by Julie Daines
Scarlett stood up and wiped her damp hand on her jacket. Well, my jacket. “A perfect life.”
“I guess. Anyway, about eight years ago she got sick and died.”
“What happened to your dad?”
“I don’t know. He just never really looked at me again.” Why did that hurt so much more than the loss of my mother? When my mom passed away, I thought my life was over. I was right, but not for the reasons I’d expected. I’d recovered from Mom’s death. My own death in my father’s eyes tormented me daily.
Scarlett slipped her hand back into mine. “What did you do?”
“I cried, when I was younger. Then I turned into a terror, causing trouble at home and at school. When that didn’t get Dad’s attention, I turned to drugs. He never seemed to notice when I came home smelling like cigarette smoke—or worse. I’m not sure he even knew. I only caught sight of him a few times a month at most.” That was when Jay came along, scraping me off the bench and shoving me back into the game.
“I finally decided that nothing could reach Dad, so I gave up. I studied hard, got good grades, and figured my only hope was to get into a decent college as far away from him as possible. Make a new life, without a family.”
“Why did you run away on the day we met? You said you had to finish your last year of high school. So why leave early?”
She’d been honest with me about her miserable life, so I told her the cold, hard truth. My low point. My shame. “I tried to kill myself.”
“Crikey O’Reilly!”
“Yep. I took a bunch of pills and woke up hours later in a pile of my own vomit. How’s that for a nice anecdote? He never knew. I thought if I died he might finally care.
“That’s when I knew I had to get out before the end of the year. Before my powers of judgment failed me again. Three days later, I found you in the back of my car.”
She lifted both hands to my face, seeing with her fingers the furrow in my brow and the tight line of my lips. “Berks, like I said.”
“Berks?”
“Gits. Idiots. Parents.”
“Oh, right.”
Her touch lingered on my mouth. I think she did it on purpose this time, knowing how irresistible it was. I leaned down and kissed her, pressing her against me and lifting her body off the ground until she stood on my mother’s gravestone, equalizing our height.
“Scarlett?” I said.
“Yeah?”
“You’re the most interesting, amazing, and beautiful girl I’ve ever met.”
“What?”
“I just want you to hear the truth about yourself, in case no one has ever told you.” I brushed a lock of damp hair from her face. “I know what it’s like to be deserted by a parent, always wondering what you’ve done wrong to never deserve their love. You shouldn’t have to feel that way.”
She smiled. “Now you’re just taking the Mickey.”
I laughed out loud. “I swear you’re making these up.”
“I’m not. Honest. My gran watched a lot of telly. I picked up only the best of the Queen’s English. It means you’re teasing.”
“Well, I’m not giving you Mickey. I’m serious.”
She snorted. “Taking the Mickey. If you can’t get it right, don’t even try.”
She pulled me in for another kiss. I dropped the umbrella on the grass so I could give Scarlett’s lips my full attention.
Chapter Ten
Christian vs. The Receptionist
Scarlett wasn’t sure which direction she’d come from to get to the cemetery. I tried to get details. How big was the tree? Did she smell flowers? How long did it take her?
All she knew for sure was that she’d walked until she’d felt warmth from the sun. Then, worried she might be spotted, she hid in the bushes. She must’ve stayed there for hours, frozen from wandering all night in the cold and wet, wearing only her Mind the Gap T-shirt. Not to mention the stress of never knowing for sure if she was fully concealed or not.
When she’d heard me pull in and the car door open and close, she waited a few minutes then slunk over and quietly climbed in. Not much to go on.
We sloshed back to the Rover and cruised the surrounding roads, me searching for some kind of medical-looking facility, Scarlett basking in the warmth of her seat heater. I didn’t see anything promising. A couple of rich people’s houses, and that was all.
Most of the area surrounding the cemetery was Forest Park. Plenty of druggies hung out there, the backdrop of the occasional murder or rape that showed up in the news. It was a miracle she’d made it to the cemetery in the middle of the night alone. She must’ve been terrified. And then, when she thought she was safe, some moron had dumped her on the highway. I groaned out loud just thinking about it.
“What’s wrong?” she asked with her eyes still closed.
“Nothing. I was just thinking.”
“About what?” She turned her face to me.
“About what a loser I am.”
She laughed. “There’s still time. Football is a game of two halves.”
First of all, football has four quarters and has nothing to do with my mental state. I opened my mouth to ask for interpretation, but she cut me off. “Nope. I’ll let you figure that one out.”
* * *
The store for the vision and hearing impaired was near the complex of facilities surrounding the university’s medical center. I parked out front of the run-down building in one of the few spaces not labeled handicapped. Two giant fir trees shaded the parking lot from the sun that was making a feeble attempt to break through the clouds and drizzly rain.
“Can I help you find something?” an older man behind the counter asked. He had silver hair and thick, square glasses.
“Yeah. We’re looking for . . . a clock?” All kinds of contraptions—special telephones, red-tipped canes, flashing doorbells, and huge Braille machines—lined the walls and filled the rickety shelves. I didn’t know half this stuff existed. “What do you want, Scarlett?”
She pulled me aside. “I don’t need anything. I’m fine. You’ve spent too much on me already.”
