Deviant

by Callie Hart

  This information freezes her in her seat. I don't often talk about Lex; I rarely even mention her name, so the fact that I've brought her up now is a really big deal. "How?" she asks calmly. "Did this guy have something to do with her disappearance? Oh my God."

  "No. Or at least I don't think he did. I can't…I can't really explain it right now."

  She doesn't like that, not one bit. She huffs out a long breath, staring at me like have gone mad. "I have a bad feeling about this, Sloane. Aside from the fact that you still know nothing about this guy—” she pauses, as though something has just occurred to her. "Do you even know his name now?" I shake my head, no. She looks mortified. "Okay, well he hasn't offered any information to the cops about Lex being snatched, and you won't tell me how you think he might know this mystery information. That leads me to believe he is probably involved in some bad shit. Up to his neck in it, no doubt. And he tried to choke the life out of you?"

  “I know," I tell her miserably. When she puts it that way, it really does sound pretty messed up.

  "I know you want to find her, but this guy sounds dangerous. It sounds as if he's more likely to stab you than help you find Lex. I want you to stay away from him, okay? There's no way you should have anything to do with him. Please, Sloane? For me?"

  I bury my face into my coffee cup. I knew she would do this; I knew exactly what she would say, and I’m kind of relieved to be honest. It's like I have permission to avoid him like the plague now, even though he might have some idea where my sister is. I should just tell the police that he practically admitted to hurting Eli yesterday and then they can do all of the questioning. I can stay the hell out of it entirely.

  "Okay, yes, you're right. I'll stay away from him,” I say. But for some reason, I don't tell her that he is returning to the hospital tomorrow. I don't tell her that he promised he'd come looking for me.

  The unsettled feeling lingering within me is a mixture of guilt and anticipation. I’ve never been one to lie or to hide things, and it’s all too worrying that the only things I’ve kept from my best friend are related to this guy. I can’t help but wonder, am I asking for trouble by keeping secrets? It seems like a futile argument; where he is concerned, I sense that trouble is going to find me regardless.

  ******

  The morning drags unbearably as I try to stretch out my rounds, doing my best to make my other patients’ needs more time consuming than they need to be. Eventually I can't put it off any longer, though. I've done everything that needs doing and since Dr Patel is off today, that makes the girl my responsibility.

  Carrie is sleeping when I go to her room, and she's not alone. Kim Perez is from psych, an incredibly lovely woman. She is motherly and warm, the first person they send down here when a kid needs assessing. Carrie’s no kid, but they obviously figured she’d respond to a maternal presence.

  "Hey, Sloane,” she whispers, putting Carrie’s chart back into the slot at the end of her bed. "Heard you performed quite the miracle with this one."

  "Suresh did most of the work." I smile, returning the same warmth she shows to me.

  "Poor girl." She turns to look at Carrie; the girl’s definitely a little worse for wear. There are dark purple rings around her eyes, and her skin is still a deathly white. "I'm just waiting for her to decide to wake up. Any idea how long I'm going to be hanging around?"

  "She's not sedated anymore. Could be a couple of hours, could be a day or more. She was in a pretty bad way."

  Kim wraps her arms around her body and tuts, frowning at the young woman in the bed. She always takes these things to heart, no matter that she has never met the patient before. "People say that suicide’s the coward's way out, but they couldn't be more wrong. It takes nerves of steel to commit like she did. It's good that she is here now, though. She can get the rest she needs, hopefully develop a different perspective on things. She'll have a whole team of people on hand just waiting to help her."

  Dark brown eyes flash inside my head. I swallow hard even though there's nothing constricting my airway. Don’t let them section her or I'm gonna be seriously pissed.

  "She's lucky she came to St Peters," I whisper. "She couldn't be in better hands." My mind goes to dark places when I worry. Maybe Alexis is alive—maybe she’s been suffering just like Carrie. Who knows the things she’s been put through if she is still alive. It doesn’t even bear thinking about. Maybe…maybe she’s been laid up in a bed somewhere, recovering from trying to end her own life, too. She wouldn’t have been taken to a hospital, though. Too many opportunities to ask for help. Too many exits through which to make a run for it.

