by Sophia Sharp
“Two months,” I said breathlessly. “How did you know? You weren’t here.”
“There was quite an uproar among the staff when you came in that night. You might not remember, but I was on duty then.”
“You were? Why didn’t you come see me?”
“Another doctor had care of you,” he answered smoothly. Then, with a twinkle in his eye, he added, “Why? Did you want me to?”
“No, I… I mean, um,” I stuttered, “I don’t really know how to answer that.”
“I was there, too,” Liz interrupted, almost as if she were boasting. “I came in that night as well.”
“I remember,” Doctor Frame said. “So, two of you came here two months ago. Why? Nobody could say. The next day, one of the most distinguished professors here leaves the school without a word—and takes his son with him.” His eyes met mine. He held his gaze. I blinked. How did he know about all that? “Oh?” he asked. “You look surprised. You didn’t think anybody else knew?”
“I… I didn’t know.”
“Everyone knows, Tracy. But, not many people connected the events. Not even me. Not until tonight, anyway. Wasn’t Chris one of the first people you met here?”
All I could do was stare. “How did you know that?”
“I saw you guys walking together before any of the other students arrived. Call it a hunch, but I think it’s more than just coincidence that he left with his dad the morning after you were admitted to the clinic, unconscious. People don’t just run from the academy. Not like that. And the headmaster paid you a visit a few days later. That’s unprecedented. It cemented the suspicion in my mind. And now here you are, with four of your friends, hauling in two bodies, out cold? It doesn’t take too much brainpower to understand something fishy is going on.”
I looked at the other girls for help. They were just as spellbound as I was. Eve met my eye and mouthed, “Who is this man?” If the doctor had connected events, who else had? Was everything really so transparent?
Doctor Frame exhaled again, and rubbed a hand through his hair. “I’m not going to ask you what it is, Tracy. There’s the Hippocratic Oath and all that. But I do want to tell you that I can help. If you need me to. If any of you girls are in any danger, you can tell me. If not – if it’s just my mind playing tricks on me – and I sincerely hope it is – then you’ll be happy to know that both of your friends are going to be okay. But, I suspect there’s something deeper than that.”
I bit my lip. Could I dare tell him what was going on? Could I trust him? “Why did you come back to Oliver Academy?” I asked spontaneously.
It was his turn to be surprised. “You mean after I graduated?”
“You were a student here?” Liz gasped.
“Yes,” I said, answering both of them at the same time. “Why did you come back to the island? You could have gone anywhere else.”
The answer that he gave was more frank than any I expected. “The whole time I was here in high school, I always felt like there was something going on here. Something none of us kids knew about. Beneath the veneer of this prestigious boarding school was some sort of secret. Something dark. Maybe, something dangerous. It was just a feeling I got from a lot of the things that went on around here. When I finally graduated, and nothing happened, I just felt like there was no closure. My suspicions about this place never left. Even when I went to med school, I couldn’t shake it from my mind. When I finished learning about medicine, Oliver Academy was still humming along as usual. But I felt as if I had to return. I had to find out what was causing that feeling.”
I took a deep breath. Doctor Frame’s answer was so honest. It confirmed that I could trust him. And his opinion was so similar to my own that it was shocking. I made the decision right there and then. What I was about to do went against everything the girls warned me about. But I knew we couldn’t handle the danger by ourselves. We needed an adult on our side. We needed someone with experience – even if that experience wasn’t that much greater than ours. Doctor Frame was the only adult I could trust. “I know what caused that feeling,” I began.
Liz gasped. Eve glared dangerously at me. But I had to take the lead. I had to take a chance. And so I explained, amid admonishing glances from all the girls, everything that had happened to me from the moment I fought Chris in the cave. I left the crystals out of it – I couldn’t talk about them anyway because of the oath – but even so, I was able to paint a descriptive picture. I told him about the man attacking me in my room. About Rob saving me. About dragging the attacker into the caves because we didn’t know what else to do. I told him about today. About coming to my room only hours ago to find two men rummaging through my stuff. I told him that the men were after something. At this point in my recounting, I lied. I told him we didn’t know what the men were looking for, but that we suspected that we could find the answers at Harvard.
Doctor Frame took it all in without comment. He just nodded at my story, listening carefully and not even blinking. When I finished, he raised his head and looked around the room. His glance took in all the girls.
“You’re all in danger,” he said quietly. “And you don’t know why. I don’t like it. Those people you told me about – the three men? They should not be on the island. You girls know about the caves. I assume you know what they were used for in the past?”
“Experiments went on down there with asylum inmates,” I said, shivering at the thought.
“That’s right. My suspicion is that they found something during that time that wasn’t fully revealed. And the people who are coming after you are somehow related to that. Somehow they’re linked to you, Tracy. Think! Do you have any idea what that link might be?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea,” I lied in my meekest voice.
He nodded. “I didn’t think so. But – at Harvard? You think you will find the answers?”
“Yes,” Liz said. “We know we will.”
“You have good friends,” Doctor Frame said to me, “to risk so much for you. This doesn’t involve them.”
