrickenridge,’ Dr Peters, my consultant psychiatrist, told them. ‘Sky needs absolute rest and no stress.’
She gave them a recommendation for a convalescent home in Aspen and I was duly registered and assigned my own room, something we could only afford thanks to the generosity of an anonymous benefactor from Vegas who had heard about my case on the news.
‘This is a loony bin, isn’t it?’ I asked Simon bluntly as Sal y unpacked my few belongings into the chest of drawers. My room had a view of the snowy gardens. I could see a girl walking round and round the pond, lost in her own world, until a nurse came out to fetch her in.
‘It’s a nursing home,’ Simon corrected me. ‘You’re not fit to go back to school yet and we couldn’t afford to stay in Vegas any longer, so this is the best we could come up with.’
Sal y stood up and shoved the drawer closed. ‘We could go back to the UK, Simon. Sky might feel better among her old friends.’
Old friends? I’d kept up with some of them on Facebook but somehow the old closeness had evaporated the longer I was away. It wouldn’t be like going back to how it had been.
Simon gave me a one-armed hug. ‘If that’s what it takes, we’l do it, but one step at a time, eh?’
‘We’ve got classes we have to teach at the Arts Centre,’ Sal y explained. ‘But one of us wil be over every day. Do you want to see your friends from Wrickenridge?’
I played with the curtain cord. ‘What have you told them?’
‘That you’ve had a bad reaction to the trauma of your kidnapping. Nothing too serious but you need time to recover.’
‘They’l think I’m crazy.’
‘They think you’re suffering—and you are—we can see it.’
‘I’d like to see Tina and Zoe. Nelson too if he wants to come.’
‘What about Zed?’
I leant my head against the cool glass. The gesture gave me a sudden flashback—a tal tower, neon signs. I shuddered.
‘What, love?’
‘I’m seeing other stuff now—stuff that makes no sense.’
‘To do with Zed?’
‘No.’ And it wasn’t, I realized. Zed hadn’t been there. And I’d been stal ing. I’d promised Victor I would try. Maybe if I saw Zed, it would help get things straight. ‘I’d like to see Zed too—just for a little while.’
Simon smiled. ‘Good. The boy’s been worried sick about you, phoning us every hour of the day and most of the night.’
‘You’ve changed your tune about him,’ I murmured, suddenly remembering clearly the argument we’d had about him a month ago. Hadn’t Zed said he loved me? So why did I feel as if he was my enemy?
‘Wel , you can’t help but like someone who walked into a trap to get his girl out.’
‘He did?’
‘Don’t you remember? He was there when you were injured.’
‘Yes, he was, wasn’t he?’
Simon squeezed my shoulder. ‘See, it’s coming back.’
The next day passed quietly. I read my way through a pile of novels, not leaving my room. My carer was a motherly woman from California who had a lot to say on the subject of the Colorado winters. She came in and out al day, but left me largely to my own devices.
At around five, just before she went off shift, she knocked on the door.
‘You’ve visitors, honey. Shal I send them up?’
I closed my book, my heart rate accelerating.
‘Who is it?’
She checked her list. ‘Tina Monterey, Zoe Stuart, and Nelson Hoffman.’
‘Oh.’ I felt a mixture of relief and disappointment.
‘Sure, send them up.’
Tina put her head round the door first. ‘Hi.’
It felt an age since I’d seen her. I hadn’t realized how much I’d missed her explosion of ginger brown dreadlocks and her outrageous nails.
‘Come in. There’s not much room but you can sit on the bed.’ I stayed in my chair by the window, knees drawn up to my chest. My smile felt fragile so I didn’t push it too far.
Zoe and Nelson fol owed her, al looking a bit awkward.
Tina put a pot of pink cyclamen on the bedside table. ‘For you,’ she said.
‘Thanks.’
‘So …’
‘So how are you, guys?’ I asked hurriedly. The very last thing I wanted was to explain my total y messed up brain. ‘How’s school?’
‘Fine. Everyone was worried about you—real y shocked. Nothing like this has ever happened in Wrickenridge before.’
My gaze drifted to the window. ‘I don’t suppose it has.’
‘I remember joking with you about that when you first came—I feel awful that you had to find out I was wrong. Are you, you know, OK?’
I gave a hol ow laugh. ‘Look around you, Tina: I’m here, aren’t I?’
Nelson got up abruptly. ‘Sky, if I could get the guys who did this to you, I’d kil them!’
‘I think they might be dead already. At least, that’s what the police think.’
Tina hauled Nelson back down on the bed. ‘Don’t, Nelson. Remember, we promised not to upset her.’
‘Sorry, Sky.’ Nelson put his arm round Tina and kissed the top of her head. ‘Thanks.’
What was this? I couldn’t help but grin—my first genuine smile in a very long while. ‘Hey, are you two
…?’
Zoe rol ed her eyes and offered me a stick of bubblegum. ‘Yeah, they so are. Driving me crazy, the pair of them. You’ve got to get straightened out, Sky, and keep me sane at school.’ Thank God for Zoe making fun of the madness—it made me feel a lot more normal.
‘When, how?’ I mimicked one of Tina’s favourite gestures—a pale imitation of her long-nailed beckon but it was something. ‘Give me the details, sister.’
Tina looked down, a little embarrassed. ‘When you were, you know, taken, Nelson was real y great.
Stopped me losing it big time. I thought it was my fault—what with the car and everything.’
Nelson rubbed her forearm. ‘Yeah, Tina saw my good side for once.’
‘I’m so pleased—for you both. You deserve each other,’ I said.
Tina laughed. ‘Is that, like, a Chinese curse?’
‘No, you dweeb,’ I threw my cushion at her, ‘it’s a compliment.’
They stayed for about an hour. As long as we kept off the subject of my abduction, I felt fine. I had no problem remembering things about school, no pain, no confusion. I began to feel like my old self.
Tina checked her watch and gave the others a nod. ‘We’d best go. Your next visitor is due at six.’
I gave them each a hug. ‘Thanks for coming to see the poor crazy girl.’
‘Nothing wrong with you that a little time won’t put right, Sky. We’l be back the day after tomorrow.
Sal y said she thought you’d be here at least until the end of the week.’
I shrugged. Time didn’t seem to mean so much to me. I’d stepped out of my normal routines. ‘I expect so. See you then.’
They left, exchanging greetings with someone in the hal . I went to the window to watch them go but I couldn’t spot the car park from my room.
There was a soft knock at the door.
I turned, expecting to see Sal y. ‘Come in.’
The door opened and Zed stepped over the threshold. He paused, unsure of his welcome.
‘Hi.’
My throat seized. ‘H … hi.’
He pul ed a massive gold box tied with a red satin ribbon from behind his back. ‘I come bearing chocolate.’
‘In that case, you’d better sit down.’ I sounded calm but inside my emotions were tossing like palm trees in advance of a hurricane. That tidal surge of feeling was coming back.
He didn’t sit. He put the box on the bed then came to stand beside me at the window.
‘Nice view.’
I clenched my teeth, keeping the door in my head firmly shut against the surge. ‘Yeah. We crazy people get to go out earlier in the day. I’m told there’s a snowman down in the orchard that looks like the head nurse.’ My fingers were shaking as I rested my hands on the sil .