by C. L. Bevill
A decision settled upon Jane like a warmed blanket. Carefully she retreated into the place where she couldn’t be seen by the people standing near the nurse’s station. She looked at herself, determining her strengths at the moment. She had clothing. She patted her jeans pocket. She had some money. She was whole and didn’t have handcuffs on her wrists to confine her.
Turning, she nearly ran into the orderly who’d brought her lunch. The young man examined her in a pitying fashion. “Too bad,” he said. “T’ought you were somet’ing else.”
Jane was frozen for an instant. The orderly could yell. He could try to grab her. Instead he raised and dropped his shoulders lightly, and a sigh of relief came out of her lungs. He wasn’t going to do anything to Jane or about her.
“Best to go down de back stairs,” he advised. “That shrink brought two fellas who look like dey played for the Saints once upon a time. Big collard green-eating men. Hold you down like you was a little stick or som’ting. Stick you wit’ more drugs, I’m t’inkin’.” He held something out in his hand. It was a battered business card with a name of a cleaning service on it. “Take it,” he said quietly, “Titus hires illegals all de time. Might need to work, you.”
Slipping past the orderly, Jane whispered, “Thank you,” even as she took the card and slipped it into a back pocket.
The young man shrugged again. “You don’t seem loony tunes to me. Don’t like dat fancy shrink’s attitude much. He t’inks his shit don’t stink. I’ve seen his kind before, me. Folks like dat gots too much power, dem. Go on, you.”
Jane threaded her way through the meandering hallways, passing other hospital employees, visitors, and patients. She looked over her shoulder, but no one was following her.
My name isn’t Margot Alder, and I’m not what that man says I am. She didn’t know what she was, but she knew she wasn’t some demented maniac. But psychiatrist trumps amnesiac patient in this place.
Jane decided evasion was the best tactic. She didn’t believe she was really insane. Well, I hear voices. Isn’t that a big symptom of paranoid schizophrenics? I need time to think about what’s going on. I need…
“To find out who I really am,” she whispered to herself. Someone left a note warning her she wasn’t safe. Something else was going on. That note was real. I felt it in my hands. I checked the writing on it to make sure it wasn’t mine.
You’re not insane, came that other voice. The masculine one. But you need to run.
And here comes the part where I’m doubtful again.
Oh, trust me, chère. You need to run. They’re here. And the other thing is here, too. The one who wants you in the darkness. Run like the devil was on your heels and find out what you need to know. Run and remember.
Jane negotiated her way through a crowd of people and found an exit sign on the opposite side of the hospital from where her room was located. She cast a rushed glance over her shoulder and found that no one was paying her any mind.
Her head had begun to throb again. She went down the stairs as swiftly as she could. Pausing once on the third floor, she listened to see if anyone was in the stairwell with her, but only silence lingered there.
The doctors would know she wasn’t in her room, if they didn’t know already. Dr. Mayhew would call security, and they would look for her. She didn’t think she’d broken any of the hospital’s rules, but whatever judgment Dr. Millet had, held precedence over her. An order of institutionalization? Is Margot Alder being committed? For her own safety and for the safety of those she would hurt?
The questions poured over her like little stinging insects, digging into the flesh of her reasoning. How would they know they had the right woman? How did Dr. Millet prove that Margot Alder and Jane Doe #7 were one and the same? Is there a photograph of me? Some kind of identification?
No, Jane decided. They had a name on a document. They had the hospital’s Polaroid photo of her. They had a doctor’s insistence that she was who he said she was and why would an M.D. lie about something like that?
He’s not an M.D., the voice came again. His voice. A man’s voice going off in her head as if she was listening to an iPod with ear buds. He’s one of them. He works for the one who wants you to suffer the consequences for your actions.
Jane inhaled. Her brain fluttered and flapped as she tried to ignore the words, but she couldn’t help herself. WHAT DID I DO?
The questioning thought was frantic and confused.