“Whatever affects Tracy affects all of us!” Madison exclaimed. I was taken aback by her fervor—even though that wasn’t exactly the truth. They were all linked just as tightly to the crystals as me. Even if Madison was saying this only as a reply to what Doctor Frame knew, it was heartwarming.
“It’s obvious you can’t stay here,” the doctor continued. “Have you thought of what you’re going to do next?”
“A little bit,” I said. “There hasn’t been much time between everything.”
“Well, it’s clear to me that you need to get off the island,” Doctor Frame said, “away from here.” I blinked at the suggestion. He was the one suggesting that to us? “And I know how.”
I almost fell from my perch. “You do?” The rest of the girls seemed as shocked as I was.
“The staff here aren’t quite as limited in their movements as the students are. People rarely exercise the right, but we’re all allowed to take a weekend off to leave the island… to go to the mainland. See family. Go shopping. Things like that. We’re granted that leave once a year outside of holidays. Anyway, I know you didn’t ask for my help, but I don’t see any other way for you girls to stay safe.” He paused, and then nodded. “And I’ll do it. I will help you get off the island.”
“You will?” I asked.
He nodded once more. “There’s a small boat that is kept at the docks for just that purpose. It can take us all the way to the mainland.”
“Us?” Liz asked. “You mean… you’re going?”
“Someone has to navigate the waters, and I’ve done it before. Part of the reason nobody takes advantage of the offer is that people are afraid of the sea.”
“Wait, hold on a minute!” Ashley put up her hands. “There are docks? Like, aside from the one the ferry comes to every few months? The one that’s completely vacant right now?”
“There are places you don’t know of on the island,” Doctor Frame told her. “Places
reserved for just the staff. There’s another dock hidden north of here.”
“So we can just take the boat?” I asked. “And you’ll bring us to the mainland?”
Doctor Frame hesitated. “Yes. But, I don’t think it’ll be that simple.” He paused again, and then nodded as if making up his mind. “I’ll have to come with you to Harvard.”
My jaw dropped open at the suggestion. I was too shocked to speak.
“You’ll need somebody to get around,” he continued. “Think. When you get on the mainland, none of you has any money. You can’t drive. How are you going to get to Harvard?”
“Well…” I began. But, I didn’t know how to finish. “Actually, truth be told, I don’t think any of us had thought of that yet.” Our priority had been just to get off the island. That all hinged on the ambiguous abilities of Eve’s connection.
“You can’t do it without me,” Doctor Frame said. “And you need somebody to give you plausible deniability. You don’t know what the future holds. You always want to be able to come back here and finish your schooling. That won’t happen if you get yourselves expelled by running away. I can always take the heat, take the blame.”
“You would do that?” Liz gasped. “Why?”
“Because… it’s like I said. There are ancient webs of secrets hanging around this place. And it looks like you guys found yourselves tangled pretty deeply in one. Besides,” he added with a wink, “there aren’t many people whose company I enjoy around here.”
Chapter Eleven – A Journey Begins
In the end, we decided that writing Rob a letter actually was the best bet. Of course, since I insisted upon it, I was the one responsible for writing it. The words were surprisingly hard to write. How to explain so much so quickly? And writing was tangled up by the sort-of-not-quite-there-but-maybe type of feelings I thought I might be getting for him. At least we had time. Doctor Frame said we should wait for the storm to abate before leaving.
So there I was, pen in hand, a blank sheet of paper mocking me, when I heard the door creak open behind me. I didn’t pay it much mind, because Doctor Frame had been coming and going between rooms the whole time. But, then, I heard one of the girls gasp. I twisted around in my seat, and found Rob standing in the doorway.
“Rob!” I exclaimed, bursting out of my chair to throw myself around him in a hug. He held a large ice bag to his forehead, and gave a feeble attempt to fend me off.
“He-ey,” he laughed. “Easy there. Things still hurt.”
“Sorry,” I said, but I couldn’t contain my excitement. He was awake! He had a single black eye, and a pallid complexion besides, but he was up! “How are you feeling?” I asked anxiously.
“Like I’d been run over by a truck.”
“So what exactly happened down there?” Eve asked, coming up behind me. I realized belatedly that all the other girls were crowded around me. They all had invested just as much to get Rob here. Liz, however, was suspiciously absent.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I was just walking back from checking in on the man. I thought I had control of things. He was in his cell, and still bound as far as I could tell. Next thing I knew, something hard slammed into my back. I fell forward, hit my head, and… Well, I don’t remember much after that.”
“I can’t believe you’re alive,” Madison laughed.
“I can’t believe it either,” he said. He looked around at all of us, and took in the room of the clinic. “You guys brought me here?”
“Yeah,” I beamed. I was just so excited. Rob had survived! He had made it back from the bleak shadow that threatened to take his life!
“Thanks,” he said. Then he frowned. “But how on earth did you manage it?”
Before I could stop myself, the whole story came bursting out: coming to my room to find the two men, finding Rob in the caves, finding Mr. Stannis, struggling to drag them both here through the rain. While I was saying all that, Doctor Frame slipped into the room quietly. He made eye contact with me, but didn’t interrupt.