“If you’re going to be here a few days, you need some things to make it easier. Really, it’s okay.”
“Won’t your dad get mad?”
“I told you. He never gets mad. He won’t even know.” But that made it sound like we were sneaking around behind his back. “What I mean is, he doesn’t care enough to pay attention. I spend his money all the time, and he never says a word. Besides, he likes you.” What else could explain his strange behavior last night?
She didn’t answer.
“A watch,” I told the old man. “Do you have something that tells the time out loud?”
He led us to a glass case filled with watches. “Most people don’t want a talking watch. They like Braille. Quieter. Do you read Braille?” he asked Scarlett.
“Yes.”
“A talking watch is for people who’ve recently lost their vision. They can’t read Braille too well. No one wants to check the time in the middle of church and announce to everyone there’s still half an hour to sit through, if you know what I mean.”
I did know what he meant. His point made sense. A watch that told the time to everyone in hearing distance broadcasted blind person. Scarlett didn’t seem like the kind of girl who would want that.
She remained silent. Reluctant, I assumed, to let me spend more money on her.
“Let’s look at that one.” I pointed to a watch with a thick black leather band and a silver face. It looked like something Scarlett would wear—it matched her boots.
“That’s a men’s watch.” He pointed to the other half of the display case where delicate, gold-banded watches or shiny silver ones sat in neat rows. “These are the women’s.”
“Bring out that gold one.” I pointed down. “And the men’s one. We’ll let Scarlett choose.”
He set them on the counter, and I put one in each of her hands. “What do you think?” I asked. It took h
er half a second to choose the black one. I smiled.
The man packaged it up and asked if we needed anything else. With a lot of persuasion, I convinced her to choose a book as well. I read her a bunch of titles, but in the end, she made me do the picking.
“Here,” I said, pulling one off the shelf and handing it to her. “It’s about a girl who falls in love with a vampire. All the chicks at school are in love with it.” The book cost almost as much as the watch. I could see why such a thing was a rarity for her.
The old man took his time ringing up the items, cataloging each one in an old ledger book before typing the price into a stone-age computer. I browsed the myriad pamphlets stacked on the counter that advertised everything from human sight-guides for hire to experimental eye treatments that could restore vision.
I picked up a few and thumbed through them. One caught my eye. On the cover, the words Sight for the Blind were printed in bold, clear letters, and under that, a picture of an attractive woman in a lab coat, with long hair pulled up in a bun, and wearing glasses.
Inside, it talked about a new silicon retinal microchip that could be surgically implanted to cure blindness.
“What’s this?” I asked the man.
“That,” he said with a touch of awe, “is Dr. Anne Wyden. She’s built a tiny computer chip that goes right in the eye. Sends images to the brain.”
“Does it work? Can it make a blind person see?” This would be perfect. What if we could get the procedure for Scarlett? I’d have to talk to my dad about it, but it’d be worth it if she could see.
“Someday, it’s going to change lives,” he said. “Right now, it might make it so you don’t bump into the furniture. Look on the back.”
I flipped it over and saw a series of pictures. The first showed a room with a couch, plant, and table lamp in normal vision. An average living room. The second showed the same scene with the use of the retinal chip. It was like looking at a black and white monitor with a resolution of four pixels per square inch. You could barely identify the objects. I guess if your choice was that or nothing, four pixels was better. I’d anticipated something a lot more sophisticated.
“She’s a brilliant doctor,” the old man continued. “And she takes on a lot of charity cases. Every year she offers the procedure to five people who could otherwise never afford it. But it won’t help everyone.” He handed me the bag of Scarlett’s stuff. “It only works on degenerative eye conditions; that’s what most of my customers have. Her clinic is just up the road. You could make a visit.”
“Thanks.” I took the pamphlet, and we left.
In the car, I helped Scarlett put on her new watch. She kept lifting the glass cover and touching the face. It had two raised bars at the twelve, and one bar at the three, six, and nine positions. The rest of the numbers were marked by a single dot. The hands were thick and sturdy.
“It looks good on you.”
“Thanks. I love it. I’ve never had a watch before. I have one clock back home that chimes the time every quarter hour. And, of course, the Shepherd had loads of stuff to help with all kinds of disabilities.”
“Let me try.”
She held out her arm. I closed my eyes and touched my fingertip to the watch. Nothing. I don’t know how she could tell time with that. I couldn’t even decipher which bumps were the hands and which were the numbers. “Nope.”
I pulled out of the parking lot and asked, “Scarlett, do you know what time it is?”
She chuckled and felt her watch again. “Two-oh-eight.”
Impressive. She was right on. “You’re a genius.”
“Just now figured that out, did you?” She reached her hand over and rested it on mine.
“I was thinking, maybe we should stop by Dr. Wyden’s clinic and just see what they can do.”
A little frown crossed her face, and she pulled her hand away. “They can’t do anything for me. I don’t have a degenerative problem. Born this way, wasn’t I?” She sighed. “I’ve never seen the color of a rainbow or the sky or a Christmas tree. But I imagine them in my mind, and I don’t know if I want that changed.” She ran her hands through the back of her hair, smoothing it. “I’ve been to places like this before. Not with computer chips but other gimmicks. Not really my thing.”