  Lex wouldn’t have had a woman like Kim to help her. That thought makes me so devastatingly sad. That guy, whoever he is, is crazy if he thinks I’m going to hand Carrie over to him. Just absolutely fucking crazy.

  “Hey, Kim, I really have no idea when her sedative is going to wear off but I’m done with all my work for the time being. Bar an emergency, I have a little while to sit with her. Why don’t you head back upstairs and I’ll come find you if she wakes up?”

  Kim smiles at me like I’m the most thoughtful person in the world. “Thanks, Chiquita. I have a mountain of paperwork that’s not going anywhere if I don’t chain myself to that desk. You got my pager?”

  I tell her I do, and she leaves, softly squeezing the top of my arm as she passes me.

  I already know the girl is awake. She’s just playing dead at the moment, assessing her surroundings before she decides if it’s safe to be conscious. Kim doesn’t deal with patients emerging from anaesthesia every day like I do, and Carrie’s breathing is shallow, quiet and controlled instead of the deep, regular draw it should be if her lights were out. I shift the lounge chair from underneath the window to the bedside and sit myself in it. From there I watch Carrie, trying to figure out how best to proceed.

  “So…I went and had coffee with my best friend this morning,” I tell her. “She’s a little prim and proper sometimes but she’s always been there for me. I’ve always been able to rely on her when I’ve needed to. This morning I told her something dark about me. It was a conversation I’d been considering having with her for a very long time, but I’d been waiting for the right time to broach it, y’know? I’m good at making excuses, though. I’ve always managed to put it off before.

  “So like with everything else, I left it until the very last minute, until something happened and I didn’t feel like I had a choice anymore. She gave me some solid advice that made perfect sense, and I just kept thinking on my way to work, why the hell couldn’t you have just made that decision for yourself?” I lean back in the chair, watching Carrie’s eyelids flutter. She’s listening.

  “I think it’s because we’re so entrenched by our problems that we often can’t see our way out of the maze we find ourselves in. Or we close our eyes and walk blindly because we’re too scared to acknowledge the mess we’re in. The darkness we create ourselves is better than the darkness waiting for us with our eyes open, because we’re in control of it that way at least.”

  She doesn’t respond. I’m no psychiatrist. I’m not qualified to try and iron the creases out of this girl’s life. But I am so curious about her—why he cares so much for her, who she is to him. How it was that he came to be the person carrying her lifeless body into my E.R. “You know, if you’re scared…if you’re in a position you think there’s no escape from, let me tell you now…there is always an escape. A way out. If you need somewhere to go, if you need someone to talk to, all you need to do is say so now. I can make it all happen.”

  Carrie’s eyelids flutter once more, and this time they open. The girl’s eyes are pale blue, the color of compacted ice. Like an iceberg. They’re filled with tears. Most people would have turned to look at me but she doesn’t; she stares up at the ceiling, her chest heaving as she battles against her emotions.

  “I don’t need your help. I don’t need somewhere to go.” Tears streak from the corner of her eyes, chasing each other
across her temples and running into her ears. “I just need Zeth.”

  ******

  “I can’t wait another day. He wouldn’t leave me here if he knew I was awake.” Carrie is barely composed. She seems so anxious that I’m considering given her another sedative just to calm her down.

  “Then give me his number. I’ll let him know.” Zeth. His name is Zeth. It feels strange having a name to put to his face, but then I only got to put a face to the voice yesterday so I guess this whole thing is strange.

  Carrie gives me a look—nice try, bitch. “How about you wheel me out of this room and to a payphone so I can call him myself?”

  “You’re not ready for that yet, Carrie. You’re too weak.”

  She looks confused. “Carrie?”

  “Yeah, Zeth said your name was—” I break off when I realize I’ve been stupid. Of course he didn’t give me her real name. Why would he? He paid in cash for her treatment ($17,000) and signed her paperwork off as K. Vonnegut, for fuck’s sake. “What’s your real name?” I sigh.

