1929 Book 2 - Elizabeth's Heart

by ML Gardner

  I stopped and looked at him. “Well, would you?”

  He shook his head, and we walked slowly down the long hall back to the men’s wing.

  “You have to watch your step, Simon. There is, well, there was talk of you getting out of here. I don’t know how this is going to affect that.” He shot me a stern look.

  “What was I supposed to do, David?” I stopped and stared at him. He pursed his lips, unable to answer and started walking again. “What time is it anyway?” I asked. I hadn’t seen a window, and it was impossible to tell without the sunlight.

  “Seven-thirty in the evening.”

  Too late for dinner, I thought.

  “I need to see her.” I hoped that his feeling of obligation for saving his life hadn’t run its course.

  “Maybe later.” He turned and looked both ways down the hall before continuing. “I’m working until midnight. Maybe when the other one goes to break, I can give you a few minutes,” he said reluctantly. “Lord knows she wants to see you. She’s been a mess since it happened. The other one has come out twice.”

  “What happens when the other one comes out? She doesn’t remember and I’ve never seen it.” He shook his head.

  “David, please, I’m just curious. It’s not going to change how I feel.”

  He looked almost ashamed. “It’s not that, I’ve just…” He shifted his weight and avoided my eyes. “I’ve never quite seen anything like it,” he whispered. “The other one, it keeps tabs on what’s going on. Like it’s watching from the back of her mind. I’ve never been afraid of a split person before, but I’ve been afraid of this one.”

  “It’s all her, so, of course, it knows. It’s just stronger. It’s like this. When it comes out, she’s putting on an extra layer of muscles for difficult jobs. The other one handles the things she thinks she can’t. It can handle remembering the hard stuff, so it does, and Elizabeth doesn’t have to.”

  I thought about picking up my honorary psychology degree on my way out of this place.

  “It’s more than that,” David insisted. “The other one sees and remembers everything, even when it’s not in control. Elizabeth doesn’t do that. She doesn’t remember anything when the other one is in control.”

  “Well, she said she’s getting better at controlling it. She told me they push her, and she keeps it from coming out.”

  “When did she tell you that?” David asked suspiciously. We had gotten to my door and he unlocked it. We were alone in the hallway.

  “Just last week. She said they push her in therapy to try to get her to show that she’s in control. She does really well,” I said.

  “No, Simon. It’s not quite like that.” He looked at me, long and ominous.

  “Well, how is it then? Because Elizabeth would never lie to me. She has no need to.”

  He sighed in hesitation. “She’s worse, Simon. A lot worse.”

  Later I waited on my bed, hands behind my head. It was a quiet night, and I could hear the ticking of the black and white clock in the hallway. David had left my door closed, but unlocked to avoid unlatching the loud bolt in case he could sneak Elizabeth down the hall to me. I strained to hear anything, anything at all. It was as if the whole building were abandoned, it was so quiet. I thought a lot about what David had said. He had no reason to lie to me. But neither did Elizabeth. Maybe she doesn’t know she’s getting worse, I thought in her defense. How could she, if she couldn’t remember the times that the other one came out? A shiver ran through me, and I was more curious than ever to see what it looked like when the other took control. Would it know me and love me the way she does? After all, it’s all still her in there, I thought.

  I heard light footsteps and a soft murmur that I recognized immediately as hers. I swung my legs over the side of the bed and listened again, just to be sure. Yes, it was her. I closed my eyes in relief.

  David pushed the door open, and she stepped in around him.

  “Five minutes,” he whispered.

  I grabbed her in a tight hug. “Are you all right?” I asked into her hair. She nodded. I pulled back to see for myself. She looked well enough, and I held her head in between my hands.

  “I’ll kill anyone who tries to hurt you,” I whispered. “Anyone.” I pulled her back and held her tight against me. We had very little time and I needed to know. “How have you been doing in therapy?” I asked after a moment.

  “I’m doing good, Simon. The other one hasn’t come out. Even after what happened with Ronnie.”

  “When was the last time?” I asked, moving a few inches away, watching her face.

  “It’s been weeks,” she said with a big smile. “And it’s all because of you.” She reached up to hug me, but I grabbed her arms, holding them away from me.

  “That’s not what David said,” I said softly.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, that you don’t have to lie to me, Elizabeth. If the other one is coming out more, it’s not going to change how I feel about you. About us.”

  “You don’t believe me?” she breathed.

  “It’s not that I don’t believe you, I just think…” I stopped, remembering all of the lies I had told her, under the disguise of being for her own benefit. All the little lies that I let slip, for the sole purpose of making her feel better, even if only for a moment.

  “I can’t blame you,” I said.

  “No, you can’t because I didn’t do anything,” she said, raising her voice a little too high, recoiling. “I can’t believe you believe him and not me!”

  “Elizabeth, shh!” I turned to look at the door. “Lower your voice!” I hissed.

  “Why wouldn’t you believe me?” she asked.

  The light was dim, but I could tell her eyes were narrow with disbelief.

  “I do,” I said finally. “I do.” I held my hand out to her. She stared at it to the long count of ten before taking it. “I believe you,” I reassured, and she walked back into my arms. I couldn’t be mad at her for doing the same thing I had.

