The Gateway Trilogy: Complete Series: (Books 1-3)

by Christina Garner

  “Taren's gorgeous, huh?” She said it in a way that made me feel like we were discussing peanut butter cups.

  “Sure,” I said casually, “if you like that type.”

  Lauren smiled with satisfaction while I wondered what type Taren was.

  When Lauren had finished dinner, we made our way to the rec room. She was content to watch more television, but I made my way over to the art supplies. There wasn't much of a selection, so I opted for a charcoal pencil and white printer paper. I sat at a folding card table and contemplated what to sketch.

  “So, you're an artist?”

  I hadn't heard Taren approach. He stood across the table from me, his hazel eyes holding mine in their steady gaze.

  “I try to be,” I replied, then gestured to the blank sheet in front of me. “Not feeling very inspired, I guess.”

  “This place has that effect on most people,” he said and sat down.

  “How's Callie?” I asked.

  “Better. She has a hard time with crowds.”

  “Does she really do that at every meal?” I asked.

  “No, that's just Lauren being dramatic,” Taren said, his expression registering distaste. “Which does happen at every meal.”

  I gave the slightest of smiles; it seemed all I was capable of. There was a moment of silence between us, and it felt like I was being judged for the tenth time that day. I was afraid to ask what his verdict was, and his face revealed nothing.

  Instead, I blurted out, “So, what are you doing here?”

  Taren blinked in surprise and I hastily added, “I mean, not here, at this table, you can sit…wherever, um…”

  He saved me from my complete awkwardness by shrugging and saying, “Behavioral issues.”

  “That's pretty broad,” I said. "Don't all teenagers have behavioral issues?”

  “Mine caused me to light things on fire,” he said, not seeming ashamed of the revelation.

  This was the guy I was supposed to trust? An unrepentant pyro?

  “Anyone get hurt?” That was a non-negotiable—no matter what the Voice said.

  He smiled and shook his head. “No, my destructive tendencies apply only to abandoned property.”

  Not ideal, but I could live with it. He’d seemed like a good guy earlier, with Callie.

  “So, how many days a week does being a pyromaniac get you with Shaw?” I asked.

  “Two,” he said, “but I’m making real progress.”

  “How can you tell? We’re not allowed anything flammable.”

  Taren gave me a smirk and said, “What are you drawing?”

  I looked down to see that I'd been doodling without realizing it. It was the same swirling line over and over. I'd drawn it hundreds of other times as a way to calm my nerves. It dawned on me that having the Voice tell me to trust someone, when I'd learned to never trust anyone, was almost as unnerving as my current confinement.

  “Oh, it's nothing, just—”

  “Taren, don't you want to come watch TV?” Lauren's voice dripped honey as she approached.

  “Maybe later,” he said, without turning in her direction. “I'm talking with Ember right now.”

  He gently plucked the paper from my hands and slid it over to his side of the table. For a moment his eyes flashed surprise, but quickly returned to casual study. I wasn't sure what to make of his reaction, it was hardly a complicated design, but I didn't have time to ask. Lauren's arched eyebrow indicated what was expected of me.

  “Actually,” I said, standing, “I'm pretty beat. I think I'm gonna head back to our room.”

  Lauren smiled with satisfaction. “Come on, Taren, I saved you a seat up front.”

  He rose to follow her, but I felt his eyes on me as I exited the room.

  Upon returning to our room, I decided to make good on my promise to Lauren and took a shower. It was a cramped stall, but the water was hot and had decent pressure. Muscles began to unwind and so did my emotional numbness.

  Before I knew it, I was sitting on the floor of the shower, hugging my knees and sobbing. It had been months since I'd cried, and once the floodgates had opened, there was no stopping it. Even my internal dialogue was silent in the presence of such raw emotion.

  Days earlier I had come to the decision that there was only one way out. Either the Voice was right and no one and nothing could be trusted, or the Voice was a figment of my imagination and I was already insane. Either reality wasn't one I had been willing to accept, so I had taken action.

