Page 48 of The Locked Ward
Driving the same half loop to Charlotte gives me plenty of time to think—and for my roaring anger to distill into a white-hot coal.
I make one stop, at a CVS. I make one phone call, to my bartender Scott.
“Everything okay?” he asks as I speed along, going precisely eight miles above the limit since I’ve heard police only pull you over when you’re ten miles over. “It’s not like you to be gone so much.”
I haven’t taken a vacation in eighteen months. I work six nights a week. I start to bristle, then realize Scott isn’t my enemy right now. He’s asking as a friend.
“Yeah, I’m just going through some family stuff… It’s complicated,” I tell him.
“So the mystery man doesn’t exist?”
I detect a hopeful note in his voice. I decide to ignore it. I’ve never thought about Scott that way, even though objectively he’s an attractive guy. But another complication is the last thing I need.
“It’s long story,” I say. It isn’t a lie: Everyone in my family is a mystery—my father, mother, and sister.
“Don’t worry. Take care of yourself. I’ve got things under control tonight,” Scott promises.
“Thanks.” I’m about to hang up; then I remember.
“Hey, Scott? If I don’t make it in tonight, make sure you lock up if you’re closing alone. Crime is going up everywhere, so…”
I can feel his surprise come through the line. He wants to ask—but holds back. Maybe he’s remembering I’m his boss first and friend second.
“Sure,” he says. “See you later.”
I park and lock my purse in the trunk. The unnerving routine—displaying my ID, walking through the metal detector, waiting at the guard’s desk for my escort, removing my jewelry, and taking the elevator to the silent hallway—already feels less intimidating.
Familiar, almost. It’s strange how quickly the human brain can embrace alien circumstances.
But when the nurse visually scans me, looking for anything that could be used against me during an attack, I feel a stab of anxiety.
I’m going into a dangerous place, filled with people accused of horrible things. The last time I saw the man with the silvery scar on his face, he homed in on me. I can’t let my anger stamp out that reality and weaken my guard.
Within no time, I’m stepping through the thick, narrow wooden door into the locked ward.
Two male residents are sitting in the common area on a low couch.
One is a preppy-looking guy with sun-streaked hair.
He’s talking while the other man, who has a short Afro, gazes into space, his eyes unfocused.
I catch snippets of the conversation as the aide leads me toward the meeting room.
“She tried to wait for me in Johannesburg, but I couldn’t get my parents’ plane that weekend,” the preppy guy is saying.
He looks like he should be holding court at a frat party. I can’t resist asking the aide why he’s here.
The aide gives a furtive look around. He probably shouldn’t tell me, but it must get boring here sometimes, and gossiping is a release.
“He’s a stalker,” the aide whispers. He names a wildly popular pop star, then tells me the man broke into the singer’s Beverly Hills home, thinking she was speaking directly to him through her lyrics. He triggered a silent alarm and security found him before the young woman came home.
“His parents didn’t want him in an LA hospital,” the aide confides. “They’re trying to keep the incident quiet. Not just because of her—they’re Silicon Valley billionaires. So they got him in here.”
I glance back at the blond guy. He’s sitting with one ankle resting on the other knee, his orthodontist-perfect smile flashing.
“He doesn’t look ill,” I say. “You’d never know.”
A lot of young women would flirt with him in bars or turn around to get a second look if they passed him on the street. He’s a predator draped in the effective camouflage of appealing facial features and an athletic build.
But he slips out of my mind as the aide leads me to the meeting room and I take my usual chair. I stare at the doorway, waiting for my sister. The momentary distraction didn’t diffuse my anger. My blood feels like it’s boiling.
A moment later, Georgia appears as silently as a ghost. She wears the beige sweatshirt and dark blue sweatpants I brought in from her closet. She looks even thinner than last time, with dark circles ringing her eyes.
I don’t have the slightest bit of sympathy for her.
I force myself to smile; I don’t want her to know what I’m feeling.
“You’re angry,” she says quietly.
“And you’re scared,” I reply without thinking. As soon as I say it, I realize it’s the truth. I can feel her fear.
“I brought you something,” I say.
Her eyebrows lift a fraction of an inch, and I hold up the photograph I had printed off my phone at CVS this morning.
It’s of me at my bar, smiling and sliding a soda toward whoever is holding the camera.
“Oh, Amanda,” she says.
Hearing her say my name, her voice filled with compassion, takes my breath away. No one except my parents has ever called me Amanda in such a familiar way. It’s like that version of my name was reserved for family. Like she understands those unspoken rules.
My voice isn’t as steely as I’d like it to be when I wave the photo closer to her face.
“Why did you do it?” I ask. “Tell me the truth or I’m walking out and never coming back.”
Then I see it, the change in her eyes. She understands what is at stake. She lifts her hand to cover her mouth’s movements from the overhead camera. My sister is finally going to be real with me.