“It’s just a dream,” Skye whispered. “It’s just a dream.” Then the world as she knew it fell away.
Twenty
It was ten minutes before her night shift began at Magnolia Manor, and Lydia Chance was trying to dislodge a popcorn kernel from between her teeth with the tip of her tongue when she heard the scream. She wasn’t particularly alarmed. Residents in the Verandah Wing were known to cry out in their sleep now and again.
She left the break room and jogged down the hall, trying to figure out who was making such a racket. When the sound rang out again, Lydia could tell the ruckus was coming from Mrs. Kale’s room.
She was surprised. Old lady Kale could spit up a monsoon, but Lydia assumed it was her only trick. She hoped that she wasn’t adding hollering to her repertoire. Lydia opened the door and saw a terrified-looking Mrs. Kale sitting up in bed with her fingers stuck in her ears.
She blinked. What in the world? Her glance immediately went to Emily’s bed. The young woman was staring at the same water spot on the ceiling, but her mouth was opened into a wide O and she was shrieking.
“Emily?” Lydia said, rushing to her side. She still didn’t quite believe what she was seeing.
She rested a hand on the young woman’s shoulder, and Emily’s head slowly swung in her direction and her rubbery arm tried but failed to reach out to Lydia before it flopped uselessly against the mattress.
“Where’s Colin?” she slurred.
Lydia felt a wave of dizziness, and the last thought she had before her knees gave way was, That was no reflex!
“Did you have any kissing dreams?” Rhianna asked. She smacked the back of her hand as Chelsea emerged from behind her curtained screening booth.
“No,” Chelsea said. “But I was flying, which was very cool. What did you dream?”
“I was riding bareback on an elephant, eating kumquats from a crystal bowl,” Rhianna said with a smile. “It was all very civilized.” She pointed to the booth next to the one Chelsea had just come from. “Skye still in there?”
“Guess so,” Chelsea said.
“We better drag her out if we’re going to make it to the amusement park on time.” Rhianna shook the curtain. “Hey, Dream Weaver, let’s shake a leg.”
There was no response.
“Skye?” she said, trying again. Rhianna shrugged. “I thought this one was hers.”
“I thought so too.” Chelsea drew back the curtain to reveal an empty booth. “Maybe we were wrong.”
“Wait a minute,” Rhianna said, sniffing the air. “I can smell her perfume. This was definitely her booth.”
“I’ll ask the receptionist if she’s seen her.” Chelsea headed in the direction of the exit.
“We’re looking for our friend,” Chelsea said, addressing the woman behind the desk. “Blonde hair, blue eyes. Did she leave?”
“No,” the receptionist said. “I didn’t see her, and I haven’t moved from this spot.”
“Is there another way out?”
“No. One way in, one way out.”
Rhianna and Chelsea peeked under the other curtained booths and called Skye’s name. After combing the entire theater, and looking into each booth twice, they had nowhere else to search.
Twenty-One
“That will be a buck fifty,” Wanda Myers said, handing a sausage dog and bun over to one of her regulars, a lawyer named Ernie who had an office across the street.
She heard snickers and knew without looking it was those same two high-school girls from St. Andrews Academy who’d been teasing her for the last few days. They sat on a bench directly behind her hot-dog cart.
“It’s a groovy granny,” one said, shrieking with laughter.
“It’s not the Mod Squad; it’s the Menopause Squad,” said the other.
“Twiggy wears Depends!”
Wanda chuckled to herself. Twiggy wears Depends. That was a new one. Those girls were nothing if not sharp, as they darn well ought to be. Their parents spent plenty of money so they could attend that fancy private school of theirs.
Wanda got teased all the time, but she never let it ruffle her tail feathers. She knew she looked like a refugee from the sixties, with her hot pants, go-go boots, and her wild yellow hair spilling out of her floppy vinyl hat. Sometimes men would see her from the back (she still had the shapely gams of a college girl, but wore fishnet panty hose to disguise her spider veins) and whistle or let out a catcall, but soon as she turned around—wow, would she give them boys a start.
