Stand Alone

by P. D. Workman

  “Get help. See someone. There’s no shame in getting counseling. They can help you get through this. Find ways to feel better and move on. Make new friends.”

  Justine sighed, shrugging.

  “I’ve already got a therapist,” she said. “I’ve been seeing him for years. It doesn’t help.”

  “Have you talked to him about this?” Officer Joe questioned shrewdly, meeting her eyes.

  Justine dropped her gaze back down to the ground.

  “Well, no,” she admitted. “No one knows.”

  “It doesn’t work if you don’t tell him what’s wrong.”

  “Yeah, okay,” Justine said, her face flushing warm again. “I’ll tell him.”

  “Okay,” he nodded. For a few minutes, neither of them said anything. “So how else can I help you?”

  Justine shifted, bending her knees and elbows tentatively. They were starting to stiffen up in the cold night air.

  “You wanna give me a ride?” she suggested.

  “Sure. Pull your feet in.”

  Justine swung her feet into the car and pulled on her seatbelt. Officer Joe shut the passenger door and went around to his own side. He started the car, tapped some codes into the in car computer, and clicked his walkie-talkie. Reporting briefly, he pulled out onto the street.

  “What’s the address?” he questioned.

  Justine gave Em’s address.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  “No problem. Now I want you to take care of yourself, understand? Get to bed early. Talk to your therapist. Ride safe, and don’t be stupid. Call me before you do something reckless.”

  He worked a business card out of his pocket and handed it to her. Justine examined it, and put it into her pocket with a smile, feeling touched that he cared.

  “Thanks. I will.”

  CHAPTER 4

  EVEN IF IT HADN’T been the weekend, Em probably would have let Justine stay home from school. When Justine got up in the morning and looked at herself in the mirror, she shook her head in amazement at the sick bruises that covered half her face. She looked like she’d been in a particularly brutal bar fight. If she’d gone to school looking like that, she would have been sitting in the guidance counselor’s office in minutes. And probably dealing with a social worker and resource cop too. As it was, even though it was a Saturday, Em laid down the law and told Justine that she wasn’t leaving the house. She was to stay in bed with cold compresses on her face as much of the time as possible.

  “Did you get in a fight?” Em demanded, staring at the bruises in disbelief.

  “No. I just took a fall. Landed the wrong way.” Justine shrugged. “It happens.”

  “I do not like you skateboarding. It is too dangerous. You could have been killed!”

  “I just bumped my head,” Justine protested. “Got a goose egg. What about that lady at your office that slipped on her bathroom floor and ended up in a coma? You can’t prevent freak accidents. I skate safe.”

  Justine knew perfectly well it wasn’t true. She’d been reckless and careless and took risks that she knew that she shouldn’t. She’d been driven to move and to act, to confront her own mortality in the face of Christian’s. But Em didn’t know that. As far as Em knew, Justine could have just been skating sedately down the street and hit a crack in the pavement, or tripped over a cat or something.

  “You obviously weren’t skating safely enough,” Em maintained.

  “Okay, whatever. What are you going to get me for breakfast?”

  “What am I going to get you?” Em demanded. “I told you, I’m not your slave.”

  “I thought you wanted me to stay in bed,” Justine pointed out. “Never mind, I’ll get my own.” She jumped up from where she was sitting at her vanity, and put her hand to her throbbing head, only half-faking a dizzy spell on rising. “Oooh. Head rush.”

  “You get back in bed,” Em insisted, herding her back over, ready to catch Justine if she fell. “I’ll get your breakfast. I don’t want you passing out on me. Do you think you have a concussion?”

  “No, I don’t feel like I have to puke or anything. Just a bit dizzy.”

  Justine swayed, and Em pushed her down onto the bed.

  “Lie down. I’ll get you something.”

  “Can I have eggs?” Justine questioned. “Is that ‘clean’? I feel like I need the protein  …”

  Em hesitated, the nodded.

