We'll Never Be Apart (19 page)

I nod and so does everyone else, even Nurse Dummel.

“Excellent.” Dr. Goodman steeples his fingers. “Alice, do you remember Robert Cohen, your court-appointed attorney?”

I give Cohen a small smile. “I'm sorry, I don't remember you.”

Cohen extends a hand for me to shake. My eyes flick to Dr. Goodman, and Cohen withdraws his hand, runs it through his hair. “We met in the hospital,” he prompts, as if that'll jog my memory.

Dr. Goodman answers for me. “Alice doesn't remember very much from her hospital stay. Part of her therapy here is helping her to regain that memory.”

Cohen nods in understanding. “Yes, well, it looks as if you're recovering quite nicely.” Unbidden, the burns on my shoulders start to itch, and I resist the urge to scratch them beneath my shirt. The radiator kicks on and a small bead of sweat forms on Cohen's upper lip. He pops open the gold clasps of the briefcase that rests in front of him on the table. “Anyway, I guess we should get down to business.” He pulls out a thick pile of bound papers. “The district attorney has made a very generous offer regarding your case.” He slides the papers over to me.

I take the papers and move them in front of me. I give him a puzzled look. “I don't understand.”

“Yes, well.” Cohen shifts in his seat. He takes a stained handkerchief from his pocket and wipes perspiration from his forehead. “I apologize. I'm doing a crummy job of explaining this . . .”

Dr. Goodman cuts him off. “What Mr. Cohen means, Alice, is that there have been some recent developments in your case. Mr. Cohen has been working with the district attorney on a plea bargain for you, and today they were able to reach an agreement.”

“Okay,” I say.

“Unfortunately, the agreement is time-sensitive and expires quite soon. That's why we had to meet this evening.”

“Right, thank you,” Cohen says. “Yes, the plea bargain. I believe this is a great opportunity for you, Alice. What's so great about this is that you won't serve any jail time. Your sentence will be here at Savage Isle and will be determined by your doctors rather than a judge or jury.”

I trace the words on the paper. They blend together in a jumble of legal jargon I don't understand. My fingers land on an acronym. “What does NGRI mean?”

More sweat gathers on Cohen's upper lip, and his mouth fumbles over the words. “NGRI is a legal term and it means that the defendant,
you,
isn't responsible for their actions due to a mental or psychological condition. And, well, since you can't remember your actions that night—we've got a solid NGRI case.”

I suck in an uneasy breath. Why is he dancing around the words? “What does NGRI stand for, though,
exactly?
” I lick my lips and stare at Cohen.

Cohen shrinks a little before he speaks. “NGRI stands for ‘not guilty by reason of insanity.'”

I push the papers away from me like they're going to burn my hand.

Cohen stops the stack from sliding farther, his hand landing on the sheets like a paperweight.   

“I am not insane.”

Cohen stutters and his face goes red and blotchy.

“Alice, I think you should consider the plea bargain,” Dr. Goodman interjects.

Consider it? How can I? My freshman year in English class we read
The Crucible.
Well, I didn't read it. I watched the movie, the one with Winona Ryder. In one of the final scenes, John Proctor is convicted of witchcraft and contemplates signing a confession. He makes a big speech about his name, about how he's been stripped of everything, and he cries, “Leave me my name!” I am
so
John Proctor right now.

“No,” I say matter-of-factly.

“No?” Dr. Goodman furrows his brow.

“I'm not pleading insanity and I'm not signing the plea bargain.”

“Alice, I really believe this is in your best interest,” Dr. Goodman continues.

“I don't think it is.” I stand.

Cohen looks anxiously around the room. Donny takes a step forward, but Dr. Goodman waves him off.

“Please, Alice.” Sara speaks, soft and low, and her voice slices through me. I slump back into my chair. Sara slides the papers over to me. Just before I take them from her, she lays her hand on top of mine. I examine her hands, hands that hold the life I could have had. Her nails are clean and her skin is smooth, totally unblemished. Dr. Goodman sits straighter in his seat, but he doesn't draw Sara's hand away like before. “Read them,” she says. And I do, because it's Sara who's asked. Because I could have been her in another life.