  But I had failed, and now things were even worse than before. I hadn't thought it possible, but here I was. In a mental institution. Rooming with an over-possessive bulimic cheerleader type who would never deign to acknowledge my existence in the real world. My meals regulated. Forced therapy sessions. My discharge dependent on my sanity, which more and more I was beginning to doubt I could even fake. My only comfort—when my already broken-down world had further deteriorated—had been that I wasn't the crazy one. It was all of them—the masses. But I was the one in here, so even if that were true, did it really matter? I'm the one here…

  When my sobbing finally subsided, I was exhausted. I dried myself off and wrapped my hair in a towel. Lauren hadn't returned, for which I was grateful. I slid beneath the covers and hoped sleep wouldn't be long in coming. I'd had enough of being awake. Which I supposed was what had landed me in this situation in the first place.

  4

  Sleep did come, but was restless, and I woke that morning as I often did, with a feeling of dread. It took me a moment to register where I was, and once I did, the feeling grew.

  “Breakfast in ten,” Lauren said when she realized I was awake. She was sitting on her bed, applying mascara with a deft hand.

  The towel that had been wrapped around my head when I’d gone to bed was now on the floor, and I could tell just by touching it that my hair was a mess. I stumbled sleepily to the bathroom and assessed the situation. I decided it was salvageable and pulled a brush gently through the tangles. I didn't have time to do much else beside get dressed and brush my teeth. I told myself I didn't have anyone to impress, anyway.

  The line for food was long, and Lauren seemed annoyed at having to wait. The eggs looked rubbery; I opted for cereal and juice. I wasn't surprised when Lauren led us straight to where Taren was sitting with Callie. She was nothing if not persistent.

  Callie seemed more bright-eyed this morning, but tensed at our approach.

  “Good morning,” I said, trying to put her at ease, yet wondering what her problem was.

  “Hey,” she replied in her usual soft tone.

  “How was your first night?” Taren asked before taking a bite of toast.

  “She thrashed around all night,” Lauren said. “I could barely sleep myself.”

  “Sorry,” I mumbled.

  “I get bad dreams, too,” Callie said with a sympathetic smile.

  “Do you have nightmares often, Ember?” Taren asked with an interest that bordered on obtrusive.

  I wasn't sure I wanted to discuss my sleep issues, but Callie saved me from needing to.

  “Taren, I don't feel so well,” she said.

  Lauren looked at me knowingly and mouthed, every time.

  “You're OK, Cal, I'm here.” Taren's reply was so low I almost didn't hear it. Not for the first time, I wondered about their relationship.

  Callie was now panic-stricken. “No, I have to get out of here. Get me out—”

  “Please,” Lauren interrupted, “do as she says, get her out of here.”

  “Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!” The voice that erupted from Callie seemed too big to have come from such a small girl. She lurched up from the table and launched herself across it—straight at me.

  I was taken by such surprise that I didn't have time to react. One instant I was sitting in a folding chair, and the next I was knocked to the cold tile. Callie was stronger than her looks suggested; it was all I could do to fend her off. As blue as her eyes were, they seemed on fire. Her
hand arced up and I saw it—a plastic knife. My eyes widened. My last thought was going to be, What the fu—

  And then Taren was there, pulling her off of me. Stunned as I was, I saw him try to pocket the knife, but orderlies had rushed over by then and confiscated it.

  Taren no longer needed to restrain Callie, she was sobbing into his chest. The orderlies pried her off, though she clutched at him.

  Her eyes bore into me as they dragged her away. “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I swear I didn't want to. I'm so sorry…”

  The entire dining hall was silent, though it wouldn't have needed to be to hear Callie's scream a moment later.

  “What are they doing to her?” I asked, still breathless and trying to calm my racing heartbeat.

  “Taking her to the elevator. They're going to move her upstairs.” Taren looked tortured, helpless.

  I suppose I shouldn't have cared—she had just tried to stab me, after all—but she was so small, even if she was freakishly strong. And the way she'd looked at me as she apologized… I believed her.

