Page 83

I squinted at the impossibly tiny handwriting. “What does all that say?”

“Oh, just lunatic ravings,” Indy said dismissively.

“Is that my name right there?”

“Maybe.”

“I can’t read anything else,” I said.

“You’re not supposed to be able to. It’s a secret.” He was already drawing a new picture in his notebook.

“It’s Olivia Rodrigo lyrics,” I said, goading him.

“Very funny.”

“Is it nice? Or are you cursing me or something?”

“I would never curse you,” Indy said, his expression suddenly serious. “You’re the best person here. If I liked girls, I would like you so much.”

“Thanks,” I said. I pushed the thin covers off my legs. One of my socks was missing. “Did breakfast already happen?”

“Lucky for you, it did not, and it’s all thanks to me. Are you ready for sausage surprise? The surprise is that nobody knows what the sausage is made of! Personally I think it’s horse testi—”

“Stop right there!” I said.

“Sorry. Just hurry up and get dressed.”

“Why?” Almost everyone at Belman went to breakfast in their pajamas. Some people never changed out of them.

“I can’t escort you to the cafeteria with you looking like that. Not on my last day here.”

The words hit me like a sucker punch to the stomach. “You’releaving?”

Indy nodded. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But I’m totally cured.” Then he laughed—but it was a bitter one. “Just kidding. My insurance won’t pay anymore.”

“Indy, they can’t—”

“Of course they can,” he said. “Hello, capitalism? But I had a long talk with Dr. Ager yesterday. She thinks that if I keep taking my meds and whatever, I’m going to do okay out there.”

My mind struggled to process what Indy was telling me.He’s going home. They say he’s going to be all right. Why is this happening so quickly? Why didn’t anyone warn me?“Do you want to go?” I asked. “Are you ready?”

He rubbed his eyebrows. They’d grown almost all the way back in. “You know what Hunter S. Thompson said?”

“I’m sure he said a lot of things,” I replied. “He was afamous writer.”

“Very funny. He said that the only difference between the sane and the insane was that the sane had the power to lock up the insane. Which means if Dr. Ager doesn’t have the power to lock me up, then there’s no difference between me and her, which means that if she’s sane,I’msane.”

“That’s some … interesting reasoning.”

“Oh, it’s all bullshit!” Indy cried. “But I think I’m ready. I mean—Ihaveto be, right? So I am. I definitely am.”

What am I going to do without you?That was the question I couldn’t ask him.

When I looked down at Indy’s drawing again, a big, fat tear fell on it. The ink bled, distorting a careful blue line, and a hole bloomed inside the castle wall like a flower.

“I’m so happy for you,” I whispered.

CHAPTER 78