  “If Zeth says it’s Carrie then it’s Carrie.” She crosses her arms over her chest, staring glumly down at her bandaged wrists.

  “Well okay, Carrie, if you don’t want to tell me that’s fine, but you’re not leaving this room. And they’re going to be asking a lot of questions when Dr Perez comes down here later on.”

  “She the shrink?”

  “Yep. She’s going to wanna know why you did this to yourself.”

  “Who said I did it to myself?” She’s pouting like a petulant child, but my heart still starts thrumming in my chest.

  “Why, did…did Zeth do it?”

  “No. Of course he didn’t.”

  The girl is playing with me. I don’t have the inclination to deal with her today even if I do have the time. I’d rather be helping the nurses change bedpans than deal with attitude like this. “Alright, well, whatever. You can tell it to Dr Perez when she comes down here.”

  Carrie stops scowling and sits bolt upright, a real emotion finally controlling her face: fear. “No! Please. I—I can’t handle a shrink. Don’t leave me. Please.” She reaches for my hand, gripping the rail of her bed, and weakly clasps hold of my wrist. It’s going to be a while before she regains any strength in her hands considering how deep she went with the razor or whatever she used yesterday. “You don’t understand,” she breathes.

  “Dr Perez is amazing, Carrie. You should trust her. She might be able to help.”

  “She can’t! Please. Zeth’s the only one. The only one. I need him. If you leave me with that shrink I—I swear I won’t mess it up this time. I’ll kill myself. I’ll do it and it’ll all be your fault.”

  I don’t usually bargain with patients in this situation. They’re hardly ever in a position to know what’s best for them, but I can see from the desperation in her eyes that Carrie’s telling the truth. She really will kill herself.

  “Shit.” I exhale, squeezing my hand into a tight fist. “I made a promise when I became a doctor, Carrie. I swore that I would do no harm, and I consider you not seeing Dr Perez harmful.”

  “Do you see me dying as harmful? Because that’s what’s going to happen if that bitch comes down here and tries to psychoanalyse me.”

  Double shit. I run a hand back through my hair, trying to think of a way to convince her that she’s being foolish. There’ll be no reasoning with her, though. I can see that. But she definitely needs help. There’s only one resolution I can think of where she gets what she wants and I do, too. “Alright. I’m not saying that I’m going to help you leave here because I’m not. That goes against everything I stand for as a health care provider. You still need at least another three days bed rest and we need to check the range of movement in your hands to make sure none of your tendons were permanently damaged. But…I will loan you my cell phone, and I will be gone for the next three hours on afternoon rounds. And I won’t make you see Dr Perez, but I want you to see my friend instead. I can ask her to see you off the books, so you won’t need to tell her your details.”

  She’s already shaking her head before I can finish my sentence. “They’re all the same. Your buddy’s not going to make any difference, okay?”

  It’s clear that I’m not going to get anywhere with her. That makes me remarkably sad. “How old are you, Carrie?”

  She supplies the information begrudgingly, after considering my question and obviously deciding no harm can come from answering. “Twenty-six.”

  I nod, thinking this over. “We’re the same age, then. And tell me, Carrie…how long have you felt…” Suicidal. Useless. Unable to control your path through this life. “…like this?”

  “Always.” Her swagger from earlier was pretty transparent, but she’s dropped the act altogether now. She’s just a broken girl in a sea of hospital sheets, still clinging onto my wrist like she needs the physical connection to stop herself from drowning in them.

  “So for twenty-six years you’ve felt a despair so grave that you wanted to end your life because of it. That seems pretty awful to me. When you look to the future, can you imagine feeling like this for another twenty-six years?” Her bottom lip wobbles, but she keeps quiet. “Wouldn’t it be better if you saw someone who could help you work past whatever is making you feel the way you are? That way, in twenty-six years’ time, you can look back and see the light you’ve had in your life, and not only the darkness.”

  Carrie remains so quiet, fixated solely on her knees, which are covered by her blankets. If I were a betting woman, I wouldn’t be laying down money that my little speech was going to have any effect. But the girl surprises me when her shoulders sag. “Okay, fine. I’ll go and see this chick once. If she’s full of shit, then I’m leaving.”