“Excuse me, ma’am. I’m sorry,” they’d stammer when they realized they’d been getting all worked up over someone old enough to soak her teeth in a glass.
Wanda checked her watch. Fifteen minutes to four. Time to pack it up.
“Hey, Hot Dog Hag!” someone yelled from a car and tooted his horn. Wanda waved and blew kisses. She’d had a hot-dog cart in downtown Birmingham for going on ten years and was a fixture in the city. One of the alternative papers had dubbed her “Hot Dog Hag” a few years back and it stuck. Now and again one of the TV news stations ran a human-interest story on her. Every year a few women (and occasionally some men) dressed up as the Hot Dog Hag for Halloween. She was as much a part of Birmingham as the fifty-six-foot cast-iron statue of Vulcan that loomed over the city.
She wheeled her cart in the direction of the garage she stowed it in every day. Chub showed up to help her, just like always.
“Let me get that for you, Miss Wanda,” he said, taking the cart from her. Wizened and white-haired, Chub was one of the older homeless men who hung out downtown. He had a genteel air about him even though he lived in a cardboard refrigerator box under a bridge.
“Thanks, Chub,” Wanda said. “Gotta run. It’s my favorite time of the day.”
The girls were still sniggering as she strutted by them, wagging her long hot-pink fingernails. She ignored them, because frankly she felt perfectly comfortable in her own skin.
It was one thing if you were a weirdo and you didn’t know it, like Tammy Faye Bakker when she was married to Jim. But it was another thing to work at being weird the way Wanda did. How else would a seventy-one-year-old woman get so much attention?
Wanda made it to her apartment just in time to hear the swell of the theme music. She popped open a diet A&W root beer, shooed her two ferrets off her couch, and reached for the remote. She turned the TV to Talk to Me, hosted by Gayle Garfield. And didn’t Gayle look pretty as a picture in her tomato-red dress? Wanda thought she was a lot more fetching than people gave her credit for.
The show’s title was “Getting Your Man to Commit,” not a topic Wanda was particularly interested in, so she only watched with half an eyeball.
Ever since she’d gotten her heart broken, Wanda had given up on trying to figure out men. A little over a year ago she’d foolishly eloped with Harvey Hart, an out-of-work sculptor who was fifteen years her junior. Six weeks after their wedding date she caught him in their bed with another man. Now she’d sworn off men and was writing her autobiography, tentatively titled Confessions of a Hot-Dog Hag.
“Next up, a surprise guest,” Gayle said. “Meet the woman who managed to land one of the country’s most eligible bachelors.”
Gayle certainly knew how to tease her audience. Wanda tried to guess who the bachelor was.
“I’d like to introduce my special guest, Susan Blaine,” Gayle said after the break. “Susan, as most people know, is married to Ryan Blaine, or ‘Bad-Boy Blaine’ as he used to be called back in his salad days. This is her first interview after her tragic accident last year.”
Susan Blaine? Wanda, like millions of gossip-loving Americans, had devoured all the details about Susan’s accident and subsequent surgeries, but Wanda especially remembered her because she’d once struck up a friendship with a street person who could have been Susan’s twin. What was the broad’s name? Ev
er since she hit seventy, Wanda’s mind was like the Mousetrap board game: information kicked around a maze of obstacles before it came rattling down the chute.
The street woman had loitered around Wanda’s cart—a big-eyed skinny thing wearing a ragged Johnny Cash t-shirt. Wanda, who could strike up a conversation with a bale of hay, chatted up the girl and even took her out for a cup of coffee a couple of times. Judging by the mud-colored crescents under her eyes and her twitchy hands, the woman was likely a drug user. Didn’t bother Wanda. When you sold hot dogs on the streets every day, you met your share of shady characters.
