“How do you know that?”
“I’m psychic,” she said.
I smiled, despite myself.
“And your reputation precedes you,” she said. “I googled you.”
“Oh. I haven’t googled you yet. I probably should have.”
She shrugged her shoulders again. “Abigail is waiting in the car. They told her to drink a lot of water and to stay home, but she wants to at least go get her car.”
“She probably shouldn’t be driving.”
“That’s what I said,” she said. “I mean, not that I’m a doctor. We can drop her off then she can work out the logistics of getting her car with Dr. Overstreet.”
“Seems like a good idea. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“I’ll be better once we get away from the hospital.”
Because of the medium thing, I thought, looking her up and down. But I didn’t say anything.
“She’s in the car,” she said, getting up. “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER SIX
LILY
2019
We drove back, mostly in silence. After we had dropped Abigail off in town, there didn’t seem to be much else to talk about. We both needed to go back to the castle. We both needed to do our jobs. He was still clearly mad at me, and I couldn’t blame him. I supposed he was going to be mad at me for a while. Maybe for good.
I didn’t think that he was going to be part of my life very long, so I didn’t want to worry about it. I didn’t know this man and I didn’t want to know him. He was a stranger, and he was probably always going to be a stranger.
He was staring at me from the passenger seat. “Are you sure you’re okay?” He asked.
I glared at him. “I’m fine. I wish you would stop asking that.”
He kept staring at me. “You don’t look fine.”
“It’s hospitals. I told you, they make me nervous.”
“Hospitals give a lot of people anxiety. For what it’s worth, I think they're a place of healing. Maybe even of joy.”
I side eyed him. “Okay. I guess I see it. That doesn’t make me feel any less anxious about it.”
“Fair enough. Is this to do with your whole…” He pointed at his head.
I swallowed. “Do you really want to know?”
“Yeah. I really want to know.”
I sighed. At least the castle was in view and I wouldn’t be stuck having this conversation for too long. “Yes. It has to do with my sensitivity. I don’t necessarily see anything in particular, I just feel it. It’s like a weight or an energy. It feels like it’s pushing down on my shoulders, like I’m going to faint.”
“Did you go to hospitals a lot when you were a kid?”
I glared at him. “Yeah. I did.”
“Do you mind if I ask why?”
“They were trying to find out what was wrong with me,” I said. “Isn’t that what you expected to hear?”
He nodded, though he did so slightly. “Did they?”
“No. They didn’t. They discovered I’m allergic to penicillin, for what it’s worth.”
“But never the source of your… Gifts?”
“No. Never the source of my gifts.”
He was going to ask something else, but I pulled into the parking lot as quickly as I could, my brakes squealing when I parked in the same spot we had been at before. I reached for the handle of the door, but he stopped me.
“Wait,” he said. “Before you go in, there’s something I need to ask you.”
I clenched my jaw. “It’s not that simple,” I said. “I can’t just snap my fingers and call on someone who has passed away. It’s not like Facebook messenger or like using my cellphone.”
He cocked his head. “No, that’s—I don’t believe you anyway,” he said. “I don’t want you to communicate with the dead. I just want to know, did you drink any water at Thornbridge?”
“What?”
“Before I got there, how long have you been there for?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t know. A couple of hours?”
“Do you drink or eat anything from the kitchen or breakroom?”
“No. Nothing.”
“Okay. I think we might need to go on a supply run at some point today. I’m not sure, but I don't think anybody should be drinking the water.”
I stared at him. “You think there’s something wrong with the water?”
“It’s hard to say. With everyone getting sick, and no real indication of a flulike virus, it’s the most likely explanation. Someone in the water, and the food. Maybe the bathrooms.”
“Dr. Overstreet said she had cleaned everything.”
He nodded. “I know. I believe her. But maybe whatever she cleaned is what’s causing the issues.”
“Okay. So don’t drink or eat anything or go to the bathroom?”
He smiled. “Don’t drink or eat anything. Go to the bathroom, you have to.”
“Got it.”
I got out of the car. I walked towards the castle, vaguely aware that he was only steps behind me. I heard him say something else, so I looked over my shoulder. When I turned around, the sun was in my face, so it was hard to see him.
I shielded my eyes with the palm of my hand and immediately felt like I was going to faint. Behind him, behind Dr. Arnold, there was a total figure made entirely of shadows.
Except instead of casting a shadow, it acted like a kaleidoscope. Light reflected through it, onto my face, flickers of different colors making me feel sick and nauseous. I closed my eyes, trying to stave off the vomit building up in my throat.
I tried to reach for a wall or something that would keep me upright, anything that would make me not faint. There was nothing. Fill the pit in my stomach as he dropped to the floor, vaguely aware that I was approaching the ground at great speed, that my face was unprotected, and somehow, knowing, knowing for certain, that if I fainted, I would be seriously hurt.
Worse than that, if I opened my eyes and I saw that… that thing, made of light, made of menacing light, it’d be worse.
It would be so, so much worse.
