“Will she even know me?” For the first time Mr. Graham sounds like the man I remember from the videos Sophie is always posting on her feed.
“She will. I know she will. Eventually. They just don’t know how long this amnesia will last. But there’s nothing on the MRI, no permanent damage. Dr. Langstaff said it’s most likely shock.”
The scream comes crawling up my esophagus again. I want to cry and yell and try to explain that something has gone terribly wrong. I want to ask them about the man who tried to take me. I want to explain that he somehow knew my name, that he’s after us. I need to ask them about what I took from the man, what was gripped in my fist. I need them to help me remember. Because if I can remember, we can find whatever it is—maybe it’s downstairs with my body in the ICU. It will prove that this whole insane out-of-body experience is actually happening because how could I have known about whatever it is I can’t remember. Needles of pain scratch up the back of my neck and spread to my skull in response to this impossible situation. I can’t afford to spend any more time in that black, terrifying sleep with the mixed-up dreams. In order to understand what’s happening to me, I have to be awake. In order to stay awake, I have to get the doctors to stop drugging me. In order to avoid said drugs, I’ll need to pretend like it’s totally normal that Mrs. Graham’s tears are splashing on my arm right now.
I flutter my eyes a bit and blink them open.
Sophie’s parents bolt upright, pasting smiles across their beautiful faces. That’s more like it. “Hi, honey.” Mrs. Graham’s blond head bobs behind Mr. Graham as though she’s photobombing him. “Your dad’s here, isn’t that nice?”
Something about the way she says it, the tension in her voice, makes it feel like she’s willing me to act normal. To pretend to remember in spite of the sympathy that’s shining in her eyes.
“I’ve been so worried about you, Bumblebee. We all have. Do you remember . . .” He stops himself and clears his throat. “I mean, are you feeling any better?”
“I feel good, actually. Much better.” I sit up in bed a little to prove it, swallowing back a gasp when Sophie’s dark hair tumbles over my shoulder. “What happened exactly? I guess I’m still a little hazy on the details.”
Mrs. Graham hovers closer to me, her face just inches from mine. “There was a car accident,” she begins.
“Jesus, Hillary.” Mr. Graham’s words are more of a hiss. But if it weren’t for the pink rising on Sophie’s mom’s cheeks, I’d have wondered if she even noticed the interruption.
“But everyone’s fine. Everyone’s going to be just fine. Just some bumps and bruises.” Mrs. Graham pastes on another shaky smile and I wonder if it’s because of her husband’s insult or the lie. Maybe both.
“Car accident?” As much as I don’t want to know, don’t want it to be more real than it is now, I need to hear what happened. I need to know if my memories of the man and my escape and the car barreling toward me actually happened.
“Never mind that right now.” Mrs. Graham waves her hand to dismiss the details. “How do you feel? Thirsty? Hungry?” She grabs a glass of water sitting on a table near the bed, sliced cucumber floating among the cubes. I have to admit it looks amazing. Especially since it feels like I’ve been sleeping with a cotton rag shoved in my mouth.
But given that I’m fighting for my life inside a near-stranger’s body, thirst isn’t exactly my highest priority. I ignore the water and focus on my biggest, scariest question. “Is she . . . Is Amelia okay?” I lean forward now. I have to know. I have to hear.
“That’s right, you’re remembering. That’s a good sign, honey.” Mrs. Graham claps excitedly and looks like a deranged preschool teacher. “Dr. Langstaff is going to be so pleased. I told him you were a fighter!” She shoots Mr. Graham a triumphant look, but he’s staring at me too intently to notice.
“The only person you need to be worrying about right now is yourself,” Mr. Graham snaps. The words come out sharp, angry almost.
Mrs. Graham’s hands freeze between claps and I can actually feel my jaw drop. What kind of a person says this after an accident? I remember the way the man’s fingers dug into my flesh when he grabbed my wrist. I remember the sickening sense of vertigo when he carried me to my car. And for one horrible moment it feels like Mr. Graham can see it all playing in my eyes like some kind of TV show he’s choosing to turn off because it’s too violent, too scary, too real.
