One night of sleeping like the dead later, I’m at breakfast. I sit at the table with Lily and Claire, a plate of eggs on toast and a cup of black coffee before me. Lily has peanut butter and banana on her toast. Claire has porridge.
The bread is thick and rich, the lab-made eggs realistic, the coffee dark and sweet. I let chew slowly while gazing at the Japanese garden. Morning sunlight streams sideways over and through the willows. Sections of Atlas gleam – an elbow, an arc of a ring, the crown of his head. The rest of him hides in the rustling green darkness.
The wealth of birdlife here is a welcome surprise. They flit from branch to lantern to the bright red railings of the bridge and chirrup to the pale blue sky. They know where to find the birdbaths and where to sift through the undergrowth for food. I don’t recognise most of them.
There’s a knock at the front door. Claire and Lily pause discussing their plans for sailing on Peconic Bay for Claire to cross into the living room. I check the oven clock. Doctor Walsh is right on time. Right, let’s see this VIP doctor dresses better than Maman. Claire opens the door.
“Morning, Stanley,” greets Claire. She steps back to let him in. He’s a small man in a well-worn black suit and a fabulous tie covered in canaries, carrying a big black medical bag like a doctor from the nineteenth century. He can’t be below sixty-five – a frizz of white hair wraps around his head, leaving the top of his scalp bald and gleaming – yet he holds himself like a younger man. There’s something elfin about his pointed chin, his small features, his sharp ears, the impishness of his smile. Well damn. I like him immediately.
“Good morning, Claire. Smells heavenly in here.” He his voice is a lovely Irish burr.
“Doesn’t it? It’s the new sourdough recipe.”
Doctor Walsh takes care not to step on any of Lily’s drawings and merely smiles at the Japanese garden. He’s been here before. He sees us at the table and beams at the little girl. “Morning, Lily. How are we today?”
“Good,” says Lily. “Mrs K and me are going boating.”
“That sounds lovely. I wish I had time to go on the water. And here she is, the survivor herself. Good morning, Alyssa.”
I nod. “Morning.”
Doctor Walsh checks his watch. “Would you like to get started?”
“Yeah, sure.”
“You don’t mind if we set up in the bathroom?” he asks Claire.
“Of course not.”
I shove away from the table. “See ya, Lily.”
The little girl waves. “Bye, Lyssa.”
.
In the bathroom, Doctor Walsh sets his medical bag on the counter, opens it up, pulls out metal cases of medical equipment, and places them next to the bar of hand soap. I sit on the edge of the ceramic bath, feeling the warmth of the rainbow tiles. The vents hum, the curtain rustles, and a cutlery drawer rattles open in the kitchen. Doctor Walsh hums a tune while he unpacks. It’s oddly domestic.
Then, from the depths of the black bag, Doctor Walsh pulls out one of Yukiko’s pill bottles.
“Ah,” I say. “Have you told my father?”
Walsh chuckles. “No. Your mother made it quite clear that this was a private matter when she sent these to us for testing,” he says. “And I’d like to think I know when to keep a secret. She said a friend of yours made them?”
“Yes.”
“Astounding. I can manufacture more, though I think you already have some with you?”
“Yup.”
“How was it without them?” he asks. “Any withdrawal symptoms?”
“Uh . . .”
He quirks a wry little smile. “Let me rephrase. Anything beyond what you took them for in the first place?”
Shade whispering in my ear. Maman’s reflection. The cracking of a gun instead of a eucalyptus tree.
Doctor Walsh waits. I frown. “Are you going to tell my father?”
“Not unless you want me to.”
“Hah, never.” I rub the back of my neck, feeling the crosshatching of the grafts so faint they’re almost impossible to notice unless you know they’re there. I can always tell. With each movement of my fingertips, the scars that obliterated my fingerprints chafe against those on my body. I feel the world in patchwork.
I glance up at the VIP doctor, with his halo of white fuzz and the flying canaries on his tie, and his small, welcoming face, and feel suddenly tired despite my recent sleep marathon – tired from moving to NYC, from the ballroom, from the dressing room, from coming here, from that call with Dad, from the threat of Shade looming, from dealing with this alone with pills and silence.
It’d be nice for someone to know everything. A few people have an inkling – Maman and Leo and Doctor Castillo and Dad, from what they saw of me in that year after the fire; the psychiatrist who treated me back then with soft words and sleep medication that turned me into a zombie; and Yukiko, who recognised the look of chronic insomnia when I arrived at ERA and gave me the pills that fixed me. My friends know about Yukiko being my chemist, but have never pushed for divulgence as to why. They’re good like that.
Now added to that list is Carter, of all people, who will doubtless have told Shade that his little abductee screams in her sleep. And then there’s Doctors Claire Knightley and Stanley Walsh. Oh, yeah, and F.L.A.R.E., too. At this rate all of New York is going to know I’m unhinged without me having to tell anyone. Better get the story straight now before someone makes it up for me.
Still, is Stanley Walsh, VIP doctor, complete stranger, really going to be the first person to hear my sob story? Not Leo or Dad?
