I said nothing until he found a plowed area reserved for parking. He pulled in so that we faced the lake, but he didn’t turn off his engine.
“I’ll keep the heater going,” he said, and sat back.
I leaned forward, looked down, and then sat back and began without turning to him. “You’re quite familiar with what happened after the prom last year at Shane Cisco’s after-party?”
“As familiar as I care to be.”
“You know what happened to my date, Paul Gabriel?”
“I know he was expelled. I haven’t followed his career,” he said sardonically.
“My stepmother, Bea, I guess I have to call her that, was still living at Wyndemere and made it a federal case, claiming I was responsible for all the negativity now aimed at Wyndemere and even her family name. My father didn’t do much to defend me. He rarely challenged Bea. He left the running of the house up to her mainly. That’s another story. What happened as a result, though, was that he wanted Ryder and me to spend less time together. His way of putting it was ‘until things calm’ or something. Neither Ryder nor I appreciated that.”
“So you spent more time, not less, together,” Dillon said as if he had to fill in the blanks.
“Yes. What you have to understand is we had no idea at the time that we were related, that Dr. Davenport was in fact my father.”
He stared at me. Was he going to fill in these blanks? “You’re saying you didn’t spend time together just to defy your father?”
“No.”
Cool Dillon finally looked a little shocked.
“We didn’t know who we were.”
He nodded. “How far did it go?”
“Not any farther than you and I have,” I said.
Maybe I was imagining it or hoping for it, but he looked like he was relieved. “And now?”
“After the lake accident, which resulted in Ryder’s memory loss, my father and Ryder’s therapist, Dr. Seymour, emphasized how important it was for me not to restore those memories directly. They wanted Ryder to sort of ease into it, into his memory of the accident. For these past months, I’ve been walking on eggshells. As far as he knew, I was Emma Corey’s daughter and not much else. My sister Samantha enjoyed that and did her best to keep me as that person only. It was the way Ryder had known me most of his life. He was in the accident before Dr. Davenport had come forward to tell the truth.”
“So he’s never actually been told the truth.”
“Not until now,” I said. “And now only because my father believes I was secretly trying to revive our short romance.”
“What gave him that idea?” he asked, with expected suspicion.
“A picture Mr. Stark took of Ryder and me the night of the prom was found in Ryder’s possession, as well as the dress I wore, which was his real mother’s dress altered and tailored to fit me.”
“How did he get all that?”
“I think Samantha did it to stir up trouble. I did something that only helped her along.”
“What?”
“When I went up to get you that pair of Ryder’s boots, I discovered the dress was in his closet. I was afraid my father would find it and think I had given it to him, so I took it.”
“And?”
I looked away for a moment. It was so hard to say these things. “He had already seen the dress, had seen it beside Ryder in his bed.”
Dillon stared, his mouth slightly open. “In his bed?”
“Spread out like someone was there wearing it.”
“And then . . . and then you had taken it?”
“Yes.”
He nodded.
“There’s more. The night before Ryder had his breakdown, my father went to check on him, and he wasn’t in his room. He was about to go looking for him when he saw him coming from the direction of my room. When he asked him where he had been, he told him he had to comfort me, embrace me in my bed. I told my father Ryder was dreaming; it never happened, but there is that lingering doubt.”
“Whose doubt?”
“My father’s.”
“He thinks it really happened?”
“Yes, but it didn’t. I swear.”
“Wow. Now what?”
“My father felt it was necessary at that point to tell Ryder the whole truth. It had the result Dr. Seymour feared; it was why he reacted so violently and why he was set back in his recuperation. My father blames himself, but . . .”
“But he blames you, too.”
“Yes. Even my mother does, I’m afraid.”
“So what happens now?”
“My father wants me to attend a private high school, live away from Wyndemere. That’s why I told you I’m not going out for the play tomorrow.”
Dillon’s balloon containing his usual Whatever was gone. He looked genuinely stunned and unhappy. “Oh?”
“I wanted you to know everything, Dillon, but I want you to help me do one more thing.”
“Sure,” he said, without even waiting to see what it was. “What?”
“I want you to help me get into the clinic to see Ryder.”
13
DR. SEYMOUR’S CLINIC was not a psychiatric hospital for the criminally insane. There weren’t bars on the windows or high fences around it, but it still had serious security. You couldn’t simply visit someone there whenever you liked; you had to be approved, be on a list authorized by Dr. Seymour himself.
There was no doubt in my mind that neither my father nor my mother would like me visiting Ryder, especially now. I was even unsure of what would happen when they found out. Would I do further damage to my relationship with my parents, damage that would take years to repair, assuming it could be repaired? Did my mother love me enough to withstand the storm of disappointment and blame that would surely follow? Even Mr. Stark would be devastated. He was very fond of Ryder and practically worshipped my father. My being sent to a private school, ostracized from this family, as fragile as it was, was probably the least of what would result.
I had never been to the clinic, but I knew where it was located. I had made it my business to learn about it after Ryder was originally sent there. About five miles outside Lake Wyndemere, the squared U-shape building sat on a small knoll, high enough to give the residents and staff a very good lake view. It was a relatively new complex. A billionaire named Daryl Fenton had donated the money in the memory of his granddaughter, who had committed suicide when she was a year younger than I was now. He had chosen Dr. Seymour to design and head it. Aside from a plaque with his granddaughter’s image embossed over the words A thing of beauty is a joy for ever—Keats, there was no other reference to the Fentons.