“Robert! The girls have been on the same tennis team for the past three years. Of course she cares about Amelia.” Mrs. Graham pushes her husband out of the way and grabs my hand. “Sweetheart, she’s going to be just fine.” The lie never reaches her eyes. I wonder if it’s more for me or for her.
“Did they, I mean, was there anyone else there? When I hit her, I mean.” My voice catches on the word hit. I have no memory of the impact, but it doesn’t stop me from wondering what it sounds like when steel pounds flesh.
Mr. Graham clears his throat and pushes up from the chair. “Replaying the accident over and over isn’t going to help anyone.” He’s agitated as he walks to the window, pushing his fingers through his hair and making it stick out a little on the side. I wish I knew if he were always like this. I expect the conversation to end; I imagine he’s used to guttural sounds and brisk movements getting him what he wants. But it doesn’t work this time.
“You mean Janie? You had just dropped her off, sweetheart. She’s just fine.” Mrs. Graham’s voice trembles. Fine. Fine. Fine.
“No, I mean a man. Someone else. Another car.” Tears gather in my eyes and tremble along my lashes. “I remember . . .”
“That’s enough, Sophie.” My shoulders jerk in response to the volume of his words. Even Mrs. Graham is startled, her hand at her neck. “Where the hell is the doctor? She’s clearly confused.” Mr. Graham closes the space between us and jabs angrily at the call button next to my bed. It’s almost like he doesn’t want me to remember.
“She’s fine, Robert. She just needs some more rest.”
Bile rises in my throat, but I swallow it back. Getting sick certainly won’t get me out of this bed and neither will Dr. Langstaff. I need a better plan.
“I’m fine, I’m fine.” I use their favorite word and smile to show them how calm I can be. “You’re right.” After I say the words, I can actually feel the tension in the room melt away like magic. The Grahams clearly want to brush this whole horrible accident under the rug, but I can’t afford to let that happen. Not when I was almost abducted and killed. Not when the person trying to take me knew my name and Mae’s. The details will have to wait. I have to make sure Mae is okay. I have to figure out a way back to being me.
All at once, with more certainty than I ever can remember feeling, I know I have to visit Amelia. My body. Whatever it is now. I’ll get back or at least find whatever I took from the man.
“I just need to go see Amelia,” I say.
The forced smile drips off Mrs. Graham’s face, bringing her color along with it. She stands, leans over the bed, and pulls the thin blanket closer to my face. “We’ve worn you out, sweet girl. Time to rest.”
I stare at them then. The two vaguely familiar strangers sitting next to my bed, fear etched into the lines around their eyes, worry turning down the corners of their mouths. Part of me wants to argue, to explain that I’m not their daughter and if they want their precious girl back they have to let me go.
But instead I just nod along because I’m guessing that’s what they expect Sophie to do, and if I want to save myself, I’m going to have to save Sophie first.
Seven
TURNS OUT SOPHIE GRAHAM IS ADORED. I’M PRETTY SURE I ALWAYS knew this. You don’t have thousands of mostly random people following your life via social media if you aren’t. But witnessing firsthand the genuine concern Sophie’s mom has for her well-being is something else entirely. I’d like to blame it on the accident, or on the hospital stay, or on their tenuous hope that whatever crazy their daughter demonstrated in hours
past will stay far, far away. But I know better. This is the Grahams’ version of normal.
Mrs. Graham is a machine. She hasn’t left my side for a minute, which is wildly inconvenient considering my escape plan or lack thereof. She also looks like she’s moonlighting as a commercial actress for laundry detergent. I’ve never heard her mention anything about working or showering or even eating. Sophie is her business, her work, her hobby. Whenever I stir or need absolutely anything, she’s there, ready and willing.
Unless what I need are details about the accident or access to a phone, my phone, her phone, a random stranger’s phone. I’d kill for a quick Google search, key words like concussion body swap coma bobbing around in my mixed-up brain. It’s almost like now she’s trying to pretend the accident never happened. Every time I bring it up or ask for my phone, she just smiles and wonders if we should ring Dr. Langstaff for something to help me sleep or mumbles about hospital rules against cell phone use.
My throat burns when I imagine my own mom downstairs in the ICU. Is she holding my hand? My real hand? Is she saying anything? Has she slept? Has she left? How is she paying our bills? The accident obviously delayed the transfer and if she’s not working for a new family, she’s not getting paid. Colors swim in front of my eyes and it feels like I can’t breathe in enough air. Maybe Sophie’s lungs are too small for these problems.