It takes me twenty minutes to read through the whole plea bargain, and most of it I don't understand. Of course Cellie's named in it. Words like
accomplice
,
accidental
, and
unaware
float up at me. Cohen sweats so much I think he might be getting dehydrated. Once in a while I look up. Sara and Dr. Goodman are watching me closely. I get to the last page, where there is an empty line waiting for my signature. The DA has already signed. I stare at it until my eyes water and everything blurs.

Sara squeezes my hand. “I think it's for the best,” she says. “You can put all this behind you, focus on getting better. You'll be eighteen soon, and you can grow so much in a year. It's not too late to start looking at colleges, thinking about your future.”

I bow my head and a few tears slip down my cheeks. I wipe them away before anyone can see.
Suck it up, Alice.
“All I have to do is sign?”

“It's your choice, like everything else.
You
have control,” Sara says. “If you really focus, really open yourself up, you could be out of here soon. You could start a whole new life.”

What she says is tempting. It's like the apple in the Garden of Eden. Except we all know how that turned out. She's promising me the same things Jason promised right before our Great Escape—a future full of paths that lead away from Cellie. All I have to do is sign my name. Confess to a crime I didn't commit. Acknowledge that I played a small but unwilling part in my best friend's death. Admit that I'm unstable and maybe, just maybe, a little bit dangerous.

But Jason was wrong, and so is Sara. There will be no refuge from Cellie. I picture her pacing in her little D ward cell, mumbling incoherently, smashing the flies on the wall and waiting, waiting for her opening, when the door is left unattended or a guard takes his eyes off her. That's when she'll come for me.

My hand picks up the pen that has appeared next to me as if by magic. Signing this document is merely a means to an end, I realize. But not the end Sara, Dr. Goodman, and Mr. Cohen have in mind. I won't get to Cellie while I'm wearing a red wristband or while I'm locked up behind bars. And I have to get to her before she gets to me. My hand hovers over the paper. I bite my lip. Part of me feels like I deserve this. This is the price I pay. I loved her. And in loving her I was complicit. What was it Chase said?
I fear never being able to forgive myself.
Me too.

I scribble my name on the designated line. And just like that, I'm one step closer to Cellie and absolution.

All the air seems to rush back into the room. Cohen snatches the contract up like he thinks I'm going to change my mind, black out my name. He stuffs it into his briefcase, and I can tell he's eager to go home and wash the smell of the hospital from his body. I wonder if he has a family, a couple of kids and a wife. Maybe he'll hug them a little tighter tonight and tell them about the lost girl with the pyromaniac twin who lives in a mental hospital.

Sara hugs me, once again ignoring Dr. Goodman's “no touching” rule. Cohen and Sara leave together, and I resist the sudden urge to wrap myself around Sara and beg her to take me with her.

“You've made excellent progress today, Alice.” Dr. Goodman motions Nurse Dummel forward. “I think you're ready to be off restricted status.” Nurse Dummel pulls a pair of shiny silver scissors from her lab-coat pocket. She grabs my wrist and the cold metal sinks into my skin.

In one swift motion my red wristband is cut and a yellow one replaces it. Involuntarily I rub where the scissors pressed into me. Doc dismisses me and Donny takes me back to my room.

Amelia lies on her bed. A magazine obstructs her face, and she doesn't lower it to acknowledge my entrance. I crawl into my bed, pulling the sheets up over my head, and let the silence between us grow heavy, full of unsaid things.

Later on, Nurse Dummel knocks. She's brought me a neat, laundered pile of my clothes.
On top of the pile is a plastic bag with my little paper zoo and a stack of brightly colored origami paper. She hands them to me and I place them on the dresser. Electing to stay in the ratty scrubs a little while longer, I sit down on the edge of my bed and stare at the stack until the colors run together. For some reason, some reason I can't even begin to describe, the thought of changing back into my clothes, despite their clean, fresh scent, makes me feel dirty.

I'm surprised when the mattress begins to sink under Amelia's weight. She's sitting beside me now. A red band encircles her wrist. I crack my knuckles. “I told them about the razors,” I confess. “I'm sorry if it got you in more trouble.”