Just what the hell did I do? Did I lie, cheat, or steal? Did my family do something to this mysterious person’s family? I don’t think I’m a bad person, but I…don’t…remember…anything.
There wasn’t an answer and Jane was surprised. She controlled her breathing by inhaling and exhaling slowly.
She continued her descent down the stairs. There was a parking garage to one side of the hospital. She could use the breezeway to go there and slip out the other side of the garage. She didn’t know where she was at in New Orleans, but it wouldn’t be hard to figure out. If she had to sleep on a park bench or under an overpass, she would. She couldn’t go to the shelters now. The people hunting her would ask questions of the medical staff, and they would tell them what the social worker had suggested. Even Nurse Picou might mention she’d told Jane about the Women’s Shelter.
Once she’d seen a t-shirt that said “Paranoia. You only have to be right once to make it all worthwhile.”
Where did I see that? And more importantly, am I right now?
Jane made it to the bottom of the stairs and started to push the door open when someone pulled it open from the other side. The man paused in the act as his eyes found her startled face staring at him with large horrified eyes.
She stepped back. The movement was involuntary and a precursor to the act of flight.
The bald-headed man pushed into the stairwell and pulled the door closed behind him. In the brief instant the door had been open she saw that the sun had set and darkness was settled on the city like a sultry blanket.
The sound of metal meeting metal reverberated in the close area and made Jane recoil. He grinned down at her. She could see the little hemorrhages in his eyes from her attack on him. There was a half-healed red mark that underscored his chin and vanished around the edges of his thick neck.
Sluggishly, Jane stepped back one more time. The bottom step stopped her foot. She couldn’t take her eyes away from the man. Fear swelled through her, incapacitating her. If she turned to run up the stairs he would be on her instantly. If she tried to slip past him, he would catch her easily. He would hurt her again.
The roar of anger ricocheted so fiercely in her head that Jane wasn’t certain if she heard it in the stairwell, as well. But then she became convinced it was only in her head because the bald man did not react to it.
“Your name is Raoul,” Jane whispered. The murmured name was an invocation of utter distaste.
His grin grew broader. “And you’ll be saying it many times, too, you little bitch. I’m goin’ to beat you until the blood spills down your flesh like little waterfalls. Then when I’m done…”
The social worker’s words came back to Jane. What if your man finds you?
He’s not my man. He’s a sadistic animal, and I don’t need to be paranoid to understand he’s a threat. And hey…if he’s here, then I’m not the paranoid schizophrenic that Millet man said I am.
Jane even surprised herself when she abruptly launched herself at Raoul, kicking and shrieking.
Chapter 5
Who runs is followed. – Dutch proverb
The attack didn’t do anything except stun Raoul for the briefest of moments. After all, the man was several inches taller and had a hundred pounds on Jane. She was weak from lying in a hospital bed, and her head felt like a bomb had detonated inside it. Initially, she managed to bloody his nose and forced him back against the wall. She brought her knee sharply upward, but he avoided it by moving his thigh into the action. Hitting him with her inconsequential fists was like
ineffectually thumping against a brick wall. Shoving her roughly away from him, she fell awkwardly, hitting the railing of the stairs before tumbling sideways onto the concrete floor with a minute cry of pain.
Did someone hear me screaming?
Raoul touched his nose with his index and middle finger. He pulled his fingers away and fleetingly looked at the blood. “Well, damn, girl. You’ve gotten a little moxie up, don’t ya?”
He coughed a little phlegm up and spit into the corner. Then he wiped the blood away from his nose with the back of his hand. Smiling grimly at her, he said, “I like that. Much better than all drugged and like a little helpless baby.”
I did strangle this man with the handcuffs. The marks are right there. His eyes are full of petechial hemorrhages. I’m not making this up. I may be hearing a voice in my head once in a while, but I’m not completely crazy.
