An Honest Lie(68)

Summer.

Taured. Or was it? After all these years, she knew his tone, his style. This was not Taured. But what did he want? As she sat, trying to fight the fog in her brain, it occurred to her. A fragment of an idea began to form in her mind. Sara. She opened up a browser on her laptop.

Okay, she texted back. What do you want?



23


Then


She’d woken in a hospital room alone, not afraid, but relieved. O’Connor was in the room, sitting in a chair, and a man stood next to her, this one short, bespectacled and bald.

“May I have something to drink, please?” Her voice was a rasp. A nurse brought her water and sat her up in bed. Then O’Connor turned to her. “Summer, this is Dan Malari. He’s a social worker with the state and he’s been assigned your case.”

“What case? I have grandparents, I told you their names. I—”

“It’s just procedure to open a case file, Summer. When there are accusations and a removal of a minor from a home, we have to investigate for your well-being.” Dan Malari didn’t smile at her when he spoke, but Summer felt that he was an okay guy, anyway. There was something calm about him.

“But I don’t have to go back there?”

“No, you’ve been removed from that place and it is currently under investigation.”

Summer felt like she could breathe for the first time since...when? Forever. She could breathe so long as they never sent her back to that place. She touched her neck and felt bare skin. “Where’s my mother’s necklace?”

“I’m sure they’re keeping it safe for you. They might have taken it off while making sure you were okay.”

If it was gone... Her face bunched up and she dissolved into tears.

“What about my mother? Will they be investigated for what they did to her?”

“What did they do to her?”

“They locked her in a room and killed her.”

“How? With what?”

“She didn’t take drugs, no matter what anyone says. I know she didn’t. They injected her against her will.”

He looked embarrassed for her, but he nodded slowly. “We’ll let the coroner do their job, okay? My job is to find out where the safest place for you is.”

Summer closed her eyes; the safest place for her was with her mother.

“If there was foul play involved in her death, police will move forward with an investigation.”

Summer looked at O’Connor and the woman nodded; she didn’t feel good about that, but she didn’t feel bad, either. Things were still in the air, as her dad used to say.

“What if they can’t prove foul play?” she asked carefully.

“Then there is no case,” O’Connor said matter-of-factly. Summer nodded, settling back into her pillow.

“Good news is, your grandparents are on their way. They should be here in a few hours,” Dan said.

“I’ll be able to live with them?”

“Yes.”

She didn’t know how it started; suddenly, she was gasping, and then the gasps hurt so much that she couldn’t get around them, or around her own air, which somehow seemed to be pressing into her. A nurse rushed in and her two visitors stepped back. She could only hear her own gasps, feel her own feelings, but the last thing Summer saw before she sank heavily into unconsciousness was O’Connor mouthing the words: You’re safe now, it’s okay. You’re safe now, it’s okay...

After her mother died, Summer’s body had been physically free of the compound, but her mind had stayed trapped behind its walls. For a while, her grandparents tried to get Summer to work with a specialist who dealt with former cult members, but she’d refused to speak to him, saying it wasn’t her who’d been part of the cult but her mother. She’d only been a kid. She’d screamed this at the grief counselor until he’d smiled and said they were finally getting somewhere. When her free counseling ended, her grandparents shifted her from therapist to therapist, trying to find someone to coax her out of her depression. But no one could understand what she was feeling, and she didn’t want them to. It was her private hurt.

Her therapist suggested she get a part-time job, and her grandparents latched on to the idea, citing all the opportunities that came with having a job. They also offered to buy her a used car to get to and from work, which was the only reason she agreed. A car meant freedom, and that was a precious commodity. She got a job at a local restaurant, busing tables and then later working as a server. The tips were good and she had nothing to spend her money on, so she saved it. What else was there to do? Summer had gone over the options, things like cheerleading and chess club, and the sport that must not be named—softball. She had no interest in doing things that normal kids did; nothing brought her joy. In the morning, she’d drive to school, and after school she’d drive to work, from work it was home: easy-peasy.

On nights when she didn’t work, she sat between Mark and Gilda as they watched their shows: the news (so they could bemoan the wickedness of the younger generations), The 700 Club (Pat Robertson was her grandma’s crush) and Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman reruns. It was her favorite time and not because she enjoyed the content. No, Summer daydreamed during those hours, hands pressed between her knees, her eyes glazed over. She thought of who she was going to be next, and where she was going next, and most importantly, she thought of all the things she wanted to do to Taured to punish him for killing her mother. She used whatever they were watching on TV to come up with her fantasy: if Pat Robertson was talking about the fires of hell, that’s where Summer would send him. If Sully was bitten by a rattlesnake, Summer would have Taured bitten by one, as well, but instead of saving him, as the brave Dr. Quinn would have, she’d watch him die, writhing on the floor in pain. It was nice, better therapy than the therapy, if she were honest.