Mrs. Graham pulls the curtains open to let in sunshine that has finally broken through relentless clouds as if on cue. She turns and smiles and I can barely swallow now, the lump in my throat jagged and suffocating. And bitter. Will I never have the chance to hug my mom again? To apologize for being such a bitch about our move? To eat pizza and ice cream straight from the carton? To forget all the crap that went wrong, to grow up, to appreciate all the stuff that went even a little bit right?
In the summers, when Mae and I were out of school, she’d bring us to work with a few toys scattered in the back of our messy car. It was my job to make sure Mae stayed out of trouble even though I was barely a year older. We never knew what she did in those houses all day, but to distract Mae, I’d make up stories. Our mom was a fortune-teller, a spy, or even a witch. The good kind that saved people. Even when I was old enough to understand that she sorted weekly medication, changed dressings on papery skin, and washed soiled bed linens, it was easier to play in some random person’s yard all day if we thought our mom was concocting some sort of potion inside.
Often I’d catch a look of pure exhaustion etched into the angles of her drawn face in the evenings when she slipped out of the house, but before she opened the car door, she always saved a smile for us. And sometimes chocolate for being such good girls. I didn’t understand why she had to work so hard. I didn’t get it yesterday. I probably don’t even now. Knowing I might never have the chance to truly understand, to thank her, makes it hard to breathe.
“Daddy’s tied up with paperwork this morning but said he’ll try to come down as soon as he’s finished.” Oh. My. God. Daddy? A sense of dread worms its way in at the memory of the strange man rushing into the room, at the idea of a dad in general. As bizarre and neurotic as Mrs. Graham appears, she is a mom. I have experience with moms. But dads? I’ve never had one, and it feels way too late to get stuck with one now. Especially someone else’s Daddy.
Mrs. Graham fusses with some daisies in a vase. There are bunches of flowers and cards everywhere. “Just remember how much your dad loves you and how hard he works for our family.” Mrs. Graham says this as though she’s trying to convince herself. Maybe she’s mad he’s not here every second like she is. Maybe she’s tired. Maybe they fought about it.
It actually surprises me that he’s not here. The guy barreling toward my bed the first day in the hospital, while traumatizing at the time, felt more in line with the idea of Mr. Graham I always had in my head. Through Sophie’s lens he seemed omnipresent. I hadn’t imagined him working, let alone fighting with Mrs. Graham and avoiding his daughter. Seeing him through Sophie’s eyes feels like emotional vertigo.
I realize Mrs. Graham is staring at me, waiting for some sort of response. I have no idea how I should be acting. How would Sophie act?
“Um, okay?” is all I can manage. “I’m actually feeling a lot better today. Can you tell the doctors I’m ready to see Amelia now?”
Mrs. Graham’s smile falters. “Sweetheart.” She sits on the edge of the bed. “Amelia Fischer is very, very hurt. Patients in the ICU can only be visited by family members. Plus”—Mrs. Graham’s eyes brighten—“if all goes well when Dr. Langstaff checks you out, we’ll be able to go home this morning. Aren’t you ready to start getting back to normal?”
My throat tightens again and I feel like I can’t get a full breath in. It feels like such a loaded question. As though everyone’s impatient for the weakness I’ve displayed to pass, as though this injury, this incredibly fucked-up situation that no one even knows about, is just an inconvenience that can be remedied with a change of scenery. I can’t go home to Sophie Graham’s house, to her life. There is no normal I can get back to. I can’t leave this hospital. I need to go downstairs and find my body and hold hands with myself or something until the universe decides to switch us back.
I imagine Sophie’s tiny fingers gripping my lifeless ones and an electric current rushing through us, zapping me back into my rightful place. But then what? Would I wake up? Or would I find myself trapped in a hospital bed, stuck in some limbo between life and death? I want to believe that if I’m able to switch back, I’ll wake up, alive and whole, but there are obviously no guarantees. I want to believe I’m okay with that.
