Luisa didn’t respond; but simply reached for a telephone, and punched a number. She spoke a few words into the receiver, and then turned to the first nurse. “Un momento,” she said.
“The orderly will come soon,” the first nurse said to Lucie. “Will you get to bed, before he does?”
“No.”
“You’re only making it harder on yourself.”
“So be it.”
Lucie had turned around, and was busy scouting out the best path for escape; when she was caught from behind by what must have been a very fleet-footed orderly.
“Back to your bed, now, Miss Benoit,” he said.
“No!”
“Syringe, Abby!”
The first nurse darted a hand into her pocket, and handed him what he requested. Lucie felt a sharp stick in her arm; but a mania was overtaking her, and she couldn’t be subdued so easily. She wrestled against the orderly, and broke free from his strong arms. “Get away from me, villain!” she cried. “Get away! I’ll break out of this place – I’ll break out of here yet! You haven’t seen the last of me!”
She began to spin around in wild circles, up and down the hall. The nurse stood quietly beside the orderly, and both of their mouths hung open.
Lucie looked at them; but instead of a man and woman in white uniforms, she saw two enormous guards, clad in grey Schutzstaffel ensembles.
“You won’t have me!” she cried, as she continued to spin. “Your ovens won’t have me! Your chimneys won’t swallow me!”
The orderly shook himself from his wondering daze, and went for Lucie again. He injected her with another syringe; and she was for the second time in two days rendered unconscious by a member of the healing profession.
~
When she woke the next time, she was in a different room. Her feet were free, but it seemed that restraints had been placed over her wrists, which were in turn tied to the bed rails.
“What is this?” she cried, as she pushed and pulled against her bonds. “What kind of a hospital is this?”
Unsurprisingly – and though the door to the room stood open to the hall – no one came to answer her.
So she lay all afternoon in bed, gazing morosely out of the window. The day was clear, and bright; but she wasn’t cheered at all by the shining sun.
Evening was just beginning to settle, and the shadows were just beginning to creep across the floor, when a nurse came to turn on the light. She didn’t look at Lucie, and didn’t speak to her.
“This isn’t a hospital,” Lucie muttered bitterly, as she shook her restraints once more, and made them ring against the metal rails. “This is a prison.”
The dinner hour passed, and no one brought her anything to eat. So she fell asleep hungry – and after she dreamt of Clara, she dreamt of hamburgers.
When she opened her eyes, the room was pitch dark. They had come while she slept to douse the light, draw the curtains, and shut the door. She was very grateful to discover that they had even untied her hands.
She sat up in bed, rubbed her raw wrists, and looked around at the shadows. There was a thin line of yellow light beneath the door – but no sound came from the hall to accompany it. It was as if the entire world had died, and left her alone in that hospital room, to sit forever in the dark.
She was scared nearly out of her skin, when there came a sound of movement at her right-hand. She squinted her eyes, trying to make use of the small amount of soft light that had begun to appear, from under and over the curtain at the window. The light shone blue over the white floor, and silhouetted a solitary figure sitting in a chair beside the bed. Lucie couldn’t see the face; but she made out the hat atop its head.
“Robert?” she said.
“Hello, Lucie.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to see about you.” He paused, and removed his hat to scratch his head. “But how did you get here? What happened this time?”
Lucie rolled her eyes, and turned away. “Why bother?” she asked. “César told me what you said.”
“César?”
“Who else? He’s the one you talked to. Don’t you remember – when you said you would keep the money, and leave me to die?”
“I never talked to César.”
“Oh, just shut up, Robert!”
“I swear it, Lucie! I haven’t spoken to him, since he came to the motel.”
Lucie looked back at him. “But why would he lie?”
“I think you know the answer to that much better than I do.”
“Then – then he always meant to kill me?”
“To kill you!” Robert exclaimed. “What are you talking about?”
“He said he would kill me, if you didn’t bring him the money. He said that you called him, and that you refused. So he was going to shoot me.”
“That crazy bastard!” Robert cried. “I’ll kill him, Lucie, I swear it.”
Lucie only sighed miserably, and didn’t know what to say.
“Where is he?” Robert demanded.
“How would I know? I’ve been stuck here since I saw him last.” She stopped, and thought for a moment. “But he’s probably here.”
“Here in the hospital?”
“I think so. He was shot, too.”
“Too?” echoed Robert. “The doctor told me you were fine.”
“Not me,” said Lucie. “Clara.”
“Clara!”
Lucie moaned, and put a hand to her aching head. “I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” she said. “I’ve had enough.”
“Well – all right,” said Robert. He began to twirl his hat in his hands – as Lucie had only seen him do, perhaps twice before in his life, when he was nervous. (For, as you well know, the feeling was not a frequent one with him.)
“But – Lucie?” he said.
“What, Robert?”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re – what?”
“I’m sorry, Lucie. I’m sorry for what I did.”
“Which thing?”
He didn’t answer, but only laid his trembling hand over Lucie’s. “I love you, you know,” he went on. “As much as someone like me can love, I mean. As much as I can – I do love you, Lucie.”
“That doesn’t change anything, Robert.”