“It's okay.” She nudges my shoulder. “Thanks for the mouse.” I hadn't been sure if she'd found the gray origami mouse I'd made for her, but I guess she did. She gets up and goes to the dresser, riffles through it, and comes back with the paper mouse in hand.

I take it from her and touch one of the triangle ears. “What should we call him?”

“How about Clovis?”

I laugh. “Clovis is a terrible name.”

She scoffs and touches her chest in mock indignation. “Clovis is my grandfather's name. It means fighter.” She grins, plucks the mouse from my hand, and turns to the dresser.

“I really am sorry, you know,” I say softly.

Her shoulders stiffen and then relax. “It's okay, Alice. Seriously. I don't know what I was thinking stealing those razors.” She pauses and sets the mouse down. “I have a bad history with sharp things.”

F
ROM THE
J
OURNAL OF
A
LICE
M
ONROE

 

At exactly 12:01 a.m., the day after our sixteenth birthday, Cellie and I celebrated our “un-birthday” with Jason. He bought us each a pie with a lattice crust and lit a single candle in the middle. As the weather got colder and Mother Nature pulled the curtain from summer to fall, we fixed up the shed in the backyard of Candy's house. We made it into our hangout, putting a little piece of ourselves into it. Jason spray-painted the walls with silhouettes of children holding guns. Cellie collected dolls and stuffed animals from around the neighborhood and strung them up from the ceiling. And I made white paper doves and hung them between the doll heads and muddy Care Bears.

We blew out our candles while Jason lit up a joint. He took a long drag, and the air became supercharged with the smell of marijuana and gasoline. The shed was also where Jason liked to keep his accelerants.

I looked down at my pie. “Shit, we don't have any forks.”

Cellie jumped up. “I'll go get some.” Ever since she had drowned my cat, she'd been nicer to me, trying to build a bridge across her treachery. I knew her madness well enough by then to know it came in waves. Right then, it was low tide.

As soon as the door shut behind her, Jason offered me the joint. Normally I would have rejected his offer, scrunched up my nose, and turned my head away, but that night I wanted to try it. Wanted to know what it felt like. We exchanged it over the pie, and a little ash fell right into the middle. I held it like a cigarette and took a long inhale, making little
oh
s as I exhaled, as if I'd been smoking for years. I grinned at him. The smoke traveled through my body like a curling vine.

“Classy, baby,” he said.

I smiled in a different way and with my free hand dug into the pie. I brought a gooey scoop of blackberry filling and doughy crust to my lips and sucked it off my fingers.

Jason's gaze became heated. He groaned and flopped backwards onto a beanbag chair. I stamped the joint out and threw my head back and laughed. Everything seemed so funny and I felt so light. I crawled toward him, up over his body, until my legs were on either side of his hips.

His eyes were half lidded and his arm snaked around to hold me. “You're an animal,” he said.

I laughed again, this time lower, huskier. Then I smeared some of the pie onto his lips.

“You wanna play?” he asked. His mouth curved into a wicked smile. Then, quicker than a flash of lightning, he flipped me over onto my back so that he straddled me. His hands wrapped around my wrists. “Jesus Christ.” He leaned down. His voice became almost reverent. “I love you in the fucking worst way.” He licked the pie from my lips and then moved in for a much deeper kiss.

The door to the shed creaked open. Something dropped, a soft clatter of metal hitting concrete. The door banged closed, and then there was the sound of footsteps fleeing into silence.

For a moment, worry made my body go limp. I thought I should go after Cellie. Make her understand that I needed them both. Tell her that I remembered the last bite of cake and I would never forget. But then Jason's lips were on my throat. His hands were in my hair and his body was moving over mine. And the worry melted away under all of his heat. And I didn't care. I didn't care. All I could think was,
I am his.
From the east to the west, I am his. I am his.

CHAPTER

T
UESDAY IS FIELD TRIP DAY,
and since I've been upgraded to yellow-wristband status, I'm allowed to go. Amelia is still red-banded and she pouts.