I knew it. I knew that it wasn’t just fainting that was on the table.
I felt the wind on my cheeks and I tried, my best, to turn around. But I couldn’t turn around. I couldn’t catch myself.
I was powerless, and thought it had only been a few seconds—maybe even less than a few seconds—I knew something bad was coming.
No.
Something bad was there.
It was there, breathing down my throat, confronting me.
Wanting me.
Ready to devour me.
And then, after that, there was only blackness.
I didn’t know where I was when I woke up. I didn’t even know I had woken up at first, because I wasn’t sure what had happened. The first thing I was aware of was how warm I was. Even my fingertips were warm. I felt sweat on my brow.
Then there was softness under my body, and as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I realized I wasn’t in my bedroom.
It didn’t take long to click.
I was still in Thornbridge. I had somehow ended up in the upstairs bedroom, the one Basil and I were working in. Two darkened figures sat in chairs opposite of each other at the foot of the bed.
I tried to sit up, but my muscles felt extremely drained.
All of me felt extremely drained.
“Stay where you are,” I heard a vaguely familiar voice say. Before I could process what was happening, Dr. Arnaud’s hands were on me and he was steadying me slightly. “Don’t get up. Just stay in bed.”
I blinked and looked up at him. He looked like he was behind a giant glass door, or maybe plastic. I couldn’t quite make out the features of his face. “Dr. Arnaud… where, what happened?”
“You fainted,” he said. “I caught you, you didn’t hurt yourself.”
“Did I… was it like Abigail? Like all the others?” My voice didn’t sound like it belonged to me.
“No,�
� Dr. Arnaud said. “No. You didn’t seize. You just fainted. Like you had seen…”
“A ghost?” Basil asked.
I wanted to smile, but I didn’t.
Dr. Arnaud turned to look at me again. I couldn’t be sure, but I thought that he was scowling. “Has this happened before?”
“No. I’ve never fainted before. Not since I was a child.”
“Have some salt,” he said, then handed me a packet of chips. I looked at them then at him, my brow furrowed. “They’ll be a little warm because they were in my car, but they’ll help with your blood pressure.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I don’t care,” he said. “Eat.”
I wanted to contradict him, but I didn’t have the energy to. I heard him tear the packet of chips open and I stuck my hand into it, slowly but surely putting them in my mouth, feeling them melt into my tongue before I swallowed.
“Do you remember what happened?”
“I saw… something,” I said, searching for Basil. At least my vision seemed to be recovering. “Behind you. Like a tree, but instead of blocking the light, it was amplifying it. Like a magnifying glass with different colors.”
“Like an aura,” Dr. Arnaud said. “Did it feel blinding?”
“Yes.”
“Ms. Quinn, do you have a history of migraines?”
I shrugged my shoulders. “I guess. But they’re never like this. Also, you can call me Lily. You gave me your chips, so it’s only fair.”
“I expect you to pay me back for those,” he said. I could hear the smile in his voice.
“You’re going to be waiting for that for a long time,” I said.
There was no sound for a little while other than my teeth crunching on the chips. I could hear everything. It felt like I could hear my cheekbones from inside my ears.
“Can I check your pulse?” Dr. Arnaud asked.
“Sure,” I said.
He smiled at me, reached over and grabbed my wrist. He counted for a second, his face a picture of concentration and focus. “It’s slowed,” he said. “I considered rushing you to the hospital, but Basil told me that you would prefer to stay here. I decided to listen to him, since the hospital seemed to make you feel more vulnerable.”
“Thank you,” I said. “If I have to see a doctor, I will. I would just much rather prefer not to do it at a hospital.”
“I understand that,” he said. “Would you mind if I stayed with you for a couple of hours? I would like to monitor your symptoms.”
“Can I work?”
“I’d recommend resting,” he said. “But I assume that if you want to work, you’ll work.”
Basil cleared his throat. “I can work,” he said. “I can, while you rest. I mean, I know I can’t do what you’re doing, but I need you to feel better, okay?”
He actually sounded afraid. It was a little endearing.
“I’ll be okay, Basil,” I said. “I’ll take it easy. I promise.”
“What about Dr. Arnaud?” he asked. “Can he stay here?”
“Sure,” I said. I didn’t know how I could possibly make him go away, and in truth, it comforted me to have him there. It was nice to have an outside presence in situations like this, when everything felt so strange and uncertain.
More than that, it felt like he needed to be there. Like he had to be there, for reasons I wasn’t certain of yet, but that would make perfect sense once they were revealed to me.
“Do you think I have what they had?” I asked, turning to look at Dr. Arnaud. For the first time since I had woken up, I could see him.
Really see him.
He had short sandy blonde hair, swept back with product, and the shadow of a beard. His face was angular, his nose slightly crooked, his eyes wide and a little too far apart. It made no sense—his features weren’t particularly attractive—but the longer I looked at him, the better looking he became.
He was striking.
He had one dimple in his cheek and a smattering of freckles over his nose and cheeks. His eyes were brown, almost golden, and his dark eyelashes practically touched his eyebrows.
