"Maybe you should go to the infirmary, Megan," Miss Dungan said softly. She stepped up to her and put her arm around Megan's waist. "Come along. Let Mrs. Cohen check you over?'
"I'm all right," Megan insisted, pulling away abruptly. "I fought him off
-
lie didn't do anything. But he could have," she added quickly. She fixed her wild, angry eyes on me. "You weren't much help," she told me. Then she spun around and returned to her clay, as if nothing had happened.
Miss Dungan and I watched her for a moment. She was humming and working more vigorously on her clay.
"I have to see about Lawrence," Miss Dungan said. "Are you all right?"
"Fine," I signed, "but I'm worried about Lawrence." "I'll see about him," she said and went to her intercom.
Lawrence frightened himself more than anyone else. The attendants found him down by the ocean, sitting on a rock. He had walked through the water, soaking his shoes, socks, and pants, and was hugging his knees, his head down, when they located him. He was shaking so badly from his panic and the chill of the ocean water, he had to be taken to the infirmary. Later, I found out his hands were clenched into fists so tightly, he nearly stopped the blood circulation to his fingers and he dug his fingernails into his skin until his palms bled. He had to be put on tranquilizers. They called his parents, but neither his mother nor his father visited. I was worried so much about him, I didn't think much about myself for days and my session with Doctor Southerby didn't go as well as usual.
A week later, Lawrence was released from the infirmary. In the meantime, Megan had behaved as if nothing at all had happened. She hadn't told a soul about the incident and had never brought it up with me. She often abruptly went from being as mute as me to talking incessantly about everything and everyone, mainly at the dinner table. Lulu and Mary Beth inquired after Lawrence and were simply told he wasn't feeling well. In this place, everyone accepted that as enough and didn't follow up with more persistent inquiries.
As if she felt she had to direct her slings and arrows at someone new, Megan zeroed in on different patients in the cafeteria and complained about the way they ate, talked, or moped about. She seemed to know everyone else's problems and always laid the blame on his or her father. She was so cruel to Lulu at times when it came to Lulu's father, I had to intervene, pulling Lulu's attention away and teaching her sign language.
"Why don't you just stop this already," Megan fired at me. "You were talking when you came here. It's just an act, an act to get them all to feel sorry for you. Oh," she said suddenly, her eyes shifting away from me, "look who's better."
Everyone turned to see Lawrence enter the cafeteria. He looked like his old self; unfortunately, that meant that once again he was unsure, timid, eyes downcast. He avoided looking our way and walked directly to the food line, stepping back when another patient went to reach for a second dessert. He didn't come to our table after he had gotten his food either. Instead, he sat at the first table available, one at which two younger boys ate, neither showing any interest in him, nor anyone else for that matter.
"Why doesn't Lawrence sit with us?" Mary Beth asked.
"He's probably too ashamed of himself," Megan said. "He peed in his pants," she whispered to Lulu. "Just like you do sometimes. Did you know that Lulu here has to wear diapers every once in a while?"
"Stop it!" I shouted emphatically with my hands as I stood up.
"What's the matter with you, Laura Perfect?" Megan teased. "You never wore diapers?"
I marched away from the table and joined Lawrence. He looked up with surprise as I sat beside him. I smiled and asked him how he was.
"I'm okay," he said softly, dropping his eyes. "I'm sorry if I embarrassed you."
I forced him to look at me and told him I wasn't embarrassed. Megan was the one who should have been embarrassed. Now she was pretending it never happened.
He shot a quick look her way. She was glaring at us.
"You don't have to worry about her," I continued. "She doesn't want anyone to talk about it. It's almost as if
she
suddenly came down with a case of amnesia."
He looked a little relieved, but I noticed how peaked and tired he was. Later, I learned that was probably an effect of the medication he had been given. It took the better part of another full day before he regained some of his newfound courage and outgoingness. He joined us in the rec room after lunch the next day and watched me play a game of checkers with Mary Beth.
Megan was in one of her mute moods again that day. She had barely uttered a word, and when Lawrence sat down beside me, she looked away and then started singing under her breath. After a while, we all turned to her. She was staring out the window and we heard, "Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are. Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky.
She turned when she realized we were all staring at her.
"My daddy . . . used to come into my room and sing that to me and tell me to look up at the ceiling and the stars would appear. So, I looked while he . ."
Tears rolled out of her eyes.
"I hate secrets," she said, staring at Lawrence. "I hate having to keep secrets!"
She got up and walked out quickly.
"What's with her?" Mary Beth said.
I shook my head and looked at Lawrence, who gazed after her and then back at me, his face full of sadness and pity. I smiled at him. He didn't hate her for what she had done to him. He truly felt sorry for her.
Megan didn't appear for the rest of that afternoon. At dinner, we all got our food and sat, but she didn't come into the cafeteria. Billy, the attendant, approached our table suspiciously.
