“Is that so?” he asked. “I feel like you might not be telling me the whole truth.”
“I am,” I said, swallowing hard. This was not going as planned. If Dr. Emile didn’t believe me, I’d have to wait another week before he’d even think about letting me into the yellow ward.
“Okay.” He smiled and shook his head. “I’m not trying to alarm you, Lillim. I’ve already decided to release you to the yellow ward. I just want to be sure you’re actually getting better.” He said a little more, but I wasn’t listening really. I knew what he was thinking. I can’t alarm this fragile girl, or she’ll slip off the little edge of the world she’s clinging to so tenuously.
I let out a breath of relief and almost bolted to my feet. “You mean I can go to yellow?” I asked, and a stupid amount of relief flooded into me.
“Yes, of course. You’ve been very good.”
“Thank you.” I smiled at him, beaming from ear to ear. “I’ve tried my best.”
“I know you have, Lillim. If you keep it up, we may even let you have at home visits with your parents.”
“My parents?” I asked, a bout of confusion welling up in me. “My dad knows I’m here?”
Dr. Emile squinted at me like he was trying to read something in my face. “Of course. Who do you think signed you into St. Simon & Simon? Don’t you remember?”
“Not really.” I shook my head. If my dad knew I was here, why hadn’t he gotten me out of here? And why did he keep saying parents, plural? Wasn’t my mother dead?
“Lillim, what are your parents’ names?” he asked, sitting forward in his chair.
“Sabastin and Diana Callina. Though my mom liked to go by her maiden name.”
“Well, you do seem to remember their names,” he replied, and I wanted to ask him about my mom, only I was worried that would make him think I was crazier. Surely, I was just reading too much into his words, right?
He was about to say more when there was a knock at the door. Dr. Emile looked up at it, startled. “Come in?”
The door opened to reveal Nurse Lana. She smiled at him, but not at me. Evidently when I’d kicked her, I’d broken her bottom rib, and she was still a little bent about it.
“Dr. Emile, um… Lillim’s parents are here, and they would like to see her. Is that possible?”
Wait, my parents were here? What did she mean by that? How could my parents be here? I bit my lip. She must have misspoke. She must mean my dad was here. If he was here, then surely he’d take me out of here, right?
“Okay…” Dr. Emile mumbled, glancing from me to his notes and back to the nurse in a swivel that made me think of a bobble head doll. “That should be fine. Afterward, would you take her to the yellow room?”
I squealed. I couldn’t help it. I was going to the yellow room. Even if for some strange reason my dad wasn’t busting me out of here. I was really sure I’d be able to escape.
“Okay,” Nurse Lana said, but what I heard in her voice was “are you sure that’s wise?”
“She’s been very good, the last couple of weeks. Wouldn’t you agree?” Dr. Emile said, standing to his full six foot plus height.
I got up and moved toward the wheelchair when Nurse Lana scowled at me. “I think you’re well enough to walk, right, Lillim?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at me.
“Sure,” I replied and followed her out of the room, my nerves on edges. How could my parents be here to visit me? That didn’t make sense for so many reasons. I trudged after the bustling nurse, eyes on the floor as my stomach sloshed, and my skin began to crawl. Something was wrong, only I didn’t know what.
The nurse stopped in front of the door and smiled at me for the first time ever. Well, that’s not quite true, she’d smiled at me lots of times, but this was the first time it seemed to reach her eyes. “I know you’re nervous, honey. You haven’t been able to see your mom and dad for a while, but it’ll be okay. They love you very much.”
She swung the door open before I could respond to reveal a small room with a little stainless steel table in the middle that looked like it was bolted to the floor. Sitting there were my parents, smiling at me. Both of them.
My heart fell to my toes as my mother, Diana Cortez, clad in a black pantsuit with a navy blue blouse stood and walked over to me, bending down to wrap me up in her arms. She crushed me against her body, the smell of her perfume, like yellow daffodils, filled my nose. Tears sprang to my eyes, clouding my vision as I hugged her back.