  She wanted to make me feel better like I had made her feel better. And maybe a small bit of that was still true. She never changed around me. I felt her breath on my neck, and it sent a shiver through my entire body.

  “Are you cold?” She giggled.

  “No.” I smiled and ran my hand slowly from her neck to the low small of her back. “Not in the least.”

  David gave a signal from the door. I sighed and held her closer.

  “It doesn’t matter,” I said, with my face buried in her hair.

  “What doesn’t?”

  “Any of it,” I said just before kissing her goodnight.

  The doctor wanted to see me first thing the next morning. My mind raced, trying to think of an explanation for my outburst that wouldn’t involve Elizabeth; something that sounded crazy enough to warrant the action, but not crazy enough to keep me here. I had seen, right after she left my room the night before, the lake and the small cabin. It was cold and we were sneaking through the woods. After hiking for a long while, we saw a white house in the distance. We waited, for what, I don’t know, and then broke into the house, gathering food and blankets. I had walked through the living room and noticed a newspaper lying on the arm of the couch. The date was January, nineteen thirty, but I couldn’t see which day. We had less than six weeks. It made less and less sense as we both were becoming less stable. I had to rely on faith in my visions. Each one had been right, except about David, and I went out of my way to change that.

  Then I thought with an icy shudder of my own death. I had seen it very clearly within days of seeing Elizabeth. Maybe I might be able to change that, too? At least, I hoped. I didn’t like to think about it. If I had changed David’s outcome and saved his life, then maybe I could save my own. I argued with myself that I might be bringing it on with my actions. My mind was spinning, and I didn’t know any longer if I was changing my own fate or pushing myself closer to it. I wasted the walk to the doctor’s office with my han
ds shoved in my pockets, these thoughts filling my mind. I walked in completely unprepared.

  “I hear you had quite the outburst, Simon. Completely out of character for you.” He sat back in his chair, staring at me. “What do you have to say for yourself?”

  “I don’t know, Doc,” I lied. I rubbed my face hard and then looked out the window. I knew I couldn’t pull off unreadable today.

  “It wouldn’t have anything to do with Elizabeth, would it?”

  “No,” I said, calm and even, staring out the window.

  “Well, how do explain the fact that you have gotten worse since she arrived? You’re having more visions, more outbursts. It’s all very confusing.”

  It wasn’t for him, though. I knew he already had it worked out in his own head. Irritated by the look of him, I looked away.

  “You said you were beginning the process of releasing me. Now you’re saying I’ve steadily gotten worse. Which is it, Doc?”

  “Letting you go didn’t have anything to do with you getting better, Simon.”

  “So you were lying to me.” I shook my head in disbelief. “And you wonder why I don’t trust anyone here.” I instantly wished I could take it back. I had no room to be defiant.

  “It had more to do with the fact that the state is rather bankrupt, and we were asked to release some of the more stable patients to reduce the financial burden. You aren’t…” He paused and started over. “You weren’t considered a threat to society, so you were first on the list to go.”

  He rose from his chair and slowly walked around his desk, sitting on the corner of it, close to me. “I have to admit, Simon, I was disappointed. I was hoping we would be able to cure you. I was hoping I could write a paper on your condition, if it could be cured. So it might help others.”

  “Sorry to let you down, Doc,” I said. I was a damned research paper to him, that was all. He didn’t see a human being, he saw a banquet dinner where he would receive an award for prizewinning research and a thesis. I wanted to kill him then, almost as much as I had wanted to kill Ronnie.

  “So help yourself out, Simon. Explain yourself to me, so we can try to move forward with your release. Help me understand why you did what you did.”

  I took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. Here goes nothing.

  “I just snapped.” His eyebrows rose. “I’ve watched him choke every single person here, and I just couldn’t take it again. I’m sick of it. You said yourself to your little student that I’m quite sane. That’s why the others don’t care. But I do and I’m sick of it.” I thought quickly and used his words to my advantage. “I feel sorry for them,” I said, adding a sane human element to my explanation. “And when you told that student that I was the sanest of the group, I started looking at them differently. Like I had to protect them, look out for them.” He nodded at me slowly with narrowed eyes. It bothered me, not knowing if he was believing me or not. “So that’s it.” I shrugged.

  “You feel it’s your job to look out for the weaker ones.”

  “Yes.” The weaker one, if I were being honest. Just her. To hell with the rest of them.

  “That’s very noble of you, Simon.” I shrugged and looked away again. “So that explains your behavior the other day. However, I am still trying to make sense of the rest of it. Your increase in visions seems to be directly correlated with Elizabeth’s other personality surfacing.”

  “I haven’t noticed.”

  “Well, I have. Take a look at this.” He handed me a piece of paper. It looked like childish writing in crayon, but it was readable. My blood ran cold. It was a timeline showing that every one of my visions happened very close to, or at the same time as Elizabeth losing control. Little blue spikes were my visions, the ones which were caught anyway, and the red ones were for her, the times when the other one took over. There were many more red lines than blue; I looked closely at the dates, and those even matched up with visions I hadn’t been caught having.

  “Who did this?” I asked.