About a week after she’d met the street woman, Wanda had been watching Animal Planet and a woman named Susan Sims (she was not yet married to Ryan Blaine and was still a complete nobody) appeared on one of the shows as a guest animal behaviorist. Wanda couldn’t get over how much Susan Sims looked like a coiffed and cleaned-up version of her street buddy.
When Wanda saw her new friend the next day hanging out in front of a pawnshop, she approached her, saying, “They say everyone has a twin walking around in this world, and, honey, I think I’ve found yours.”
The street gal took an immediate interest, wanting to hear all the particulars. She even smiled for the first time ever, saying, “Isn’t that something? Imagine someone who looks like me being on TV.”
By this time Wanda had taken a shine to the pitiful alley rat. Over the next few days she went out of her way for the girl, giving her a makeup kit she’d gotten free from Estée Lauder and some old clothes from her closet. She’d even treated her to a few free hot dogs. But things had soured fast when Wanda caught the woman trying to sneak a few bucks out of her till. She cussed the little larcenist up and down, and after that day she never saw her again.
“Welcome, Susan,” Gayle said to a woman with short spiky blonde hair. When Susan appeared on Animal Planet a little over a year ago, her hair had been long enough to skim her shoulders, and it hadn’t been commonly known she was involved with Ryan Blaine.
As the camera panned in for a closer shot of Susan, Wanda could see how much the car accident had banged up her face. Now, instead of looking like the street woman’s twin, Susan looked more like a sister or even a cousin.
“So glad to have you here,” Gayle said excitedly, seizing Susan’s hand as if she were her very best friend. “So tell us what every woman wants to know. What’s Ryan Blaine really like?”
“A little bit clumsy. He’s always tripping over his big feet or breaking things,” Susan said with a laugh. “But he’s such a great kisser I forgive him.”
Wanda wasn’t confused by what Susan was saying but by how she was saying it. She turned up the volume on the remote.
“Is he, now?” Gayle said, her mouth opened wide, looking into the camera as if sharing a private joke with the viewing audience.
“He’s pretty good at most everything he does.”
There it was again. “Most everything” came out “moth everything.” No mistaking it. Susan lisped.
The interview continued as Wanda’s mind raced. She’d nearly forgotten the street gal had lisped. Surely it had to be more than a coincidence that Susan Blaine lisped as well.
“So what do the two of you argue about?” Gayle asked. “Do you have a pet peeve when it comes to Ryan? And what does he nag you about?”
“Believe it or not, sometimes Ryan misses the hamper when he takes off his socks,” Susan said. The audience clapped and laughed in recognition. “He also thinks I read too many gossip magazines,” she continued. Gossip coming out as “gothip.” “And he hates my Johnny Cash CDs. He makes me play them in my office with the door shut.”
Johnny Cash? Wanda nearly choked on her soda. The street girl had also been a huge fan. What was going on? Had Susan lisped during her appearance on Animal Planet? She’d only caught the very tail end of the show, but Wanda thought she’d remember such a distinct speech impediment.
Two women who lisped. Two women who were fans of the same country singer. Two women who could pass for identical twins. When Wanda suggested to her street buddy she’d seen her “twin sister” on television, she hadn’t meant it literally, but as she watched Susan Blaine on Talk to Me it seemed the two almost certainly had to be related.
Was she Susan Blaine’s twin sister? Did Susan even know about her twin’s existence, or was she a secret she’d prefer to hide, especially now that she’d married a big shot like Ryan Blaine?
Wanda’s curiosity got the best of her. She decided the only way to get answers to her questions was to write Susan Blaine a letter.
Twenty-Two
Caroline was still in bed even though it was nearing lunchtime. Yesterday Ms. Waters had come into her room and issued a strong warning. Caroline was not to go into the Verandah Wing and see Emily for any reason, and if she did, the staff would consider using restraints.
“It’s for your own good,” had been the despicable woman’s parting words.