“Mom!” I cried, burying my face in her shoulder. “Mom, I missed you so much!” I blubbered, clinging to her.
“Gee, I feel like chopped liver,” my dad said, smiling at me from behind her. He was wearing a brown leather bomber jacket over an untucked black and white checkered shirt that fell over the front of his jeans. He still had his scars, but they weren’t like I’d remembered them being. Instead, they reminded me of someone who might have had really bad acne as a child.
“Sorry,” I tried to say but I wasn’t sure it was audible through my crying.
“Quiet, Sabastin,” My mother said, voice slightly annoyed. “Don’t spoil my moment.” She stood up, gripping my hand tightly and bringing me over to a grungy grey couch that sat against the far wall.
“So how are things?” she asked, her voice strangely neutral. It was almost like she was gearing herself up, trying to make the situation seem like it was normal. Which of course, it wasn’t. How normal is it to visit your daughter in an insane asylum? Then again, I had been pretty sure she was dead, but here she was…
“I can’t believe you’re alive,” I said, and she stopped, just stopped, her spine straightening like steel.
“I don’t understand why you keep thinking I died.” She glanced at my father, shooting him a look that I was pretty sure meant, “I thought the doctors said she was getting better?”
Chapter 21
Like all things good, my parents’ visit eventually came to an end. As I was ushered out of the room, and toward the yellow ward, I wasn’t sure if I was crazy or not. I mean, I knew, just knew, that my mother was dead. But right now, I sort of hoped that maybe I was crazy and she was, really and truly, alive again.
“How was your visit, Lillim?” Nurse Lana asked as she walked me toward the yellow room. Her tone was strangely neutral as though she didn’t want to upset me if it hadn’t gone well. But it had gone well. It had gone so well that, for a moment, I was really sure it was all real. We had played Scrabble. I didn’t even have one memory of ever playing a board game with my parents, and we had played Scrabble.
I knew eventually I was going to wake up from this dream and realize that the best moment I had ever had was made up. The thought made a chill run down my spine.
“It was great,” I said, my voice catching in my throat as a traitorous tear rolled down my eye.
“Then why are you crying?” she asked, voice surprisingly comforting.
“Because I thought my mom died, and then I saw her. I think I really might be crazy,” I sniffed. “And if I’m not crazy, well then…” I cut myself off with a snort and wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. “Then she’s dead…”
“Honey, your mom is fine.” She smiled at me with a look that told me she thought I was crazy, but felt bad about it. I’d gone from being the object of scorn to the object of pity. I wasn’t sure it was an improvement. “Are you ready to see all your friends?” she asked as we stopped before a large yellow door with a little window in the middle. It was so bright yellow that it almost hurt my eyes to look at it.
“I’m okay,” I said, steeling myself.
“If you’re not, I can show your new room in the yellow ward. You could be by yourself if you need a moment.”
“I’m good,” I said, smirking. “Did you move all my things?” I added before I could stop myself. It was my attempt at a joke because I had no things. Nurse Lana’s face tightened into a mask as she nodded once at me and pressed her thumb to a little pad by the door. There was a click as the li
ght flashed green. She pushed the door open.
The room wasn’t as big as I’d expected. Sure, it was big enough to fit about a hundred people or so, but for some reason I’d been imagining a football field sized room. All around, kids within a few years of my age were playing games or reading. There were even a few tucked off in a corner watching a giant blue puppet on a television suspended from the wall.
“Everyone, this is Lillim. I know she has been gone a while, and to some of you she is a new face, but please try to make her feel welcome,” Nurse Lana said, before turning and exiting back through the door. It clicked shut behind me as a couple people looked up at me. Most, however, ignored me and the announcement.
“Hi,” I said feebly, waving with my good arm.
“Hello,” no one replied as the rest of them went back to what they were doing. I swallowed, unsure of what to do and decided to put on my big girl pants. I threw a little steel in my spine as I walked toward four familiar-looking kids surrounding a foosball table, their bodies hunched over the game in concentration.