  “I was hoping you would know,” he said. “I found it on my desk this morning. I have read both your charts and it’s all correct. It matches up.” He pointed to the lines with an old crooked finger. “They are nearly mirror images of each other. It is rather–” He rubbed his chin. “Interesting.”

  God, I hated that word. I tossed the paper onto his desk.

  “It makes no sense to me,” I said, folding my hands to hide the tremors. “I don’t see the connection.”

  I danced around through the rest of the appointment until he finally let me go.

  I passed David in the hall on my way back to my room. He was half-pulling Ronnie along. At least, he’s alive, I thought, noticing the swollen bruises all over his face.

  David stopped and Ronnie shrunk away from me.

  “I need to see her,” I said urgently.

  “Is everything okay?” he whispered.

  “No.” I glared at Ronnie. I knew now that I would leave first, and she would be left here, at least for a little while. I took a step toward Ronnie. “You’re not even going to look at her, are you, Ronnie?” I asked through my teeth. He shook his head with his eyes at my feet.

  “I’ll see what I can do,” David said and pulled Ronnie along to his appointment.

  Three long days passed before David could bring me to her room. The women’s wing was short staffed, and we had to wait until near midnight. She knew something was wrong, but it was impossible to talk to her about it during the day. We were watched every second now. Loretta showed me to her room and waited outside.

  “What’s wrong?” She jumped up to hug me.

  “Everything,” I said. “I think they know.” I swallowed hard, not wanting to tell her what I suspected. “Sit,” I said, pulling away. “We don’t have a lot of time.” I sat beside her on the bed, which was equally as uncomfortable as mine. In fact, the room was identical, except they had let her have a hairbrush. “I think I know what’s going on,” I said. She waited with owlish eyes. “I think it’s the other one.” She continued to stare at me. “Look, the doctor showed me something the other day. A chart that someone drew. Someone who has been watching us very closely. It showed every time I had a vision, and every time the other one showed itself.”

  I could see she was getting upset, so I held her hand.

  “Think about it, Elizabeth,” I whispered. “Who else would know every time I had a vision? I only ever told you about the ones that I didn’t get caught for.”

  “I don’t understand,” she said slowly.

  “I’ve had three days to think this over. I think the other one is watching. David thinks it takes note of everything you say and do, everything that goes on around you. It knows it can’t come out when we’re together, because you’re strong enough to keep it down. I think that makes it angry, and it’s trying to keep us apart. I just don’t know how you got the paper on his desk. Not you,” I backtracked quickly. “The other one. That’s the only thing I can’t figure out.”

  “This doesn’t make any sense,” she said, on the verge of tears.

  “It makes perfect sense. The other one is stronger. It wants to be in control. The only way it can be is if you get rid of me.”

  “No. No, I would never do that, Simon. You have to believe that.” She grabbed my shirt, shaking her head.

  “I don’t think you did,” I said. I glanced at the door as our time was almost up. I grabbed both of her hands in mine and kissed them quickly. “I need you to fight harder, harder than you’ve ever fought before, to keep this other one down. I’m going to be getting out soon.” She looked panicked. “It’ll be fine, you’ll be right behind me. I promise. I’ve seen it, but–” Loretta gave a soft knock on the door. “Just be strong. Fight hard, alright? And remember,” I said as I stood and hugged her. “This is your mind, Elizabeth, and you are in control of everything and everyone in it.” She nodded silently against my shoulder. I gave her a quick kiss and hurried back to my room.

  That night I
dreamed vividly. It was Christmas. I saw muddy fingers molding a small heart made of clay. Tiny cracks covered the surface of it from sun drying. I saw the heart in the palm of her hand and then looked up to see her face, smiling and bright.

  Two days later the nuns came again to do art projects with us. They worked with women and men separately, and I sat in the far corner of the room and watched the other guys make a mess. One of the nuns called to me, inviting me over, but I shook my head and looked out the window.

  “No, Ronnie, don’t eat the clay,” one of the nuns called out. My head jerked toward the group, and I squinted my eyes to see everything the nuns had spread out over the table. On the end of one table was a chunk of molding clay. It was the same color as the clay heart in my dream. The nuns seemed to be pleased when I walked over and sat down. I ripped off a piece of the sticky clay and played with it mindlessly. When no one was looking, I took another piece and slipped it into my pocket.

  Once back in my room, I molded it in the dark into the heart I saw in my mind.

  “Psst.” David’s eyes adjusted to the darkness of the room, and he saw me sit up and reach for something under my bed.

  “Can you put this on the windowsill for me?” I whispered. It was far too high for me to reach. He stepped in, and I placed the heart carefully in his hand. “Be careful, it’s not dry yet,” I whispered.

  He stared at it for a moment with an indescribable expression, and I thought I saw his eyes mist just a little.

  “What?” I ask defensively, worried he thought it was stupid.

  He shook his head, cleared his throat, and reached up high to place it on the windowsill to dry in the sun, undetected. He left without explaining his odd behavior.

  On Christmas Eve, David and Loretta planned something spectacular for us. Well, spectacular from the perspective of a caged animal. Not just for Elizabeth and I, but for all of us.