  “Yeah, they'll let her chill out in solitary until Monday,” Lauren said.

  “Monday? But that’s three days from now.” I couldn't imagine Callie locked up that long with people who were truly dangerous.

  Lauren shrugged. “It's a mandatory twenty-four hours, and Shaw is off on weekends. She should have known that today was the worst day to go off the rails.”

  “Hard as it might be to believe,” Taren said, his voice brittle, “not everyone manipulates their behavior just to get attention.”

  Lauren’s mouth hung open, clearly affronted, but before she could respond, Taren tugged at my arm. “Can I talk to you for a second?”

  He didn't wait for my reply, just pulled me a few feet away.

  “Did she hurt you? Your head hit the tile pretty hard.”

  That explained the spinning, and the pain that was starting to seep through the cracks of my shock. I reached up to touch the back of my head.

  “Ow! Yeah, I guess she got me pretty good. What was that about, anyway? What's her problem with me?”

  Before he could answer, one of the nurses approached. “We'll get you checked out now, dear.”

  “I was just going to get her some ice,” Taren said, his hand on the small of my back, steering me away from the nurse.

  “Don't be ridiculous,” the nurse said. “She could have a concussion. We need to take her to the E.R. Wait here—I’ll be right back.”

  She went to confer with an orderly, and I stifled a laugh. I had been wanting to get out of there. Maybe if my mother knew I was just as likely to lose my life inside the mental hospital as out, she'd spring me that much sooner.

  “Ember.” Taren leaned close, his breath warm in my ear. My pulse went back to racing. “Do you have any…birthmarks?”

  His question was so bizarre, that heedless of the pain, I snapped my head to face him.

  “What?”

  His eyes were only inches away, boring into mine. He grabbed my wrist and pushed up the sleeve of my hoodie, searching. I tried to pull away, but his grip was too strong.

  “Do you?” he asked again, checking the other arm.

  “N-no,” I stammered.

  Intensity didn't usually unnerve me, but at that moment, his definitely did.

  “Taren, enough!” the nurse said, hurrying back to us. “What on Earth are you doing?”

  She pried his hands from my arm, causing Taren to come back to himself.

  “Nothing, sorry.” He dropped his gaze. “Sorry, I hope you feel better.”

  He turned abruptly and strode away.

  By the time I got to the E.R., my head was throbbing. A welt had formed despite the ice pack I'd been given for the ride. The waiting room was mostly empty, so I didn't have to wait long to be seen by a doctor. He ordered a CT scan, and the wait for that was considerably longer.

  With nothing to do and no one to distract me, I was forced to process Callie's attack and Taren's strange behavior. I had no idea what to make of either. I'd been nothing but nice to Callie, and why Taren was interested in a non-existent birthmark, I couldn't fathom. I wondered if Lauren was right about Callie being seriously disturbed. If anything, the idea made me sympathize with her even more. If life with my mother had taught me anything, it was that being mentally ill didn't make you a bad person. Hard to deal with sometimes, yes, but not necessarily bad.

  As it turned out, I didn’t have a concussion, and after a few hours I was back at Windsor. I found Lauren painting her toenails on her bed.

  “Your mom is a trip,” she said, admiring her work.

  “My mom was here?” I had been both surprised and relieved that she hadn't shown up to the E.R.

  “Is here. She's talking with Dr. Shaw, I think.”

  I groaned. This would either be really good or really bad. As if on cue, my mother burst into the room.

  “Ember!” She rushed to me, pulling me into a tight hug. “Thank God you're all right.”

  Her tone was an octave too high; she was either close to hysterics or just coming off of an episode.

  “Hi, Mom.” I could hear her heartbeat racing.

  She let me out the embrace, but held my face in her hands. “They didn't call me until an hour ago.” She glared over her shoulder at Dr. Shaw standing in the doorway, then turned back to me. “If I'd known, I would have come to the E.R. right away. You know that, right, baby?”

  “Of course, Mom. It's OK.”