"Where's Queen Megan?" he demanded. "She knows what it means if you don't show up for dinner," he said pointedly, directing himself at Mary Beth, who quickly looked down at her lap.
"She said she would be right along," Lawrence told him firmly. Billy raised his eyebrows.
"What are you, her lawyer?"
Lawrence turned crimson. Billy laughed and returned to his position, but he kept looking at our table and at the door.
"I'm going to go get her," I signed to Lawrence and rose as inconspicuously as I could. I left the cafeteria and hurried up the corridor to the residential wing.
Megan's door was closed. I knocked and waited and then knocked again. We weren't able to lock our doors from the inside, so I knew I could enter her room, but she wasn't exactly the type of person who would forgive you for barging in. But I wanted to warn her about Billy and what he would do if she didn't show up soon, so I opened the door slightly and peeked in.
At first I thought she was gone. She wasn't sitting in a chair or lying on the bed, but I heard what sounded like water running in the sink so I entered the room and knocked again on the door to get her attention. She didn't appear. I walked slowly to the bathroom and gazed in.
There she was, sitting on the closed toilet cover, her arms over the edge of the sink. I stepped forward and looked. Her wrists were under a sinkful of ruby red water, so dark it looked like she had cut off her hands. She gazed up at me, her eyes wet with tears, her cheeks streaked, and she smiled.
"Hi, Daddy," she said. And then she began to sing, "Twinkle, twinkle, little star . . ."
I felt my throat close and then open, as the shock of what I saw hit me. I ran to the door, gasping for breath as I tried to summon up my long-lost voice.
"He . . hel . . . help!" I screamed, finding my voice. "HELP, HELP! HELP!"
Two male attendants and Mrs. Kleckner came running down the hall.
"What is it? Why are you shouting?"
"Megan!" I cried and pointed. "She's trying to kill herself!" -
They sped past me and I fell back against the wall, sliding down slowly until I was crouched along the baseboard. The commotion drew some of the staff from the cafeteria and Lawrence and Mary Beth came out, too. Lawrence saw me sitting on the corridor floor and came hurrying over.
"What happened?" he asked.
"Megan tried to commit suicide," I said gravely. He looked down the hall at the staff gathering around her room and then looked back down at me.
"You've got your voice back," he said.
I nodded. Sometimes miracles happened at the strangest times.
Thankfully, I had found Megan in time. She needed only a day in the infirmary. However, they took her upstairs afterward, instead of permitting her to return to her room and to us. We all felt just terrible for her.
"She's probably heavily sedated," Lawrence said at dinner that night.
"When she comes out of it and realizes she's in the Tower, she'll get even more depressed," Mary Beth said. "You know how she is about the Tower," she reminded Lawrence and Lulu. They nodded.
"Maybe she won't be up there long," Lulu said hopefully. Despite the way Megan had often treated her, Lulu really liked and needed Megan.
"You know, when someone goes up there, they usually don't come down," Mary Beth reminded her. Lulu started to cry and rock in her chair.
I reached over and took her hand in mine.
"Maybe it will be different for Megan," I said, stroking her hand. "She's pretty tough and knows how to take care of herself around here, right?"
Lulu smiled and nodded.
"Why give her false hope?" Mary Beth insisted.
"What do you mean?" I asked. "They can't keep her up there forever."
"If they can't make any progress with you upstairs, sometimes they move you someplace else," Lawrence said. "Someplace where they handle only serious cases, not a rich person's country club clinic like this."
"Oh."
"I'm glad you found your voice," he said, smiling. "It's really nice to hear you talk again."
"Yes," Mary Beth said and I noticed she looked a lot healthier--like she had gained a couple of pounds since I had first arrived. Lawrence told me she had made significant progress in that she finally admitted she wasn't overweight. The end of her ordeal was in sight.
I felt bad for Megan. Despite her bouts of nastiness, missed her. I told Lawrence how I felt when we went for a walk together after my work in art therapy. Lulu trailed along with us. She seemed to be the most lost without Megan, who in her strange fashion had defended and looked after Lulu as much as she ridiculed her.
"Poor Lulu. Maybe we shouldn't call her that anymore, Lawrence."
He laughed.
"I think it's gotten so she wouldn't answer if someone called her Edith," he said.
"I'm going to start doing that. She's never going to get better if we don't help her face reality, too."
"You're right," Lawrence said. "Here you are worrying about everyone else's problems but your own."
"You once told me helping others helps you, too."
"Yes," he said, smiling, "I did, but that was more of an excuse to get you to let me be involved with you more."
"You didn't need an excuse for that, Lawrence," I said and his smile widened.
We sat on our favorite stone bench, the one that had become a symbol of the boundary for me, because beyond it was the hill that led to the view of the ocean, a view that put ice into my veins.