  “Eggs are fine,” she deliberated. “And maybe a green smoothie  …”

  “Oh yes,” Justine agreed immediately, “that has lots of iron. Can I have cheese in the eggs? Real cheese?”

  Em shook her head.

  “You know you’re not supposed to have any casein  …”

  “If you’re making me eat kale, can’t I have real cheese? It’s not going to hurt, this once. I love cheese in my scrambled eggs. You can even put some chopped veggies in it,” Justine wheedled, in her sweetest, most ingratiating voice.

  “I’d better get moving,” Em said, looking at her watch. “I’m supposed to be meeting someone.”

  She left without telling Justine whether she had won or not. Justine lay there with her eyes closed, feeling the room whirl like a merry-go-round around her. In a few minutes, the smell of cooking eggs wafted its way up the stairs. She could hear the blender going madly. Em hurried up the stairs when the meal was ready, all arranged on a breakfast tray for Justine.

  “Thank you,” Justine said sweetly. When Em placed the tray across her lap, Justine went for the green smoothie first, tipping it up to get a frothy green mustache and swallowing nothing. She laughed and wiped her face. “Mmm, those are getting better,” she said.

  Em laughed in delight. She leaned over and gave Justine a kiss on the forehead, away from the bump. Justine didn’t even pull away.

  “I’m sorry I have to go out, when you’re not feeling well,” Em apologized. “Do you need anything else? Are you going to be okay here alone? Should I see if someone could look in on you?”

  Justine shook her head.

  “No, I’m just gonna stay in bed,” she said. “Listen to music or something. I’ll be just fine.”

  “Okay. Well, you call me if you think it’s getting worse. If you throw up or anything. Okay?”

  Justine nodded obediently. Em fussed for another moment, straightening her pillows and adjusting her blinds. Then with a look at her watch and a squawk, she was leaving.

  “I’ll see you tonight, baby. Sorry I have to run.”

  “Bye.”

  Then the front door slammed, and she was finally gone. Justine got to her feet, and the first order of business was to flush the vile green concoction down the toilet. She rinsed the rest of the froth out in the sink, and took the cup and her plate of eggs down to the kitchen. Ten minutes later, she was sitting at the computer with a double espresso and a quarter of a cup of cheddar melted over her eggs.

  “Now this is breakfast,” she said in satisfaction, and opened up her browser.

  At first she just fiddled, checking her email and various social networks and feeds. But even online she didn’t have any real friends, so that didn’t take very long. Justine took a bite of her eggs while she waited for a missing persons website to load. They put too many people on one page. The numerous pictures made it slow to load, even with a good connection. Once the top row of pictures was loaded, she started to scroll slowly down. She didn’t know how she was ever going to find it, but she kept assuring herself she would know it when she saw it.

  The website seemed to have ordered the pictures with the most recent at the front. Which meant that if Justine’s own picture was in here, it would be many pages back. She started skipping back three to five pages at a time, watching the photos getting older and degrading in quality. If her pictures was in here, it would be at least twelve years back. Justine had memories of Em from when she was three. Longer ago than that was a blank. If Justine had been kidnapped, the records would be at least twelve years back.

&nb
sp; Justine considered the things she knew about herself for sure. She was a brunette, not a blond. No identifiable birthmarks. Her eyes were blue.

  She reached the right year of disappearance, and stopped scrolling, looking carefully at each little girl three or younger. What if she’d been older when she’d been kidnapped? She’d always been at the head of her class. She was smarter than the others. What if she was older than them too? Any girl four and younger, Justine decided. Four or younger, brown hair, blue eyes. That was still a lot of pictures to consider. She studied the faces of the little girls. There were so many of them, and she couldn’t see any resemblance between herself and the pictures. There were Em’s pictures of Justine when she was a baby, but that didn’t work, because they couldn’t really be her. When had Em taken her? When did the pictures stop being the other baby, and start being her?