“I know it doesn’t. But I – I just wanted you to know.”
He patted Lucie’s hand, and then removed his own.
But then Lucie remembered. She wondered for a moment; and thought, after all, that it was very unfair, and very undeserved; but she would do it, anyway.
“Robert?” she said.
“What?”
“Sylvie asked me to kiss you for her.”
So she leaned over the bed, wrapped her arms around her brother’s shoulders, and kissed his cheek. Then she sighed sadly, and resumed her place.
“What – what did you say?” Robert breathed.
“You heard me.”
“But – but –”
“Oh, be quiet, Robert.” She took his big hand in her own, and said, “I love you, too.”
She couldn’t have sworn to it, of course – but she thought very much that she saw, in the blue light from the window, a single shining tear slip from Robert’s eye. Yet he said nothing more. He only pressed Lucie’s hand, and rose quickly from his seat. Next moment he was gone.
~
Lucie got out of bed at first light, after shaking off the drowsy effects inflicted by what could only have been a precautionary sedative, slipped to her after she fell asleep the second time. She felt a pinch in her arm, as she tried to move; and looked down with some annoyance, to find that another IV had been put in. “For God’s sake!” she cried. “What in the hell are you all treating me for? Insanity? Well, don’t waste your time – they’ve tried that already!”
She ripped the tube out angrily, and threw it against the wall. Then she took a deep breath, got to her feet, and crept silently out into the corridor. She looked about; but there was no one to be seen. So she turn
ed around, and began on her search.
She had assumed she was on the same floor as before – but that didn’t seem to be the case. Rather, when she reached the end of the corridor, she met a green metal door which was painted with the words, “sala psiquiátrica.” (Obvious enough.) The door was locked.
She looked around desperately. Her eyes lighted on a little red lever, which read “alarma de incendios.” She pulled the lever, and a great clanging bell seemed to begin sounding off, directly above her head. She clapped her hands to her ears; but when she tried the door again, she felt it give way.
Assuming that Clara would be where she herself had been, just the day before, she ran to the stairs, and flew down to the third floor. She burst out into the hallway, to the shock of several nurses gathered round their station, and then began to pelt along at breakneck speed.
Presently, however, she was assaulted by the high, screeching voice of Abby the nurse, who was displaying a little more each day a strange obsession to keep her captive in her hospital bed. She was rather beginning to feel like James Caan; and Abby was rather beginning to resemble Kathy Bates. (Though only in the single instance of Misery, however – for otherwise Lucie thought Miss Bates quite lovable.)
“Oh, leave me alone!” she cried. “There’s nothing wrong with me. Go and bother someone who’s sick!”
“How did you get down here?” asked Abby. “You little miscreant! Come along with me this instant. I don’t want to have to call an orderly!”
“Where’s Clara?”
“If you don’t follow me, young lady, to your proper room, then I’ll have to –”
“What room?” Lucie pressed.
“I won’t tell you that, if you don’t cooperate.”
“I’ll find her myself!”
So she turned on her heel, and began running in the opposite direction. She was beginning to think that her efforts were futile, however, by the time she reached the end of the hall without having accomplished her goal. But then she heard a voice – a voice coming from the very last room on the right. It sounded very much like Maríbel Vicente’s voice.
Lucie looked over her shoulder, and saw that the ruffled nurse was in pursuit; so she dashed quickly into the room, and locked the door behind her.
She looked towards the bed under the window, round which a group of people were gathered. This group was the Vicente family – and in the bed lay Clara.
“Lucie!” exclaimed Eduardo, as he rushed forward to meet her. “I did not know you were here.”
But Lucie was straining to see past him. “Is she all right?” she demanded, as she pushed against his shoulder. “Is she?”
“She has been sleeping since she got here,” answered Eduardo, in a voice tinged with sadness. “The doctors do not know when she will wake.”
Suddenly there came the sound of two fists, hammering against the outside of the door. No doubt it was Abby – perhaps the most dedicated nurse that anyone shall ever find.
A look of fury rolled across Eduardo’s face, and he crossed to the door in two strides. He unlocked it, flung it open, and screamed into the nurse’s face (quite before she had had the time to speak a single word): “Leave us be! Go on, get out – before I do something I will regret!”
Fear and shame crept simultaneously into Abby’s previously stone-like countenance; and she backed slowly away from the room. Eduardo slammed the door in her face, and then returned to Lucie.
Lucie looked at him for a moment, taking in his tired face and dark-ringed eyes, before she managed to stammer, “May I – may I see her?”
“Of course,” he said.
She stepped forward, then, with all of her urgency dissipated. Now that she saw Clara, lying just as still as before, she wasn’t eager to look more closely into her face. But she pressed on just the same, and finally arrived on weak legs at the side of the bed. She felt something wet trickle down her palm; and looked to find a rivulet of blood flowing from the little hole she had made in her arm. But she only furled her fist, and paid it no mind.
Still, Clara looked just as if she were sleeping. Her black lashes lay gently over her cheeks, and made no move or flutter in the midst of her deep slumber. Her face was as smooth and tranquil as the sleeping beauty’s must have been; and her lips were just slightly parted, so that the soft and regular sound of her breathing could be heard. But if she was only sleeping – then why wouldn’t she wake?
