The Memory Thief (38 page)

Soon the man that carried the meal trays left a menu. When Hannah picked it up she didn’t read
Grilled Chicken Sandwich
or
Baked Cod.
She rearranged letters. Searching out all the new words she could create. Her eyes saw the pencil on the tray.
Check off one entrée choice, please.
She picked it up and turned the menu over. Slowly, with careful marks, she drew a flower. A clear pencil design across vanilla cardstock.

Repetition was key. The doctors had Hannah repeat her story—what she did, why she did it—on a daily basis. They had her say,
over and over, that she was a mother. That she might never know her daughter. She had to own it, they told her. She had to
stop running from it. She had to be able to talk about it. To tell people, to allow people to know the real Hannah.
It was the hiding
, they told her. That was what drove her to take that baby. The pretending that everything was okay. She was simply trying
to make her fantasy become reality.

She didn’t ask them about going home. About freedom and being well. She already knew the answer. It was up to them. They could
keep her as long as they wanted. They could keep her until they believed she was truly well.

So she read the menus. She marked off her entrée choice. She listened to the intercom, the flow of random noise that spilled
into her room. She met with doctors every day. She answered the questions. She told the right story. And she waited.

“Have you thought of what it would be like to see Daniel?” Dr. Vaughn asked one day.

Hannah nodded slowly, careful to hide the pain and joy that surged together inside her.

“He’s here today. I didn’t tell you before because I want you to speak to him from your heart. I didn’t want you to worry
or practice.”

Hannah turned to Dr. Vaughn. “Bring me a mirror.”

As Daniel walked the hall toward her room, Hannah studied herself slowly. The white hair, hanging limp at her shoulders. The
pale skin. The tiny lines around her eyes. She wished for mud to smear across her hands. She wished for paint to smear across
her chin. She wished the whole room were yellow instead of white. So she could frame her body with her best color, with something
almost heavenly.

When he walked in, Hannah stood in the middle of the room. Unsure of what she should do, just like old times, when she used
to find him waiting for her in the Great Room. He hurried to her, hugged her tightly. His hand reached up to her head and
pushed it against his shoulder.

“Hannah,” he whispered. “Put your arms around me.”

She slid her arms up and around his neck.

“Let me see your eyes,” he said.

As he stared at her, she wished that she hadn’t asked for the mirror. Wished she didn’t know exactly what he saw.

“I’m different,” she said. “They cut my hair.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m different, too.”

Hannah saw the patches of gray above his temples. Had it really been three years since she’d seen him?
Three years?
She thought of all the nights they hadn’t spent together. All the breakfasts she hadn’t prepared for him.

“I’m sorry,” she choked, as she laid her head against his shoulder.

“It’s all right.”

“No. It’s not. Nothing is. Daniel, I had a baby when I was seventeen. I’ve spent every year after that trying to pretend it
never happened. Trying to make up for the fact that it did. But I can’t.” Hannah sobbed against his shoulder. “And it doesn’t
feel all right. I should have told you the truth—”

“I knew,” he interrupted. “Your mother told me.”

“What?”

“She told me. About Sam. About when you were seventeen.”

“
She told you?
”

“Yes.”

“Mother?”

“Yes.”

“I don’t believe you. She wouldn’t. Everything, every lie I’ve told since then has been because of her. She promised me—”

“I’d had some friends track down information on the family that called to offer us the baby. The trail led back to your mother’s
hotel. There was a worker there, a former prostitute she’d hired from a truck stop. She had a fifteen-year-old sister who
was pregnant. Your mother found out. Offered the family twenty thousand dollars if they would give you that baby.”

“Mother,” Hannah whispered.

“Yes. I called the family myself and heard from them that the deal had been called off long ago. You hadn’t told me. And you
were still fixing up that nursery. I knew then something bad was wrong. So I went to her. Told her I needed answers. Asked
her what she was fighting.”

“Fighting?”

“There’s a war inside you. I’ve known that from the beginning. She was still trying to fight it.”

“All those years she groomed me to pretend it never happened. It’s the reason we settled on the mountain, changed our name.
So that I could start over. So we could all start over. And then she just tells you—”

“You could have told me, Hannah.”