And then there’s the man from the side of the road. Someone tried to kidnap me. Someone who knew my name. But who? Why? Am I still in danger lying helpless in a hospital bed? What about my mom and Mae? Are they okay? The familiar rush of panic comes hard and fast now and I have to fight for each shaky breath. The only thing that scares me more than these questions are the potential answers.
Mrs. Graham tucks a stray strand of hair behind my ear. I recoil at her touch. I’m not much of a hugger or a toucher. My mom has always called me a prickly little thing and while little isn’t a word I ever would have used to describe myself, prickly is about right. When you’ve always got one foot out the door, you stop trying to make friends, you get used to sitting alone at lunch, and you learn to travel light. You don’t move seven times in fifteen years without developing some thorns.
It’s the thought of my mom. My real mom. My sister. Being bound to these strangers. Trapped. The man with no face who knew my name, who knew Mae. It’s all too much, and I know what comes next. I’m hot now and Sophie’s body feels too small. I might not have appreciated my height when I was in my body, but it was nice having that weight behind me, the knowledge that I could create more space for myself in the world if I needed it. I feel claustrophobic in Sophie’s childlike frame, like my soul is too big for this body. My breath quickens and I sit up in bed, squeezing my eyes shut against the constriction in my chest even though it is not my chest.
Mrs. Graham’s voice is faint in the background. “Breathe through it, Sophie, deep breaths, baby girl.” The sound of her voice only fuels the panic. My mom and Mae understand that the silence makes it easier to breathe, they know when to give me space.
I’ve been dealing with panic attacks my whole life. I know the drill and I’ve learned how to turn the tides of panic and regain control. I block out Mrs. Graham’s voice and slowly blink away the blurriness of the room, let the woman’s fuzzy form come back into focus.
“Good girl. That wasn’t such a bad one.” Mrs. Graham rubs my back and I can’t stop myself from jerking away.
Apparently, the Sophie Grahams of the world aren’t strangers to panic attacks themselves, but somehow I can’t imagine anything ever making perfect Sophie Graham anxious. She always seemed so confident, so sure of herself when she glided through the hallways, arm linked with Janie McLaughlin’s or wearing her Zach Bateman jersey to the
homecoming game. Her Instagram posts are instantaneously liked by dozens of people and she has an entourage of fans at every single tennis meet. What could someone as perfect as Sophie Graham possibly have to feel anxious about?
“Knock, knock!”
The simple words are almost enough to bring back the suffocating waves. It’s Dr. Langstaff. He’s going to say I’m fine and release me and I’m going to be stuck in Sophie Graham’s life forever. Or he’ll know that I just had a panic attack and medicate me. I have no idea which is the lesser of two evils anymore. I manage to ward off further panic by focusing on staying. Staying present, staying unmedicated, staying at the hospital. When the door opens, it’s Sophie’s dad who walks through.
I should feel relief, but something about the efficiency in his gait makes me uneasy. I can’t be sure if it’s him specifically or if it’s just because I’m not really used to being around grown men when I’m stuck in a hospital gown, but I’m uncomfortable and I’m supposed to be his daughter. He strides over to Mrs. Graham and kisses her chastely on the cheek.
The gesture feels forced and strange, causes heat to rush to my cheeks, and I curse Sophie for blushing so freaking easily. I never had that problem. Thankfully Mr. Graham kills the moment, his deep voice ringing with false cheer.
“I ran into Dr. Langstaff in the hallway and he says we’re going home today, Soph. We’re so proud of you. Always such a fighter.” His teeth are too white and too big for his face and he seems to be forcing everything, from the kiss down to the smile. Alarm bells sound in my head, but I hit my mental snooze button and remind myself that this is Sophie’s father. Not all men are kidnappers.
“I actually think I need to stay, I mean, I don’t know if I’m one hundred percent,” I mumble. I can’t go home with them. I can’t leave. Not without switching back to my real body.
Mr. and Mrs. Graham exchange a look. “Honey, you can’t feel guilty,” Mr. Graham says. He makes a move to come closer to the bed but reconsiders, hovering awkwardly near his wife instead. I wonder if he’s always hesitant around Sophie or if my reaction when I woke up has spooked him. “That’s what this is about, isn’t it? This is no one’s fault and your friend will be just fine.”
Now You See Her Page 4