Jane carefully moved to her knees, hooking one hand over the railing, never looking away from the bald man. He watched her in turn, waiting for her to make a run for it. He balanced on two strong legs, ready to thwart any effort she would make, clearly enjoying the cat and mouse game being enacted.
Jane was trapped in the corner of the stairwell. The railing prevented her from swiftly getting back on the stairs. The man named Raoul would be on her before she could swing a foot over the metal rail. The darkness behind her was a dead end, a place where some hospital janitor stored several buckets and mops. A tiny caged area held other cleaning supplies, and the open door indicated some janitor or orderly had recently been using it. There was nowhere to hide.
One of her legs came up, and she put weight on her left foot. She was a deer ready to take flight from an avid hunter. Raoul didn’t shift. His eyes scrutinized her every action, waiting for her to show a weakness.
“Who am I?” she said, her voice a hoarse petition.
Raoul laughed. “Remember my name, do ya? But not yours. That’s rich. Must be driving you crackers, little miss thing. Have you remembered anything else? La Famille?”
“La Famille?” she repeated. “The family? What family? Mine?”
“More importantly you should remember my family.” He inched forward, herding her into a corner. Jane shifted to one side. He countered the motion. “You will remember once we let you, and the knowledge will kill you.” He suddenly jerked toward her, a test to see how jumpy she was. Jane lurched backward, caught the rail with her hand, and maintained her balance.
Raoul smiled hugely.
Slowly, Jane came to her feet. She reached behind her with one hand and grasped one of the mops. She brought it around and held it like a sword in both hands.
“You’re nothing but a sadist,” she whispered. “A man who beats women, who wants to control others. A baseless animal.”
“Life is all about having control, having power, little girl,” Raoul said with an evident smirk. “Anyone who doesn’t believe that is a fool.”
“Come any closer, and I’ll wrap this around your skull,” Jane warned. She raised the mop in preparation for striking him.
Raoul didn’t hesitate as he rapidly struck out. One powerful arm backhanded to his right, knocking the mop from her hand while his left hand snaked in to grasp her neck. The mop clattered against a concrete block wall. He wrenched her around so that her back was to his front and his left hand came down to clutch her body firmly against his. His right arm curled around her throat and tightened like freakish python. She couldn’t move away from him, and she struggled helplessly in his arms.
“Let’s see how you enjoy a little strangling, oui?” he muttered into her ear.
His brawny arm constricted relentlessly about her flesh and cut off the air. Jane clawed at the arm with her hands and suddenly changed tactics. One hooked hand slashed at his eyes and he ducked backward with a curse.
“Petite catin!” he said vehemently. His arm muscles flexed again, and Jane saw black dots dancing on the sides of her vision. She forgot about clawing his eyes out and her legs convulsed. Weakly she attempted to stomp on his feet, but the arm tightened more around her neck. Her heart thundered in her chest. Her lungs screamed for air.
The furious roar came again. It resounded all around her, and she dimly realized it was within the stairwell. It was all around them like a manic bellow of an incensed beast. Raoul loosened his grip with an alacrity she would have found amusing if she hadn’t been half unconscious. She gulped in much needed air and tried to keep the blackness from closing in on her. Drooping in his arms, he held her absently because his attention was no longer on her.
“Merde!” he said violently. Jane could feel him behind her, angling his head so he could look up the stairwell. It occurred to her oxygen-starved brain that Raoul had undoubtedly heard the roar, too. It wasn’t just in her head.
Raoul began to drag her toward the closed door, and the sound that answered his movement was an enraged growl. “Voila merde!” he said. “Beaucoup de merde!”
Jane could see the stairs extending upward. Something was moving one flight up. There was an explosion of light as some tremendous limb shot out and broke the light. The sound of bits of glass tinkling down on the floor came to them a moment later. Before the shadows descended, a blurred suggestion of a great shape was unmistakable to both of them. It was something black and brown with bits of gray hanging off. Mottled fur undulated in the gloom.