“It wouldn’t have changed anything that happened.”

“Might have. I would have at least known what to fight.”

They sat on the edge of her bed together and Hannah told him about
Baby Girl. How Mother staged a false reunion, shortly after the failed adoption. What Baby Girl looked like the day she was
born. How sometimes it was hard to remember, and that was why Hannah had created her from the scraps of strangers. Daniel
told her about the trial. Hannah, out of her mind, had missed much of it. Daniel told her about the doctors he hired. How
Bethie testified on her behalf, and how he forced Mother to testify, too. She nearly went to jail for contempt when she wouldn’t
answer his questions.

“So the whole world knows, then,” Hannah whispered.

“It had to come out. I had to prove that your motive was pain, not evil, if I was ever going to get you placed here instead
of with the State.”

Everyone knew. The judge. The newspapers. Guests at the hotel. Her customers at the artisan’s fair. It was in all the records.
Like the ones Hannah’s parents had paid so much money to avoid. She’d never hide it from anyone ever again. There was nothing
to pretend anymore.
Everyone already knew
.

“No more secrets,” she said.

“There’s still one,” Daniel said lowly. “I’ve spent so many nights thinking about the pottery. Every single piece broken,
Hannah… all my favorites. Was that message—was it meant for me?”

Hannah shook her head. “It happened the night before… when you were working late.”

“But why?”

“Because I know what’s in the mist. What nobody else could figure out. And I couldn’t bear to see it anymore.”

“What is it?”

“It’s home.” She turned from him, until her whole body faced the wall. “With every stroke of paint, with every layer of color,
I was painting home. Not ours.” She began to cry. “Hers. Sometimes I just painted myself. Because my body was the only home
we ever shared. Other times, I painted the unknown. All the places she may have lived. All the somewheres she might be.”

Daniel’s arms slid around her, pulling her to him. They sat there together, until her whole body relaxed against him. He leaned
down and kissed her forehead.

“You should know better,” she whispered bitterly. “I’m not safe to love.”

“No,” he agreed. “But I knew that about you, I loved that about you, from the very beginning.
Love is an emergency
. Remember? If we have that, who needs safe?”

A five-minute warning was called out from the intercom. And it occurred to Hannah, for the first time since Daniel had walked
into her room, that he would have to leave. It was up to Legion when she would see him again. It was up to Legion,
if
she would see him again. And as she started to cry, he told her to be strong. To fight the war with him. For him.

Hannah remembered her sister then, and how Bethie had screamed her good-byes. Screamed those magic last words.

“Have you seen Bethie?” Hannah asked. “She came here a few months ago. Have you seen her? Did she say anything?”

Daniel shook his head. “I haven’t seen your family since the trial. But last week there was a message from Bethie on the machine.”

“Did you call her back?”

“Not yet.”

“Why not? What if she needed you?”

“No. It had something to do with your art, I think. A piece of yours she’s found and thought I’d want. I’ll call her back
tonight, don’t worry.”

“Daniel,” Hannah cried. “Tell me exactly what her message said.”

He shrugged his shoulders. Tried his best to remember the right words. “
Hi, this is Bethie. I need to meet with you… There’s something of Hannah’s here… I can’t describe it on the phone. You’ll
have to see it to believe it
.”

A
NGEL

In the middle of the night I heard them, right outside the door. They were loud. Every once in a while they shushed each other
and tried to be quiet. I couldn’t make out their words, but their voices were new. And that was all that mattered.

“Hello?” I cried. “Is somebody there?”

It was quiet for a moment. And then a man answered.

“Who are you?”

It was a test. The old woman was testing me, to see if I would keep my end of the bargain. I sighed.

“I’m Lily.”

“Lily who?”

“Adams.”

“Are you her?” he called out. “Are you Hannah’s daughter?”

“Yes.”

“Can you let us in?” he asked.

“I’m tied to the bed.”

They raised their voices again, and this time they didn’t bother to shush one another. Someone tried to force the door open.
It didn’t work. I knew then, when I heard the boom of a shoulder against that door, they were coming to rescue me. I knew
when I heard the knob rattle and shake in its socket, they weren’t with the old woman.