“So what are you going to do next?” Rob asked seriously once I had finished. His focus was completely on me.
I hesitated. Rob had a right to know. But we had decided as a group not to tell him. I looked back at the girls, at Liz especially. She was still seated by the window. “He has to know,” I whispered to her. She was the one most adamant about keeping things a secret. What I would say hinged on her reaction. I thought I would still tell him without her blessing, but I didn’t want to strain our relationship. Thankfully, after a moment, she gave a tiny, resigned nod.
“We’re leaving,” I said. “We have to go to Harvard. We think we can figure things out there. Why the man came after me. Who the people were in my room. That’s the only place we can find answers.”
“And what gave you that idea?” Rob asked.
“Some papers Eve found on my attacker link him to Harvard.” It wasn’t far from the truth, but it wasn’t the whole truth either.
“Then it’ll be dangerous where you go.”
“No, not really—”
“Yes it is!” he interjected. “I’m coming with you.”
I balked. “What?”
“You need somebody to watch after you. I know a few things. Besides, I have some friends in Boston.”
“You do?”
“Yeah. People we can stay with if we need to.” He paused, tapping his lips. “You’re not thinking of coming back after, are you?”
My eyes went wide. Was Rob really so perceptive, or were we really just that transparent? I looked back at the others for support, but they just kind of passively looked at me, as if they were saying it was my fault for getting into this. “I… I don’t know,” I admitted. “I guess it depends on what we find.”
“So it’s all of us, then,” Doctor Frame said from his corner. Rob whipped around. He seemed startled to find the doctor there. “I wasn’t expecting him to come, but I think we can make room.”
“He’s going too?” Rob asked incredulously.
“That’s right,” I said. “He’s the one who can get us off the island.”
Rob took a moment to come to grips with the fact. Finally, he nodded. “I’m Rob,” he said, extending his hand to the doctor. “I guess I owe you thanks for what you did.”
“John,” Doctor Frame said, clasping Rob’s hand. Suddenly he barked a laugh. “We’re breaking so many rules already. Once we leave the school I won’t be a doctor any longer. All of you can call me John.” He said it to everyone, but I thought he meant it specifically for me.
Liz bounded up from her seat and offered him her hand. “Elizabeth,” she said in a voice that came dangerously close to being flirtatious. “But I like to go by Liz – to my friends, anyway.” She flashed him a sultry smile. “Since we’re on first name-terms, that’s Madison, and Ashley, and Eve. And you know Tracy.”
“What do we do about Mr. Stannis?” Madison wondered.
“He’ll be fine,” Doctor Fr—John—answered. “My shift ends in a couple of hours. I’ve left a note for the nurse who’s here after me. The professor will last that long. More importantly, it gives us time to leave without anyone realizing it.”
“With luck, we’ll have a few days before anyone knows we’re missing,” Eve pointed out. “Even if we miss class, it’s not until the third or fourth day that the teachers will start wondering where we are.”
“And by then, we’ll be well on our way,” I said.
***
With Rob up, it didn’t take long for us to leave the clinic. Even though the worst of the storm had passed, by the time we reached the secretive second dock, tucked away in an unremarkable enclave on the east side of the island, we were all soaking wet again.
The boat looked old, but seaworthy. It was about twenty or thirty feet in length and had the captain’s cabin above deck and a lower level below. The dock was another story. Entire planks of wood were missing, rotted away, or destroyed by time. The flimsy rope that held the boat to the m
ooring looked ready to give way at any moment. In the cove, the wind howled between the rocks, and the water was turbulent. John led the way. He helped all of us on. Rob came last after holding up the rear. I was extremely glad Rob was last, because when it was my turn to step onboard, the boat lurched the other way, and I nearly plummeted into the sea before he caught me from behind.
“Careful,” he warned, helping me down. I smiled weakly at his warning.
When all of us were on the boat, John untied the flimsy rope and started the engine. It sputtered momentarily before revving into gear. Slowly, we started to drift away from shore. John said he couldn’t go any faster for fear of smashing into one of the rocks. Only when we were out of the cove, with the island fading in the dark behind us, did I breathe my first real sigh of relief.
I headed to the lower level, out of the rain. The other girls and Rob had all settled there. John, of course, was steering the craft in the main cabin. Waves rocked the boat, and the wind still howled even at sea, but for the first time in what felt like days, I felt safe. Nobody could reach us out on the water. I knew it was a transient type of safety, a false safety, but the relief was paramount.
I settled down beside Madison. Everyone else had their eyes closed. I felt like I could use some rest. After everything that had happened, we were all exhausted.
Just as I was about to close my eyes, Madison whispered to me, “Tracy?”
“Yes?” I answered, just as quietly.
“Do you think we’ll ever see Oliver Academy again?”
I thought about that for a minute. Then, I answered truthfully. “I don’t know.”
“I really hope we do.”
“How come?” I asked. In the few months I had known Madison, she had never revealed much about her past. Out of everyone else, she seemed to be the most attached to the school.