Sure, if I want to wait six weeks. Right now it’s either Walsh or Claire and at least Walsh won’t be analysing me over the dinner table.
“Ugh,” I mutter, fingers playing with the buttons on my blue flannel pyjama top. “Fine. Are you comfortable there? When I was thirteen, my father took our family to Australia over the Christmas holidays. As a treat, he invited my best friend, Drake . . .”
.
And so I tell Doctor Stanley Walsh everything. About Australia and the fire and Drake. The Sydney doctor and Maman and Doctor Castillo’s replacement grafts. The year of being an inpatient and fighting to go to ERA and meeting Yukiko there and being given a lifeline in the form of little white tablets. About rebuilding my life and then coming here, to New York, and having it all undone because of a madman with a gun. I tell him everything I saw and dreamed and heard in the dressing room and what Carter said without skipping any details. I tell him that I miss Drake and Maman.
I tell him, “I want to go home.”
Walsh is quiet for long moment. He took a seat on the closed toilet lid partway through and kept his kind gaze on me. He keeps it on me now, while mine drops down to the little tiles on the floor where red mingles with orange, into yellow, into green, blue, indigo, violet. Little flecks of each colour spray through the rest with no regard to natural laws. Each tile is the size of my big toe. It must have taken forever to put this in. I start counting the tiles. My brain feels too wrung out to do anything else. Hell. I actually told him.
“You’re a very impressive young woman, Alyssa,” says Walsh in his lilting burr. I snap my head up. He’s smiling at me, sadly. “It’s not often that one meets a person with your resilience.”
“Oh, uh . . . thanks.”
He inclines his head. “Thank you for trusting me.”
I smile wryly back. “Thanks for listening.”
“Of course.” He plucks my pill bottle from the top of his bag. “I understand now why these are so necessary. We can make more for as long as you need but . . .” He considers the bottle and frowns. “I sincerely hope that one day we won’t have to.”
I laugh, nothing more than a quiet puff of air between my lips. “Yeah. Let’s see what happens first - me going home or the walls coming down.”
“Or, perhaps, you simply won’t need them anymore.”
“Yeah, right.”
“It is possible. None of what has happened to you has been your choice, but it can be your choice to not let it haunt you anymore.”
I try not to laugh at the idea. “It would take a miracle.”
“It would take love, support, and time.”
“And a psychiatrist.”
“I’m sure Claire would be happy to help.”
“She’s – well –"
Walsh picks up my hesitation. “Or I can arrange for one of my staff to come visit you while you’re here.”
“Oh, that’d be . . .” Nice? Terrifying? Wait a minute, is he serious?
“Think about it. I want to see you freed from these one day, Alyssa.” He shakes the pill bottle and hands it to me. I stare at it, nestled in the white lines of my palm, a dependency, and the thought lodges itself in my brain like a thorn and my heart starts to beat faster.
“Would like to talk more?” Walsh sounds concerned. “I am happy to stay as long as you’d like. We will have to do your physical examination at some point but that can wait.”
I swallow and get myself under control. “No, no.” I lean down and set the bottle on the tiles where I don’t have to look at it. “Let’s get on with it.”
.
“This one is from a different type of graft.” Doctor Walsh sounds mildly impressed. I have my leg extended, heel resting on the sink, and he’s peering at the rip of thick white flesh up my shin.
“Yeah, broke that when I crashed a motorcycle. Got a steel rod put in.” I sigh. “I wasn’t allowed back on the motorcycle. Maman put her foot down.”
“A wise woman.” He pats my knee. “All done. From what I can tell, you are physically no worse for wear other than that bump on the head.” He turns away to pack away his instruments and samples while determinedly not looking at the mirror.
“Great,” I say, quickly exchange my towel for my pyjamas, and sit on the edge of the bath. My pulse is steady. Being poked and prodded with dermascopes and scrapers is comforting in a strange way. It brings back memories of Maman and Doctor Castillo and our easy laughter during my sporadic examinations back home.
“I once knew a man who could fix burns as bad as yours without using skin grafts,” Walsh says as he checks the lids on my skin sample containers.
I sit up straight. “Really? Who?”
“Doctor Shirō Ishii. The best dermatologist I’ve ever met, and a brilliant neurosurgeon.”
“Where is he now?”
Doctor Walsh takes a moment to carefully slot a scalpel back into its plastic case. “He passed away,” he says.
“Damn.”
Doctor Walsh glances in the mirror, sees me slumped in my pyjamas, and turns to place a long-fingered hand on my flannel shoulder. “Don’t worry. We have the best research doctors in the country. We’ll take good care of you. I’m coming back in a month to check on Lily. Would you like to talk more then?”
I shrug. “Yeah, sure.”
He pats my shoulder and zips up his bag. He pauses at the door. “It is possible, Alyssa.”
“Yeah, sure,” I mutter, and I wait for him to leave before I hunch over and press the heels of my hands into my eyes. The heating vents hum, the curtain rustles, and my breathing grows harsh. The little pill bottle is right there, on the floor next to my left heel, innocuous and problematic and, screw it, I can’t deal with this right now, I’m going for a run. Facing my demons can wait.
Great as always, thanks Sarah.