“We’ll be back, Lily,” the man called out. “We’ll be back for you.”

I waited all night. I lay there in total darkness, my eyes playing tricks sometimes. Imagining I saw light coming from under
the door. Imagining I heard them whisper. But they never came.

The old woman did, though. The next morning she walked in happy.

“Good morning, Lily. How have you been?”

I didn’t answer.

“Well the nurse gave a good report. Said you’ve done your exercises and rested well.” She sat down in the chair next to my
bed. “I never dreamed things would turn out so well for us. Hannah is in prison. You are an addict. But in the end, you will
both be well.”

I turned my head and stared at the wall. It was the only rebellion left to me.

“A simple
thank you
would suffice, Lily. Doesn’t it feel nice to sleep naturally? To take Tylenol for pain? To not
need
so much? When you first came here you were half starved. Standing on my porch in those awful cutoffs, and it wasn’t more
than fifty degrees outside. You were nothing but a skinny redneck. And now, look at you. You are healthy. ” She stood up.
“I went shopping for you.”

“What did you say?” I whispered.

“I have some new clothes for you. You’ll need to wear them when you go see Hannah.”

“You called me redneck.”

“I called Angel a redneck. But you, Lily, are nothing like her.” She smiled sweetly and walked away. When she returned, she
carried two shopping bags.

“These are for you. I bought them at the Gilded Lily. I thought it was fitting to purchase your new look from a store that
shares your lovely new name. Have you ever shopped at one? Did they have one in Tennessee?”

I started to shake my head no. I started to tell her how me and Momma shopped for clothes at the general store. Where behind
all the candy barrels stood a discount rack of clothes: T-shirts with beaded fringe, ribbed tank tops that said
Great Smokies,
jeans designed more for farm work than fashion. Nothing was ever more than a few dollars. But then I remembered what Lily
would say. And I nodded. “Sure. Been there lots of times.”

“Look here,” the old woman said, as she pulled a sweater out of the bag. “The lady at the store told me this was a great deal.
It had been eighty, but it was marked down to fifty.”

She held it up to the light. It was a shade of green that reminded me of home. The same money shade of Daddy’s car.

“Would you like to try it on?” she asked.

I nodded.

“Let’s get you some pants to go with it. I imagine it’s hard to judge a top unless you’re wearing the right pants for it.”

She pulled a pair of jeans from the bag, with little studs where the belt should be and a lacy stitch across the pockets.
She undid my wrists and helped me dress.

I looked at the tags. I was wearing a hundred dollars’ worth of clothes. Half the price of Black Snake trailer. More than
Momma and Daddy would spend on a month of groceries.

“Lovely,” the old woman said.

There wasn’t a mirror, except for the small one that I used to practice my story for you. I looked down at myself. I’d never
worn such a pretty color, or such thick soft cloth. Never worn jeans that weren’t skintight or didn’t have holes in them.
I stared at myself and had no idea if I looked pretty or ugly. Or maybe something more strange:
decent
.

“Perfect,” the old woman said softly. “I can’t wait till Hannah sees you.”

“Yeah,” I answered.

“Is there…,” she began, then stopped. “Did anything unusual happen while I was away?”

It might have been another test. Maybe she set me up after all. Sent people there to see what name I would give.

But then maybe she didn’t. “No,” I said, and shrugged.

She stared at me until I looked away. “Take off your clothes. You need to keep them fresh and pretty.”

I was starting to undress when the door went
boom
again. We both jumped.

“Let me in,” the man’s voice called. “I know you’re in there, Mrs. Reynolds.”

“Daniel,” the old woman said in a low voice. “This is a private part of my home, and I demand that you respect my privacy.”

“I’ll wait as long as I have to. Now open this door.”

The old woman turned to me. “Sit down in the chair.” She smoothed up the bed covers. Pulled the blankets over the wrist restraints.
She walked to me and smoothed my hair down, tossed it over my shoulders a bit. Then she turned to me. “Remember Tennessee
and what you did before you left. Remember you’ll see your mother because of me. Don’t mess it up. It’s showtime, Lily.”