I saw the necklace, too, which he had tucked inside his shirt. Thin, made of white gold. I didn’t think it was silver. I wondered what the pendant was, if there even was one. I wondered, for a second, if it was a crucifix.
That would have certainly been a twist, I managed to think, somewhat foggily. All of my thoughts were slowed down.
He was deep in thought. Still considering what I had asked him, clearly. “No,” he said. “I mean, it’s hard to say, but no. I don’t think so.”
“You don’t think so?”
“You haven’t been in the castle long enough,” he said. “Plus, you don’t exhibit the same symptoms. You did faint, but you didn’t have any seizure activity. You didn’t have any head trauma either—”
“I didn’t?”
“I caught you,” he said. It might have been my imagination, but it looked like he was blushing. “The pavement didn’t look like a safe place to land.”
I heard Basil snickering.
“That said,” he said. “I don’t think anyone should be in this place.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I think that this whole place needs to be quarantined. You might be more sensitive to whatever is happening that other people, or maybe has nothing to do with that. Maybe it’s completely unrelated. But my job is to look for patterns, and that tells me that everybody here is in danger. Including you. Including your assistant.”
I licked my lips, which were suddenly dry. “Have you told Dr. Overstreet yet?”
“I already told her that she needed to close.”
“Did she?”
“No. But that was before Abigail. I think she’s closing up now.”
I looked up and down, tightening my jaw before I spoke. “I understand that you don’t believe in this. I understand that this is not something that you are on board with. But I’m not going anywhere. I’m doing my job, just like you’re doing yours. And you might not think it’s important, but I certainly do.”
“Okay,” he replied, after a little while. “I get that. But does it have to be the two of you?”
“No. It doesn’t.”
Basil was sitting next to me pretty much immediately. “That’s not fair. You need me.”
“I need you alive. I need you well. I need you to make sure that everyone follows Dr. Arnaud’s orders. Do you understand?”
“I do. I just disagree.”
I laughed. “Okay. We can talk more about it over Skype or something. For the time being, I need you to get everyone out. Are you going to do that?”
“Yes,” he said. “I will. But I just want to say, for the record, I am not happy about it.”
I waved my hand in front of my face. “You never are.”
“Please look after yourself,” he said before he moved away from me. “If you need anything, anything at all…”
I nodded, grabbing his hand. It was warm compared to mine. “You’ll be the first person I call,” I said. “I promise.”
“I better be.”
I watched him walk slowly away from the bed. He turned around before he got to the door, furrowed his brow, and looked right at me. “Are you sure you want me to go?”
“I don’t want you to go. I just want you to do what the doctor needs you to do. I want us both to do what the doctor needs us to do.”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Okay. Whatever. Suit yourself.”
He opened the door and walked through it, closing it softly behind himself. I licked my lips again, feeling the nausea starting to build once more. “He’ll take care of it. He’s good like that.”
“I would still like to go downstairs and verify. At some point. Maybe when you’re getting some rest, or when you’re feeling better.”
“I’m fine. I don’t need your supervision.”
“I know you don’t. Still, for my own mental health, I would like to spend some time a
round you while you recover.”
I rolled my eyes. “You mean because I am the first person you’ve seen whose developing early symptoms and you’re academically interested?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “I mean, I wouldn’t have put it like that,” he replied. “But yes.”
“How would you put it?”
“I’m a doctor, you’re a human being, and it seems to me like you might need medical attention.”
“Fine,” I said. “But I’m already feeling better.”
“Well, I would still like to observe you,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “Even if it’s just for, you know, academic purposes. If you consent to that, of course.”
“Fine. Whatever you need,” I said. “Like Dr. Overstreet said, you don’t interfere with my work, and I don’t interfere with yours.”
“I never intended to interfere with your work. I still don’t know what kind of work you do, for what it’s worth, like I said, my only interest all in you is as a patient,” he said, then laughed wryly. “Of course the one who says she is a medium would have to be the one to faint.”
“I don’t say I am a medium,” I said. “I am a medium. It’s out of my control.”
“You say that about things a lot,” he said, rolling his eyes, then he took a deep breath. “Nothing seems to be in your control.”
I shook my head. “No,” I said. “I just accept that the things that are out of my control are out of my control.”
“Yes. But you seem to think that everything is.”
“That’s not what I said.”
He waved his hand in front of his face. “Whatever. I’m not going to get an argument with someone who thinks they can speak to dead people. I don’t think I’m going to win.”
“Has anybody told you that your bedside manner is really, really terrible?”
He scoffed. “You’re not the first, but I think you might be a special case. You are the first person to tell me they have a message from my dead fiancée, so…”
I shook my head. “You should go. You should tell Dr. Overstreet that you want everyone out,” I said. “Basil will be doing his best, but your expertise will make you seem more reliable.”
“At least we agree on something,” he said. “But no. I don’t want to leave until I see you having a bit more color in your cheeks.”
The Healing Process Page 4