  Justine knew that there were people who spent days looking through missing children pictures, looking for pictures they recognized. She didn’t know how they could do it. The hours crept by and she didn’t feel like she was any closer to finding herself in the endless database than she had been when she started. And who knew if she was even looking in the right place. Justine stretched and got up to make herself another coffee. Her elbows and knees in particular we stiff after taking so many tumbles the night before. Justine rubbed them gently and put the coffee on. While it was brewing, she went upstairs to Em’s room. Em kept the photos in a box, always planning on assembling them in a scrapbook, but never getting to it. There was also a baby book, listing all of Justine’s early milestones, and preserving her hospital bracelet, a lock of hair, and other mementos. Justine touched the lock of hair. Maybe she could get it DNA tested. If she could prove that it wasn’t hers, then people would have to listen to her. They’d have to admit that she wasn’t the real Justine, but someone else that Em had kidnapped somewhere. Then she could be free. There was a pair of baby footprints too, but they were so smeared that Justine couldn’t work out the lines and whorls and tell whether they were her own or not. Sighing, she put the baby book away. There was nothing else there to help her.

  She went back down to the computer, and examined picture after picture of little girls that could have been her.

  After a fruitless weekend of searching for herself on the internet, it was back to school. Justine slipped into a desk. The boy in the desk next to her eyed her, frowning.

  “You’re in the wrong seat,” he told her.

  “Oh, sorry,” Justine said, “I’m new here.”

  He looked her over, one eyebrow raised.

  “You’re not new,” he scoffed. “You’re that Justine chick. You think I don’t know you?”

  Justine looked at herself. She had borrowed some of Em’s clothes, dressed in an unfamiliar feeling pair of pants and a print vest over her blouse. She wore a knitted cap covering her hair and had it braided, and tucked into her shirt so it didn’t show. She’d even put on a few touches of make-up, and had been practicing a different walk and mannerisms so that she wouldn’t be easily recognized.

  “My name isn’t Justine,” she said. “It’s Katie. I’m new today.”

  “Nice try. And that’s Lanaea’s seat, so you’d better move,” he pointed out.

  Justine shook her head. An instant later, Lanaea herself stood at Justine’s elbow.

  “What are you doing in my desk? Move it, freak.”

  “Hi,” Justine said. “My name is Katie. I’m just new today. Sorry, I didn’t know this was your seat.”

  Lanaea shook her head, rolling her eyes.

  “That may have worked the first time you tried it a couple of years ago,” she said scathingly. “But it’s a bit old now. Come on, get out of my seat.”

  Justine refused to get up. Other students were talking and whispering around her. But she stuck to her guns. She was determined to be a new student today. She had prepared, and she should have been able to fool them. Some of the students looked at her in puzzlement. Others ignored her and just sat down. The teacher arrived and looked around impatiently at the class.

  “Take your seats, please. What’s going on here?”

  The other students sat down. Lanaea remained standing beside Justine. Mr. Potter looked at her, scowling.

  “What are you doing here?” he demanded.

  “I’m a new student,” Justine said, “I just transferred in.”

  He looked momentarily confused.

  “Is this some kind of joke?” he questioned, looking at Justine, and looking around at the rest of the class for their reaction.

  “No. My name is Katie. I’m new today.”

  He frowned. He studied her for a moment and made up his mind.

  “You’re not Katie. You’re Justine Bywater. And you’re not in this class. So please remove yourself so I can continue with the lesson.”

  Justine shook her head.

  “My name is Katie,” she repeated, a catch in her voice. She was desperate for him to believe it, and let her stay.

  “Whoever you are, please leave.”

  “No  …”

  “Yes. Now. Go,” he spoke firmly. He wasn’t fooled.

  Justine finally stood up, looking around, at a loss as to what to do next.

  “Get on, then,” Mr. Potter repeated, shooing her with his hands.

  Justine picked up her books, and left the room. She went downstairs to the office and tried again.

  “I’m new here,” she said, “I’m supposed to meet with Mr. Brooks?”

  “Sure,” the student receptionist said. “What’s your name?”

  “Katie. Um, Katie Kerr.”

  “Great. I’ll let him know you’re here.”