It was the thing straight out of her nightmare.
It stalked them.
“Merde,” Raoul repeated again. Jane could feel his anxiety pouring off him. He pulled her backward against his form, keeping her body in-between himself and the thing moving above them on the flight of stairs.
The rolling, aggressive snarl echoed in the narrow area.
Raoul muttered another word, and it took Jane’s scrambled brains a moment to decipher it. “Roux-Ga-Roux,” he said under his breath. She felt his body moving as he sought some kind of innocuous safety.
I know that word.
The shape moved down a step. Claws clicked on the concrete surface.
“Come on, little girl,” Raoul muttered into Jane’s ear. “We’ll go out the door and—”
Jane took her elbow and thrust it back into Raoul’s gut, using the pointed end like a Billy club. His breath exploded out of his mouth, and he let her go, doubling over. She dove for the shadowed corner of the stairwell, yanking the metal door to the cleaning supplies open and forcing herself through. Her knees scraped against the metal wires and then she was inside.
Panting, she looked back. There was no way to lock the door and worse, it opened to the outside. Raoul or the other thing would be able to easily pull it open and get to her.
Foolishly, in a state of effervescent fear, she had put herself into a cage, like something waiting for its master to come and cull her from the mighty herd of humans.
Stupid. I should have gone out the door.
The unseen beast growled again. There was another explosion of light, and Jane realized it had put out the other light at the bottom of the stairwell. Darkness was not complete, but she couldn’t see much past the edge of the cage door.
Raoul said, “Go. Go after the girl.” His tone was panicky and bordered on hysterical.
Whatever it was, did he really think it was going to do what he said? Is he serious?
Another rolling snarl answered him.
Raoul made another noise. There weren’t any words to the frantic grunt. Then the door opened and his footsteps pounded away. Light came in from the door, and Jane could see for a moment. The exterior of the stairwell door was the outside of the hospital. Beyond lay a breezeway and yellow lights making pools on the concrete. The door shut by itself and darkness resumed with an ominous click of the latch mechanism.
It didn’t go after Raoul.
It’s still in here…with me.
There was another sound. Snuffling. The thing was sniffing her out. Jane shuddered and reached out to hold the edges of the wires on the little door. Her fingers tighten
ed on the wires, hoping it wouldn’t be able to bite her flesh away.
The sniffing came closer. What she could see made her insides freeze like ice. It was a massive figure, bent over. Its head went back and forth, scenting her. Its eyes blazed in the blackness, reflecting the meager light back. Fantastic glowing eyes sought her and her alone.
The growl was low-pitched, making goose bumps break out in a rash on Jane’s arms. The noise was as unnerving as anything she’d ever heard and the epitome of the dream she’d had before she first woke up in the hospital. Somewhere, somehow, this thing had been chasing her before the present. It wasn’t interested in Raoul. It was only her.
By excruciating increments it came closer and closer. Jane could hear its rough breaths, a snuffle as it scented again. She bit down on her lower lip, hard enough to draw blood. The fear inside her was crushing her. She couldn’t move. She should have been digging up a bottle of bleach to throw in its eyes or breaking a mop so she could use the sharp ends as a spear.
Instead, Jane was fixated on the reflective eyes and bit her lip into bloody bits so she wouldn’t make a noise.
Another roar escaped from its mouth, closer than she would have imagined. Jane couldn’t resist the shriek of alarm. The tremendous shape hurled itself against the cage door. The metal supports groaned in response. Jane tried to back away, but she knew she had to hold onto the door.
The thing snarled again and threw itself at the obstacle keeping itself from her. Jane cried out. The cage wall began to bow inside. The weight of the beast was too much for it, and the cage was only for the minimal amount of security. She kicked with her legs and tried to get the supports back to where they had been attached to the bottom of the cement stairs.
Unrestrained rage in the form of an animal wail thundered forth.
