Suspicious Minds (Stranger Things Novels #1)(53)

And you’re not even in the lead.

She spotted a slightly wider space through the trees ahead of Ken and Alice, and whisper-called, “That should work.”

Alice heaved down her machine, then wiped her brow. The load must be heavy. “Good. I mean, not good, but you know what I intend to say.”

Intend to say. Terry smiled in the dark at Alice. She switched her flashlight off. “We should probably keep things as dark and quiet as we can.”

“We’ll leave on one light,” Ken said, showing an organizational leadership side tonight that Terry hadn’t expected but appreciated.

He sat it on the ground so it illuminated Alice’s blanket lump. She pried off the blanket around the edges.

And there it sat. Terry got her first look at the contraption they were hooking Alice up to.

“Should I be so glad it’s too dark to see it well?” Terry asked.

“Oh, Terry,” Gloria said, and her headshake was in her voice. “Never insult the work of an inventor.”

Alice propped her hands on her hips. “I tried to make it so it’ll work, not so it’s pretty.” Terry moved closer and thought she heard Alice mutter, “Though I do think you’re pretty. Don’t listen.”

There was a miscellany of parts of machines joined together in a Frankensteinish way. It was beyond Terry to tease out in this dim light what the parts were and how they worked. But she recognized the low hum of a motor engine when Alice started it up. There was a slight vibration to the metal amalgamation.

“Let’s do this,” Alice said.

“Slow down,” Ken said. “You’d probably better give the acid a bit to kick in first, don’t you think?”

“Oh, yeah, right,” Alice said.

Gloria reached into her purse, unwrapped a handkerchief, and presented the stolen acid to Alice. Alice plucked it up and popped it into her mouth. In the flashlight, her hand had trembled.

Terry realized that despite her bravado, Alice was as nervous as the rest of them. “We’ll be right here,” Terry said, and wished it didn’t remind her of Brenner’s words to her the first time they’d put her in the sensory deprivation tank.

“Stop making me more nervous,” Alice said.

They were in this together, though, unlike Brenner and…anyone. Alice had been having electroshock for months and she was fine. Still Alice. It would be okay, and hopefully they’d learn enough to make the risk worth it.

Terry prayed.

Alice set to work on the machine. “I’ll show you what to do.”

She teased out some electrodes that extended from the center of the contraption. “I stole these from the lab.”

“How?” Terry would never cease to be amazed by her.

“When I was taking apart their machine to see how it works.”

Alice tapped a finger to each of her temples. “They go here.”

Terry reached out to accept them and felt the plastic, cold as her fingers. She had a sense of disassociation like she’d taken acid, as if she hovered above her body watching this madness.

Gloria took over, lifting away the electrodes and placing them carefully on the sides of Alice’s forehead.

Alice walked Gloria through the steps for administering the electricity.

“We’ll be shocking you twice at most, at a low level, for safety’s sake.” Gloria hesitated. “How often do they do it in your sessions?”

“That’s a good question,” Terry said when Alice didn’t answer. She shook out the blanket and sat down, gesturing for Alice to join her. Ken would follow Gloria’s directions on running the machine and take the notes. Terry would be Alice’s steady hand-holding presence.

“Depends. You should do it twice tonight.” Alice plopped down beside Terry. She reached out and dragged the blanket around both their shoulders.

“I already feel it working,” Alice said. “The trees are whispering. I say you give it five more minutes and then zap me.”

“Nice terminology,” Gloria said. But she checked her watch by the flashlight.

“In the meantime, someone tell me a story,” Alice said. “What about a ghost story?”

“No way,” Terry said. “No ghost stories when we’re in the woods with you hooked up to a car engine. Someone tell a good story.”

“What about both?” Ken asked. He stood beside the machine, but now he lowered to his knees.

“As long as it doesn’t scare Terry,” Alice said. “And it’s not a car engine.” A burble of laughter slipped out of Alice. “Can you imagine how big that would be? I did use a car battery, but I built the machine from—”

“Story time,” Ken said and lightly clapped his hands together.

Terry snuggled deeper into the blanket around her and Alice. If she forgot what they were doing and why they were here, she could almost imagine this as a campout. Instead of a campfire, they gathered around a homemade electroshock machine.

“My aunt and uncle’s house was haunted,” he said.

“This better not be scary,” Terry warned, coziness evaporating.

“You’re not moving in there. It won’t be.” Ken came forward a little, the flashlight glow on his face.

“I’m scared.” But Terry couldn’t keep a straight face as she said it.