Lucie felt as if she could scream, or stamp her feet, though she refrained. She was pulsating with a vicious feeling of regret, which she feared very greatly she might never have the chance to allay. What if Clara never woke – and Lucie couldn’t tell her, how her heart overflowed at the sight of her? What if she could never say aloud, all those replies she had formed in her own head, to what sincere and unequivocal words Clara had spoken in the bloodstained apartment? What if she could never tell her – that she was her life, as well?
But surely she would wake! Why wouldn’t she? It wasn’t possible; it wasn’t sensible. It wasn’t acceptable . . .
“Lucie?”
Lucie started, and looked towards the voice that had spoken. She saw Maríbel standing beside her.
“What are you doing here?” asked Maríbel. “You are not hurt, too!”
“No.”
“Then . . .?”
“It’s a very long story, Maríbel.”
Maríbel sighed; and a catch in her breath betrayed a sob, just as it escaped her throat. “Lucie?” she repeated.
“Yes?”
“I am sorry.”
Lucie neither needed nor asked for more than that. Truthfully, she didn’t feel as if she deserved as much as she got – because she blamed herself for everything. What guilt she had felt, as she leaned over Clara’s bleeding chest in the death room, was magnified tenfold now. She could hardly speak. So she only reached out, and patted Maríbel’s hand.
She looked around at the others; and saw that they all smiled. Eduardo had gone to sit beside his mother and father. Alejandra gave Lucie a small wave, from her place at the window.
Josefína looked to her, and reached for her hand. “Lo siento, Lucie,” she said.
“Don’t be, Mrs. Vicente.”
She pressed Lucie’s hand to her cheek, and then kissed it. Lucie bent down to embrace her.
“Oh – oh!” she cried. “Es demasiado mucho! Es demasiado mucho!”
She looked with tear-filled eyes over Lucie’s shoulder, and began to weep afresh, at the sight of her unmoving daughter.
“It is too much for her,” Maríbel said softly.
“It is too much,” Lucie answered. “It’s much too much.”
She looked down at Clara; tried to maintain her composure; but fell anyway to her knees beside the bed. She grasped Clara’s cool hand, that lay so slack in her own, and began to sob. “Listen to me, Clara,” she said. “I want you to go back. I want you to go back to that night – go back, and stay home! Don’t come for me. Don’t think of me. I’ll take your place, Clara – and it will be all right. I’ve made my peace, and it’s enough.”
She pressed her forehead to Clara’s hand, and was silent. She knelt there for what must have been a very long time, but what seemed to her only a few moments – before she heard a scream, and snapped her head up to see what was wrong.
“She is awake!” cried Alejandra. “She is awake!”
Lucie looked to Clara, with an indescribable feeling of hope fluttering all around her chest; and nearly screamed herself, when she saw her eyes were open.
“Clara!” she cried. “Oh, Clara!”
Clara looked for a long moment into Lucie’s face, and then smiled. Afterwards she raised her eyes to all the others, and began to look rather puzzled.
“Why is everyone crying?” she asked.
~
After Lucie left Clara, she went docilely back to the psychiatric ward, where she behaved irreproachably for three days. When she was released, she went back down to Clara, and found her still
surrounded by her family. It was nearly a whole week more before she was able to leave.
Back on Little Tortuga Street, the family sighed with shame over the newspaper articles on César’s trial. At first, Clara didn’t want to press charges; and Lucie went along with her wishes. But when they all visited César at the jail, they found him in a state of madness and terror – and he begged them repeatedly to testify against him. He gave the names of some of his worst enemies, and requested that they speak their piece against him, too. What with the list of charges that resulted, he was recommended for twenty years in a maximum-security prison – where Domingo Jiménez and his “colleagues” couldn’t get at him.
It was a sad end to a terrible story. César went away, and all his family cried – and Lucie’s heart was heavy with pity. On the day of his transport, César asked her, whether she hated him? She patted his cheek, and asked him to smile for her – as she had always loved his smile. Then she told him, no, she didn’t hate him. So then he asked Clara, whether she hated him? Clara cried silent tears, and told him that she loved him; and he fell down to his knees on the ground, where he wept joyfully, and held his arms up to heaven.
Robert disappeared – and Lucie never saw him again. Sylvie’s ghost was gone, too. But one night Lucie went up to the roof with Clara, where they looked together at the stars; and Lucie saw painted in them, the picture of a laughing girl, with a man and a woman holding each of her hands. The girl skipped nearer, waved her hand, and blew a kiss. Then the picture faded.
Clara leaned her head on Lucie’s shoulder, and asked, “What will we do now?”
“We’ll live,” Lucie answered. “And I think we’re going to like it here, from now on.”
THE END.
Author’s Note
Dear Reader,
I just want to take a moment to thank you for reading my story. Did you enjoy it? If you did, I’d really appreciate it if you could post a quick review on Amazon or Goodreads. It doesn’t have to be long.
If you’d like to know more about my writing, check out my Amazon author page for additional titles. Click here to explore.
TO CONTACT THE AUTHOR:
Email: [email protected]
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