  “It is most certainly not OK, and I've let Dr. Shaw know it. Letting a dangerous criminal run around with knives, attacking people—”

  “She's not a criminal, Mom, she just…” I struggled to explain what I still found baffling. “She was just…confused or something.”

  “Well, you don't need to worry, it won't happen again. Dr. Shaw has promised that there will be a set of eyes on you at all times until you're well enough to leave.”

  Perfect.

  “We'll take good care of her,” Dr. Shaw said, in a conciliatory tone.

  Mom gave him a withering look and turned back to me. “You just concentrate on getting better. I don't know what I'd do if something happened to you, so just do whatever they say and get better so you can come home. OK, honey?”

  “Yeah, Mom. I'm feeling better already. I think if you took me home—”

  She cut me off with another too-tight hug. “Good. That's good.” Her heartbeat had slowed a little—a positive sign. She held my face in her hands. “Now, they don't like you to have any visitors your first week here, but I've informed Dr. Shaw that given last night's incident, I'll be dropping in quite often to make sure you're being taken care of.”

  “Thanks, Mom, that would be nice,” I said, trying to hide my disappointment that she wasn't taking me home immediately.

  She gave me a tight smile, her eyes growing misty. “I'm so glad. I was sure you'd be angry with me.” While my mind raced for a way to stop her tears before they started, she went on. “Angry that I had to put you here. I'm sorry, honey, I just didn't know what else to do. If you ever left me…”

  No, not the sobbing. Not in front of Lauren and Dr. Shaw.

  “Mom, don't be silly.” I said, trying to make my voice light. “Everything is fine. I'm fine, you're fine. I know I didn't leave you any choice. I'm not mad.” I held up her hand and inspected it. “Look at this, your nail polish is chipped. Why don't you go get a manicure?”

  She looked at her hand as if seeing it for the first time. “It looks terrible, doesn't it?” She wiped away the tears that had been threatening to spill.

  “You could never look terrible, Mom.” I gave her my most reassuring smile.

  After that, she left without incident, other than fixing Dr. Shaw with another firm stare. Once they'd both gone, Lauren turned to me, her expression a mix of shock and fascination. I waited for the onslaught of questions about my mother's mercurial behavior.

  “Your mom looks fantastic,” she said. “What does she do to stay in
shape?”

  I couldn't help but laugh. Leave it Lauren to excuse her behavior simply because she looked good.

  “Pilates,” I said. “She's an instructor.”

  “Pilates…” Lauren breathed, as if she'd found the Holy Grail.

  5

  I'd only eaten a bite of breakfast and it wasn’t yet time for lunch, so I paid a visit to the vending machine. I was contemplating my purchase— being careful not to include peanut butter cups in my decision—when Taren approached.

  An orderly observed from a distance. Dr. Shaw was making good on his word. So far I'd noticed nurses and orderlies passing my room at regular intervals, always making sure to peer in. Being watched set my teeth on edge.

  I stepped back from the machine. “Go ahead, I haven't decided.”

  Even with the whole morning to figure it out, I still had no idea why Taren had acted so strangely. We were in a mental institution, so maybe that should have been explanation enough, but I really wanted to believe he was sane. That however bizarre his behavior, there was a reasonable explanation.

  “I'm not hungry,” he said in a low voice. He continued to stare at the vending machine, as though deciding what to get.

  “Um, OK.”

  “I need to talk to you,” he said.

  “Does it involve checking my body for birthmarks?”

  He shook his head. “No, I should have known better, you're too—never mind,” he said, and took a breath. “Look, I'm sorry I did that. I wasn't trying to scare you.”

  I shrugged. “Would it surprise you to know I've seen weirder?”

  His face twitched into a wry smile. “No, actually, it wouldn't.”

  “Was this what you wanted to talk about?” I asked.

  “No,” he glanced at me from the corner of his eye. “I need a favor.”

  “What kind of favor?” Why was my pulse quickening? It was the intensity in his eyes again.

  “I need you to come with me to see Callie.” He cast a glance toward the orderly that had just passed, making sure he hadn't heard.