  “You promise?”

  “I promise. Now hand over that cell phone.”

  “Fine. Just make sure you leave it in the drawer of the nightstand when you’re done.” When you go. I can’t believe I’m condoning this.

  Despite the bad vibe in my gut when I give her my phone, I also feel like I’ve won three small victories. The first: she’s going to get help, even though I’m going to have to literally beg Pip to take her. The second: she’s going to be out of here today, a full twenty-four hours before Zeth promised to come looking for me. The third: she’s probably going to be too overwhelmed to realize that she’s typing the bastard’s telephone number into my cell phone. Having his number will feel like a small piece of power I’ve taken back, something I have over him. Something I can provide to the cops if I need to.

  I go on afternoon rounds, careful to avoid the east wing of ICU where Carrie is being kept; the last thing I need is to run into Zeth when he comes to secret her out of the hospital. It’s the end of my shift, seven p.m., by the time I head back to her room to collect my phone. Just as I’d suspected, Carrie’s bed is empty and her ruined clothes from yesterday are gone. But when I look in the drawer of the nightstand, I’m less than happy when I realize that she’s also taken my cell phone with her.

  Fuck.

  Pippa. 11.33

  I hope you really heard what I was saying, Slo. Stay away from that guy. I mean it!

  I get tingles when I read through Sloane’s messages. Kinda fucked up, I know, but I’m that self-obsessed. I get the warm and fuzzies when I realize she’s been talking about me to her friend. I haven’t mentioned her to a single soul on the face of this planet, but then that’s what guys do; we hoard our shit. Refuse to let anything slip. Chicks aren’t like that—they gossip like mother hens. I’m absently wondering whether she’s told this Pippa how big my dick is, if she remembers how big my dick is—of course she does—when the phone fucking chimes in my hand.

  (816) 5466 7980 21.32

  Asshole.

  I know it’s from her. And I know it’s meant for me. I grimace as I reply:

  Me: Bitch.

  (816) 5466 7980 21.38

  That phone is on a plan. Be good to get it back.

  Me:
Have to come get it then, won’t you?

  I’m playing with fire right now. I shouldn’t be trying to get her to meet me. I should be cutting all ties with her entirely. Since I brought Lace home and forced her into her bed to rest, I’ve questioned her eighteen different ways from Sunday. Did you give her an address? No. Did you tell her where I worked? No. Did you give her your real name? No. Did you give her my real name? Lace? Did you give her my real name? Yes.

  Well, shit.

  It’s not her fault. The girl was drugged up to the eyeballs and I hadn’t had chance to give her our story, but still…I’m fucking furious that Sloane has my name. Somehow feels like a gross imbalance in power now. I know everything about her and she knows next to nothing about me, but I liked remaining an anonymous party in this shit fight of a situation.

  (816) 5466 7980 21.32

  Give me an address. I’ll send the cops around for it asap.

  She’s grown feisty since we met again in the corridor of St. Peters. It’s easy to be shitty with someone in a text message, though. Different story face-to-face. Body-to-body. I’m yet to get a proper read on the girl, but I’m concerned she’s not as smart as I think she is. She’s a doctor now, so you’d think she had some brains—will let this drop and will forget all about me like I told her to. But I know first hand how desperately she wants to find her sister, and I doubt time has done much to change that.

  Me: Apt. 12c, 515 West Ave. 8pm, tomorrow. Wear something nice and short. And I’d seriously recommend leaving the five-oh at home. We don’t play well together.

  I’m smirking when I hit send. That’s not the address to the warehouse; that’s the address of the apartment downtown where I host my little get-togethers. Get-togethers isn’t exactly the right term for the gathering, but Lacey thinks it’s better than what I’d called it before—the fuck-fest. The first Saturday of each month is always the same at 515 West Avenue, and tomorrow night will be no different. My cock stirs in my pants just thinking about Sloane knocking on the door, absolutely no idea what lies beyond on the other side.