“So, uh, how do you play?” I asked, trying to peer over the blond guy’s shoulder, but he was so big I could barely see past him. The girl across from him looked up at me, and my heart felt like it exploded in my chest.
Kishi Al Akeer, the girl who had gone with me into Fairy, stared back at me, her emerald eyes sparkling. “Lillim, they let you out of crazy jail!” she squealed just as the ball sailed past her defender into the goal. “Finally! These losers are so boooooring.”
“Kishi, pay attention!” Masataka said as he looked from the sunk ball to his partner and followed Kishi’s gaze to my face. “Oh, hey Lillim,” he said, elbowing Kishi in the ribs. “Focus.”
The world started to spin, whirling away in a haze as I stumbled back from the table. The burly guy I’d been trying to see over turned, and grabbed me by the arm before I could fall, steadying me.
“You okay, Lillim? You look like you just saw a ghost,” Caleb said as he glanced at the others, then toward the big observation window in the back. “Come on, let me help you sit down,” he added a little louder than he needed to. He bent his head toward me, as he half-dragged me across the slick white tile floor. “You need to keep it together, or they’ll send you back. Do you understand?”
I nodded dumbly as he sat me on in a blue recliner that faced out a window. The glass was filled with that mesh wire, and as far as I could tell, was over an inch thick. Beyond the window, a huge cathedral that reminded me of the great spires of Lot stood off in the distance, shrouded by cloud cover.
“I’m okay,” I replied, when he stood next to me, one huge paw on the chair next to my head. “How… how are you here?”
“Here? Um… cause I’m crazy?” Caleb replied, giving me a ‘duh’ look. “When you like to light things on fire, they tend to send you to places like this.” He gestured at the room. “But I haven’t burned anything in like three weeks.” He grinned at me. “They should give me a cake with some candles.”
“No one is giving you any candles, bud,” Joshua, my half-demon ex-boyfriend said as he sidled up on my other side. He glared at Caleb for a second before kneeling down next to me. “You need anything, babe?” he asked.
Before I could respond, Caleb stepped around the chair and looked down at Joshua. “She doesn’t need anything from you, Joshua.”
“That’s not what she said last night,” he replied with a smirk. Then he popped to his feet and sauntered, actually sauntered, away whistling with his hands in the pockets of his all blue scrubs. It was the same uniform I was wearing along with everyone else.
“Oh my god,” I mumbled, clutching my face in my hands. “I am crazy. I’m absolutely insane.”
“Um… yeah, but don’t take it personally,” Caleb said, shrugging. “We’re all crazy.”
“You… you don’t understand at all,” I mumbled, shaking my head as tears burst from my eyes and flooded out from between my fingers. “I thought I was a super hero, and you were my godly boyfriend and…” I trailed off as a blush burst across my face like a firecracker. Had I just said that aloud?
“Um…” Caleb said, fidgeting uncomfortably. “Okay,” he said after such a long pause that it might as well have been an hour later.
“We’re not actually dating, are we?” I asked, too scared to look at him through my splayed fingers.
“Not that I recall,” he said, and I could hear the nervousness in his voice as he backed up a couple steps. “We’re not allowed to date, anyway, not that…”
“Please stop talking before I die of embarrassment,” I said as a weird buzzing sound rang out from the door.
It swung open a minute later as Warthor Ein escorted in a kid who was looking down at his shoes. “Hello everyone,” Warthor said, his voice carrying across the room. “I’d like you to meet your new friend. He’ll be staying with for a while. He came in with his parents a few days ago, so some of you may recognize him.”
Kishi was standing next to me, though I hadn’t seen her approach. “Isn’t Walter dreamy,” she said in a low voice. Caleb glanced at her and smirked.
“Well, it’s true,” Kishi said, looking away embarrassed.
Walter, who looked just like Warthor Ein, glanced over at us and smiled. “Kishi would you show Connor around?”