  Justine sat in a chair waiting. She stared up at the ceiling, bored. Eventually, Mr. Brooks came into the waiting area and nodded to her. A short, balding man with a perpetual smile.

  “Katie Kerr?” he questioned, holding out his hand to shake hers.

  Justine shook hands, smiling widely at him.

  “I’m a new transfer student,” she told him. “They said that you were expecting me.”

  Mr. Brooks raised his eyebrows in surprise.

  “Uh, yes,” he said, “I  … didn’t realize that was today. I’m not sure where the paperwork is  …”

  He led her back into his office, a close room, barely big enough to fit his desk and a visitor chair. In spite of being crowded, he also had a plant, a small tree that infringed on the visitor’s chair. Justine brushed it as she sat down, pushing leaves out of the way. Mr. Brooks sat down in his swivel chair, fidgeting with a button on his shirt.

  “So remind me,” he suggested, “where is it you are coming from?”

  “Lincoln,” Justine invented, blinking as if she expected him to remember.

  “Ah, yes, Lincoln.”

  He studied her, his smile wavering a little.

  “Did we meet before?” he queried uncertainly.

  “No,” Justine used both hands to adjust her cap, hoping to keep him from recognizing him.

  “Well, we’ll just fill out a new transfer form, request your old records,” Mr. Brooks said brightly, digging in the drawer of his desk for the appropriate form. “What were you taking over at Lincoln?”

  He looked up at her questioningly, and did a double-take. Justine saw recognition enter his eyes.

  “Justine.”

  “What?” Justine looked behind her. “Who?”

  “You’re Justine. Just what are you trying to pull, here?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, sir,” Justine said politely.

  “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but it stops now. I don’t have the time for this. Go to your class.”

  Justine didn’t move.

  “I need your help,” she pleaded.

  “You need my help with what? With registering?” he threw the ruined form on the desk in disgust. “What’s this all about?”

  “Mr. Brooks  … I’m really not Justine,”
she said desperately. She pulled the photos out of her pocket. “Look. Look at this. These are pictures of the real Justine. The real Justine Bywater, when she was a baby. Look at her. That’s not me, is it?”

  Brows drawn down, Mr. Brooks looked at the baby and toddler photos, and back up at Justine.

  “Little girl. Dark hair, blue eyes,” he said. “Looks like you.”

  “But that’s not me! Can’t you see it? The shape of the face, the eyes, it’s not the same, is it?”

  He pushed the photos back at her.

  “I don’t know,” he said irritably, shaking his head. “I think all babies look the same, if you ask me. All like Mr. Magoo. Everybody’s face changes shape as they get older.”

  “How about the ears?” Justine persisted, pushing the baby picture back toward him. “They say that your ears never change shape. Look at baby Justine’s ear in that picture, and look at mine.”

  Justine took off her cap and pushed her hair away from her ear, turning it toward him.

  “See, look? It’s not the same shape, is it?”

  If she could just make someone believe her.

  “I don’t know. I need you to stop this silliness, Miss Bywater, and just go to your class. I don’t know who the baby in that picture is, but I know who you are. You’re Justine Bywater, and you’re late for class. Let’s fix that, shall we?”

  “I was kidnapped,” Justine burst out. “As a baby, just after this picture,” she tapped the toddler picture. “I don’t know what happened to baby Justine. But that’s not me! I was kidnapped, and Em’s been lying and saying that I am Justine all along. But I’m not. I have another family. And they’ve been missing me all these years and probably think that I’m dead. Please, can’t you help me?”

  Mr. Brooks shook his head. His ever-present friendly smile was gone. He was impatient to get rid of her.

  “What exactly do you expect me to do? Call the police? What kind of proof do you have? This isn’t the kind of thing that I do. Why don’t you talk to your therapist about it?”

  “Nobody will believe me. I’ve told him before. But he just believes Em’s lies. Everybody just believes her because she’s the adult, and I’m just a stupid kid. But I know. I remember. I don’t belong here!”