The Fall of Never(93)

No, not tell me, she corrected herself. You’re trying to get me to remember something. I know you are.

Becky’s eyes moved beneath their lids.

“Becky…”

Help me, Becky. Help me remember.

Heat broke out along Kelly’s back, along her arms and neck. She moved slowly around the foot of the bed and to Becky’s side until she was close enough to reach down and touch the girl. She laid her hand on Becky’s arm. The girl felt cold.

You’ve been desperate to get inside my head for a long time now, Kelly thought. It was the only way you knew how to get in touch with me. You needed help and knew that I’d be the only person who’d understand, for some reason. And somehow you knew how to get inside my brain, my head, and stir up my thoughts and emotions. It’s impossible, but you’re able to do it, aren’t you? I know because I could feel it then, and I still feel it now. It’s very strong. But I didn’t know what the hell was happening. I had no idea you were in trouble. I had no idea you even remembered who I was. And I don’t know what to do now, either.

She thought of Becky’s diary, about the entries where her sister had mentioned speaking with her. Of course that hadn’t happened…but had Becky somehow spoke to Kelly inside her mind, without Kelly ever knowing? Had she reached inside Kelly’s head and plucked answers from her mind like some kleptomaniac psychic? Could that be it?

That’s what you were doing, wasn’t it, Becky?

Kelly felt the girl’s arm twitch.

You have that power, Kelly thought, and I have it too. Maybe it’s hereditary or maybe it’s just the work of some god, but we both have it, don’t we? We both share that gift. I can remember that now…

Feelings, memories rushed back to her…

As a child, she’d had an active imagination. Sometimes she found she could actually feel people’s emotions, could sense what was going on inside them. Sometimes—like with her parents—there had been nothing but cold. An empty void. To them, emotions—particularly love—were alien. But feeling…

And there had been something else too…some other special gift…only she couldn’t remember…

I’m listening now, Becky. Can you hear me? What happened to you? What is it you need to tell me? And what is it that I’ve forgotten and you want me to remember? Please…

Remember. She had to remember. Kelly realized this with sudden and absolute clarity, as if she should have known all along. But remember what?

Looking at her sister, Kelly could almost—

(help me)

—sense her pleading, her begging for Kelly to comprehend, to remember.

“Show me. Can you show me?”

And then it occurred to her that maybe Becky already had shown her, at least as best she could.

Kelly turned and stared at the closed closet door. The other night, she’d imagined herself back inside the institution, and that Mouse herself was hiding in Becky’s bedroom closet…Mouse, or those two dead girls…

The institution, she thought. Mouse and those two dead girls.

Something turned over inside her head. There was no sense to be made of anything—there was no solid realizations or epiphanies—just the simple fact that the institution, and perhaps Mouse herself, was the final piece of the puzzle that needed to be snapped into place.

Remember…

The institution…

“But I don’t understand…”

Yet she couldn’t pull her eyes away from the closet door. She thought of Mouse, her dark hair in ropy strands, her eyes bloodshot and darting, her bruised and scabbed arms and legs…

What does Mouse and the institution have to do with any of this?

She felt herself begin to shake. When she looked down, she saw that Becky’s fingers had closed around her own.

Lost in thought, Kelly did not notice the shape that passed in the hallway just outside Becky’s door.





Chapter Twenty-One


In the two days following the incident at Nellie Worthridge’s apartment, Marie grew despondent and uncommunicative. On the cab ride back to their home, Marie’s sobs eased off, only to be replaced by a disturbing calm that seemed to quickly overtake her. Too angry and afraid to speak to his wife, Carlos only held her body against his own as the taxicab trundled through the city and away from the old woman’s tenement. She was stiff against him, unresponsive. And for the length of the cab ride, he couldn’t help but think, What have I done? What just happened up there? It felt like a radioactive charge filled the room. My God, did we all almost die?

Although his mind continuously replayed the image of Nellie’s resuscitation, Carlos suddenly felt no compassion for the woman, and certainly none of the concern he had felt toward her upon their initial meeting at the hospital. Now, in his mind, she had become nothing more than the conduit for something bad: not only a speaker of cryptic words damning his unborn son, but now, based on what had happened, he saw her as a harbinger of a power beyond her own control.

In his mind, she’d become very much a monster.

“She all right?” the driver said as Carlos fitted his hand with bills.

“Fine.”

At home, he helped Marie into the house, peeled off her coat, pushed her up the stairs, and set her down on their bed.

“Is there something I can get you?” he asked her. He’d been thinking about what to say for the length of the cab ride home, and now that he spoke, he was disappointed in his lack of something better.