Kishi nodded dumbly and started forward as the boy looked up. Connor McLain looked up and stared straight at me. His gaze seemed to bore into my very soul, his mouth twisting into a sly grin. “It’s okay, I recognize my friend Lillim over there,” he said, starting toward us, moving past Kishi as though she wasn’t even there.
I tried to get up, tried to do anything, but the world around me started to spin. I looked to Caleb for help, but he was already walking away, edging back toward his foosball table where Mitsoumi and Masataka waited, impatiently.
“Hi, Lillim,” Connor said, squatting in front of me so that we were eye to eye. “Remember me?”
“Um… maybe,” I squeaked. “Sort of, I think… I don’t know.” I probably would have kept babbling that way, but he chose that moment to run his hand through his hair, and my voice caught in my throat like a screeching train.
“What?” he asked as two octopus eyes stared back at me from his forehead.
Thank you for reading Hardboiled. If you wouldn't mind, please leave a review. If you are wondering what happens to Lillim next, you may want to check out Mind Games. As a special bonus, the first chapter is included on the next page.
You may also want to check out my other series. The first book is May Contain Spies.
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Chapter 1
The world outside the car windows whooshed by in an ever changing mishmash of color and scenery so by the time we left the parking lot of the mental hospital, the seasons had changed from summer to winter and back again. It was almost like watching my life pass before my eyes in the space of a moment. I shivered, hugging myself in the back of my parents’ old tan station wagon even though it was so warm inside the car, I was sweating.
My father turned around in the front passenger seat and smiled at me, lips stretching the acne scars on his face wide. His eyes darted from me to the back window where Mercer & Mercer slowly faded into the distance so quickly I almost didn’t catch it. Almost.
“Are you excited to finally be heading home, Lillim?” he asked, and the joy in his voice made my heart ache. Why? Because this couldn’t be real. Something was going on, only I didn’t know what. For the better part of six months, I’d been locked up in that mental hospital, and only after forcing myself to pretend everything I’d known was a lie, they’d let my parents take me away from their too bright walls and patronizing voices. Provided, of course, I kept taking my medication and stopped claiming my friends were werewolves
.
Yup, that’s right. I said parents plural because even though my mother had been stabbed to death, she was somehow in perfect health and driving our car over the bumpy road. It was unnerving because I could still remember what her face looked like in death, all slack-jawed and empty. A shudder ran through my body as my father stared at me like it’d never happened, like she’d never died and everything was perfectly normal. I almost wanted to believe it wasn’t true. It would be easier if I did.
But I couldn’t.
“Yeah.” I forced myself to smile, not sure if it reached my eyes or not. I hadn’t ever learned to lie very well with my eyes, so I turned my head to avoid further scrutiny and stared at the trees flashing by outside as we drove along. Their leaves were an assortment of yellows and orange, and in the bright light of the morning, the dew on them glittered, beckoning for me to believe they too were real. God, how I wished that was true. Why couldn’t it be true?
“Cupcake, is everything okay?” my father, Sabastin Callina asked. His gaze bored into me, searing into my flesh like a high intensity laser. I was reasonably sure he couldn’t read my thoughts, but it didn’t stop him from trying to see into the inner workings of my brain and suss them out.
“Of course! I’m going home.” I turned back in my seat, my hands twisting my beige seatbelt. “I’m just a little tired.”
“Did you not sleep well?” my mother, Diana Cortez asked, not taking her eyes from the road as she drove our little car. Her hands were locked at ten and two on the wheel. I’d remembered hearing you weren’t supposed to drive with your hands in those positions anymore, but old habits die hard, I guess. Then again, I’d never actually driven a car before…
“Not really,” I said because that at least was true. My dreams had kept me up all night. Every single time I closed my eyes a horrible feeling would crawl over my skin like an icy spider, chilling me to the core. When my eyes were shut, the darkness would overwhelm me. I’d start to see and hear things I couldn’t explain. I didn’t know what the dreams meant, but they didn’t seem good. “Had some bad dreams.”
Hardboiled: Not Your Average Detective Story (The Lillim Callina Chronicles Book 5) Page 17