Lulu walked around us, occupying herself with wildflowers.
"I'm looking for a four-leaf clover," she said. "My daddy told me it brings good luck. If I find one, give it to him when he comes to visit."
"Why doesn't her father ever visit her?" I asked. Lawrence turned to me, a strange look on his face. "I thought you knew," he said. I shook my head. "I know her parents got a divorce. At least that's what
Megan said."
"Yes, but not long after that, her father was killed in a car accident. Lulu won't believe it. She never went to the funeral."
"Megan never said--"
"Megan can be cruel, but not
that
cruel; at least to Lulu," Lawrence said. "Maybe . . maybe she didn't want it to be true. She seems to hate all men, especially all fathers, but I think she really wants to love one, to have a real father. We all know what her father did to her. He put her here. Just like my father put me here," he added angrily.
look like a wild woman. You'll frighten the other patients half to death."
"But, I have to see him now!"
"If you don't listen to me, have to have you confined to your room or worse," she threatened. "I don't condone wild behavior here, no matter what's supposedly wrong with the patient. Those who can't follow the rules are placed elsewhere. This is not a high-security clinic for the mentally disturbed," she added.
I stepped away from her.
"No, this isn't, although I know you would like it to be," I said defiantly. "Well, we shouldn't be treated like criminals just because we have mental problems. We're people who have had difficulties in their lives, serious difficulties."
"I know," she said dryly, "overindulgences. Having too much can become a problem. Where do you put everything? How do you handle all the special privileges? Very serious difficulties," she said with a sardonic smile.
"Why are you working here?" I asked, shaking my head. "You don't care about the patients. You have no respect for us. You should be working in a prison hospital. That's really where you belong," I fumed.
"Really? How come all you blue bloods know what's good for everyone else but yourselves? Spare me the career guidance and behave yourself."
I straightened up as if a rod had been inserted in my spine and fixed my eyes on hers.
"I want to make an appointment with Doctor Southerby," I insisted. "I can do that at least, can't I?"
"I'll make the arrangements for you," she said. "Go on, get ready for dinner. You look a mess."
I hesitated a moment, debating. She looked like she was made of stone and if I tried to move her, I would only anger her and delay my visit with Doctor Southerby.
"I have to see him as soon as possible," I said and then turned and walked back toward my room. Lawrence and Lulu had come in and were looking for me.
"Are you all right?" Lawrence asked when he caught up with me outside my room.
"Yes, I just had a real memory and I wanted to share it with Doctor Southerby, but Mrs. Kleckner stopped me and told me to clean up for dinner. She said she would make my appointment for me."
"That's good," Lawrence said. "I'm happy for you, Laura. This might be the beginning of the end of your time here," he said.
"Maybe," I said and went into my room. I was too frustrated and furious to appreciate my progress at the moment.
However, when I looked at myself in the mirror, I saw that Mrs. Kleckner was right about one thing: I did look wild. My hair looked like I had run my fingers through it for hours, my face was flushed, and my eyes were bright with excitement. I decided to shower and change for dinner.
I was just putting on my shoes and going in to brush out my hair when Mrs. Kleckner appeared in my doorway.
"I've made you your appointment," she said. "Tomorrow at ten."
"Thank you," I said.
"Go to room one-oh-one in the morning," she added and started to leave.
"One-oh-one? But that's not Doctor Southerby's office," I cried. "Why do I have to go there?"
She turned back to me slowly.
"Your case has been transferred to Doctor Scanlon," she said, not without some pleasure.
"But I don't want to be transferred. I want to talk to Doctor Southerby," I said, My heart was racing. Why would I be transferred now?
She sighed and rolled her eyes toward the ceiling.
"I want, I want, I want. Don't you people have any other words in your vocabulary? It's not important what you want; what you
need
is decided by the people in charge here," she said. "Your transfer to Dr. Scanlon has been decided and that's that," she added, her words hammering into my brain.
"I won't talk to anyone else but Doctor Southerby," I insisted just as firmly. I faced her with all the defiance I could muster.
She stared at me a moment and then stepped toward me, a cold smile on her face.
"If you refuse your therapy, you'll have to be transferred upstairs, and if we can't help you upstairs, you'll be transferred to a different sort of institution, one that suits your needs better," she said. "Believe me, that's what will happen." She started to turn away.
"But Doctor Southerby is helping me," I moaned. How could I fight such raw power over me?
"Doctor Scanlon is just as good. In fact, he's Doctor Southerby's superior. You should be grateful you've been given the opportunity, that he has made time for you, but being grateful for things is not in the character of most of the patients here. Why should you be any different?" she added. "Don't be late for dinner," she warned.
She left me staring after her, wondering what I had done to deserve to be transferred to Dr. Scanlon. After all, getting my memory back wasn't something to be punished for. Was it?