“But if you could see, wouldn’t you want that?” Who wouldn’t choose partial sight over darkness?
“I do see, in my own way.” She put her hand on my face. Very distracting when driving. “I can see you are worried, that you didn’t shave, and that you’re squinting in the sun. Do you want to borrow my sunglasses?”
The clouds had finally given way, and shards of sunlight reflected off the wet road. How did she know all of that?
I parked the car in front of the two-story clinic. Vinyl lettering on the front door read Center for Vision Repair, Dr. Anne Wyden. Shouldn’t there be some letters after her name? Like OD or MD or both?
“Brought me here anyway, didn’t you?” Scarlett asked.
“Let’s just go in and ask for a brochure. They won’t talk to us because we don’t have a parent. You can’t do anything in this country without a parent or legal guardian.”
“Let me see if I have time.” She smiled and checked her watch. “I guess I can spare a few minutes.”
I jumped out, trotted around the car, and opened her door for her. We walked into the clinic and up to the reception desk. A young girl with white-blonde hair sat behind the counter chatting on the phone. She held up a finger, indicating we’d have to wait.
The reception room had a few plush couches and lots of reading material in special, large-print editions. Nothing in Braille though. Everything looked new and expensive but still smelled like a doctor’s office.
She hung up the phone and smiled at us. “Hi, I’m Jenny. Do you have an appointment?” She looked about five seconds older than me.
“No, we just wanted some information. Do you have a pamphlet or something on the silicon chip procedure?” I asked.
“Dr. Wyden isn’t usually in on Saturdays. Would you like to schedule a consultation?” She grinned up at us.
“No. We’re wondering about the retinal surgery and if you have something we can read about it.” I held up the little pamphlet from the vision store. “Something more than this.”
“I have her business card.” She handed me a white card with a name printed in large, black ink. “It has her contact numbers and website. Do you want two cards?”
Scarlett snickered.
“Um, no,” I said. “We only came in for some information about the eye operation. You know, the basics of what Dr. Wyden can do and who is eligible, that kind of stuff.”
“Oh.” She twirled the end of a pencil in her hair. “Well, I just work here on the weekends. The regular scheduler is here on Mondays if you want to call then and set something up.”
Scarlett stepped up to the counter. “Look, we don’t want an appointment. We’re here to gen up, savvy? What can you tell us about Dr. Wyden?”
Apparently, she did savvy, at least that last part, because she smiled and said, “Let me think. She lives on the west side. She drives herself to work. Oh! She has a nine-year-old daughter that’s blind. That’s why she became a visual doctor.”
Visual doctor? How did Jenny land this job?
Scarlett snickered again.
The receptionist leaned in and whispered, “But I think she and her husband are separated. I’m pretty sure that’s right because they don’t have the same last name, and he lives in a totally different country.” She smiled at us like she’d just given us an early Christmas present. She looked at Scarlett, and her eyes went wide with enthusiasm. “I love your hair.”
“Thanks,” Scarlett said, obviously not flattered.
“So did you want to schedule an appointment? Dr. Wyden is here today, but she’s just doing research and not seeing patients. I have openings on Monday?”
A woman’s voice called out from the back of the building, “Jenny, is Ga
ry here?”
Scarlett dove to the floor in front of the counter.
“No,” Jenny said. She stared at the air where Scarlett used to be standing then looked at me. “Gary is her brother. Um, is your friend okay?”
“She’s fine. She just had to . . . tie her shoe.”
Jenny nodded. “Do you want me to tell her you’re here?”
Scarlett tugged on my pant leg, and I looked down. She was shaking her head.
“Nope,” I said. “But thanks for your help.” I squatted down to Scarlett’s level. “What’s up with you?”
“That’s the woman,” she whispered.
“What woman?”
“From my dream. The one in the operating room.” The words came out in a hushed scream.
I checked the photo on the cover of the pamphlet. I guess it matched Scarlett’s description. Scarlett must have recognized her voice. Time to go.
“Who’s here?” Dr. Wyden asked, appearing from the depths of the clinic. She did have a deep and soothing voice, just like Scarlett had said.
I flipped Scarlett’s hood up and grabbed her hand. I pulled her from the floor and attempted a casual exit. When I opened the front door, a gust of wind rushed in and blew her hood off, exposing Scarlett’s telltale pink hair.
“Scarlett?” Dr. Wyden called. It was a question, like she really didn’t know.
Chapter Eleven
Christian vs. The Detective
I tightened my grip on Scarlett, and we bolted for the car. I practically picked her up and tossed her into her seat then darted around the car and jumped in. I slammed the gears into reverse, and when I looked over my shoulder, Dr. Wyden was standing in the doorway to her clinic talking on her cell phone.
I burned about six months of rubber off my tires peeling out of the parking lot. “What was that all about?” I asked.
Scarlett fumbled with the seat belt, trying to keep herself steady as I zoomed away. “It’s her. I’m sure of it. I dreamed about her twice, and I’d know that voice anywhere.” She panted like she’d just sprinted the whole twenty-six-point-two. “Are they following us?”