Caroline refused to meet her eye or acknowledge a word Betty Boop said. This morning, at about seven a.m., during the shift change, when most of the staff was gossiping in the break area, she had crept out of her room and snuck into Emily’s. She found Mrs. Kale snoring in her old bed, but Emily’s was empty—the sheets and covers made up, the IV gone. There wasn’t a trace of her left.
Caroline clenched her jaw. Obviously Ms. Waters had moved Emily to another room in hopes of tricking her. Well, she’d underestimated Caroline. There were twenty rooms on the Verandah Wing, and she intended to search them all.
She left her old quarters and made her way along the corridor, peeking into every room. It took her nearly an hour, but she managed to scour the entire wing.
When she came to the last room and there was still no sign of Emily, she felt like tearing her hair out. What had happened to her roommate? What had Dixie Waters done with her? Then a sobering notion occurred to her. Maybe Emily hadn’t been moved. Maybe she’d left this place the way most of the residents did, on a stretcher, a sheet covering her stilled features. After all, Emily had become extremely dependent on Caroline. Maybe when the poor girl woke last night and saw she was gone, she’d lost hope.
Caroline returned to her bed and remained under the covers in one of the darkest funks of her life. She decided she would not speak, eat, or leave her bed until she found out exactly what had happened to her roommate.
Twenty-Three
Emily heard voices. People talking in low, serious tones. She heard the name “Emily” repeated several times. As soon as she opened her eyes, the room grew silent and a penlight blinded her.
“Please blink twice if you can understand me,” said a male voice. She lifted a hand to her face to shield her eyes from the brightness. Her hand was so heavy it felt as if it were encased in a block of cement.
Three doctors were huddled around her bed, clipboards in hand, clinically scrutinizing her as if she were a new strain of mold growing in a petri dish.
“This is a fruitless exercise,” said the female of the group. “It’s highly unlikely the patient can understand—”
“I understand you just fine,” she said. Her speech sounded thick and slurred to her ears, as if her tongue was too large for her mouth.
The doctors’ cool appraising expressions were replaced with looks of shock when she spoke. One let out a gasp, and another dropped his penlight.
“Would you...could you...answer a few questions?” said the tallest doctor. He had a dark mustache shot with gray and a pockmarked face. His name tag identified him as Dr. Perry.
I’m the one who needs to be asking the questions, she thought. Unfortunately, she had trouble deciding where to begin. What kind of mess had she gotten herself into now?
“I’ll try,” she said. Remaining awake was such an effort. Sleep lapped away at the edges of her consciousness, threatening to blot her out entirely.
“Do you know your name?” he asked.
“Emily?”
She was simply repeating what the doctors had said earlier. Was Emily her name? What had happened to her?
“What year is it?” the same doctor asked.
Her head throbbed. Stop bombarding me with questions, she wanted to say. I’m still trying to figure out my name. Obviously her first name was Emily, but what was her last name? How could she not know?
“The year?” the doctor repeated.
“I’m working on it,” she said. The wheels of her thoughts turned sluggishly as if coated in mud.
“What’s nine times nine?” asked the female doctor, clearly eager to jump into the game.
Finally, a question she could answer. “Eighty-one,” she said, triumphantly. At least some of her synapses were merrily firing, even if others were taking the day off. “And eleven times eleven is 121,” she added, showing off a little. She hoped they wouldn’t ask any twelves; she was rusty with those.
“What’s the year?” asked the tall doctor again. She closed her eyes, valiantly trying to retrieve that slippery bit of data in the murk of her mind. The year eluded her, but other memories were rising up from the silt. There was the sound of a radio and an elderly black woman in a rocking chair. Yes! The woman’s name was Caroline and she sang off-key and rubbed her legs. Or was she just part of a dream? No. She didn’t think so.
“Where’s Caroline? I want to speak with her, please.” Caroline would help her make sense of this. The old woman had known her before she’d landed in the hospital with all these quiz-happy doctors.
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