The clinic had beautiful grounds, rivaling any estate or mansion, with lush gardens blooming in the spring and summer, fountains, and walkways. Contact with nature was considered therapeutic. It was no secret that the clinic was expensive and catered to the very wealthy. I had heard that even celebrities suffering from addiction resulting in some mental issue were often patients there. However, I also learned that Mr. Fenton had left an endowment to help finance the treatment of teenagers in desperate need who were less able to afford it.
I had no idea whether Dillon would help me get in to see Ryder. I feared that once he had learned that I was being sent to a private high school, which would make it very difficult for us to see each other during the remainder of this school year, he might decide it was better to make a clean break in our budding relationship. Why suffer with it? I certainly wouldn’t blame him if he decided that was the best choice to make. Ironically, at the start, I thought he was the one bringing along all sorts of complications. As it turned out, I was the one nearly crushed by them.
“Why do you want to see him now, Fern?” he asked.
“I want him to understand who I am, who we are. I think it’s the only way he’ll really find himself again. It breaks my heart to think how lost he is. I’d like to do that before I leave.”
“But you said your father admitted that he told
him everything and that’s why Ryder became so upset, had the breakdown. He blamed himself.”
“I’m sure I contributed to that reaction. You have no idea how I’ve treated him since he’s been home. At times, I forced myself to be indifferent when we were together at the dinner table or in his room, in the game room, anywhere in the house. I acted disinterested in him, barely talking to him most of the time. I let Samantha dominate our conversations, and I avoided going to his room without her or someone else present. I was afraid I’d be accused of exactly what I’m being accused of now. I gave him a Christmas present but had to be sure it wasn’t anything very personal. It was just a funny shirt. I was even afraid to show my father too much affection in front of him, and I am sure my father, who rarely showed it anyway, avoided showing me any whenever Ryder was present. It’s been pins and needles. Believe me. I understand what soldiers face when they go through a minefield.
“But I want him to understand and believe that I will love him still, as his sister, and I don’t blame him for anything that’s happened. I can’t just leave it all as it is,” I said, my throat so tight with emotion that it ached for me to speak. “Neither my father nor my mother will permit me to do that now. They’ll just send me away, and the dark thoughts will linger in Ryder’s mind. I can’t imagine what it will be like for him to return to Wyndemere with those added shadows woven like cobwebs only he will see.”
Dillon nodded. “Nevertheless, you’re taking a big risk. You might set off a hell of an explosion in your family.”
“Yes, I know. I’ll admit I’m afraid.”
“You could just leave and put it all behind you. Start over.”
“Like some Etch A Sketch and redraw my life?”
“Which doesn’t make me happy,” he said. “I was beginning to believe I might enjoy my last year here before heading off to college and then stay in touch with you, come home as many times as I could.”
“I’m hoping we’ll still be able to see each other most of the remainder of this school year, maybe on some holiday weekends.”
“Unless he sends you across the country or overseas.”
“He won’t. My mother wouldn’t permit it.”
“Maybe she would after you do this.”
“She won’t,” I insisted. “She won’t be happy, but she knows what it means to be separated from your family by great distances, and I don’t mean just in miles.”
“Yeah, I imagine she does.” He was silent, thinking, and then he nodded. “Okay. Give me some time.”
“What are you going to do?”
He put the car into reverse and started to back out of the parking area. “Reconnaissance,” he said. He smiled. “I finally have a real challenge.”
He drove me home.
“We might have to cut classes to do this, Fern,” he said when we pulled up to the front of the mansion. “Timing could be very critical.”
“Two days ago, that would have terrified me,” I said. “Right now, it’s about what a sneeze is to pneumonia.”
He laughed. “I’ll call you later.”
“Thanks for trusting me and caring for me enough to want to do this, Dillon,” I said.
We leaned toward each other and kissed. After I got out, I watched him drive away, wondering if I had started something I couldn’t stop. I could hear Mrs. Marlene warning, You can’t put toothpaste back in the tube.
But maybe that was the only way I could get myself to go through with this: get on the plane while it was moving. I could regret it all I wanted, but I couldn’t stop the takeoff and being on that flight.
My mother stepped out of the living room the moment I entered the house. The way she had her shoulders hoisted like someone who just had an ice cube dropped down her back and the way she was pressing her lips together, creating those tiny white spots at the corners of her mouth, told me she was angrier than ever. It wasn’t something I had often seen, but it took only once to embed it forever in my mind.
“You never leave this house without my permission,” she said through clenched teeth. “Why did you do that?”
“I’m sorry, Mummy, but I needed to leave and breathe fresh air. I’m being accused of things I didn’t do.”
“Go up to your room and stay there, Fern. Right now, I’m too upset with your behavior to discuss it.”
I walked toward the stairway. When I looked back, she had already returned to the living room. I could hear my father’s voice, but he was speaking too low and softly for me to understand anything he was saying. When I entered my room, I went to my windows and stood there with my arms folded under my breasts, gazing out, remembering happier times.
Once, to defy Bea, who had refused to permit me to ride in the limo to school, Ryder refused to go to school in the limo and boarded the bus with me. He loved “getting her goat,” as Mrs. Marlene would say. I recalled our snowball fights and sledding in the winter, biking around the lake together, and playing badminton and tennis. There was a point when Ryder was into his friends, and doing anything with the younger daughter of the head housekeeper diminished to almost nothing. Those were the more difficult days for both my mother and me. Bea was still the reigning queen and patrolled this mansion with a riding whip at her side, snapping it at her servants and especially at me.
One day, Ryder took a longer look at me and saw that I had moved from childhood to adolescence. I couldn’t remember a time when I didn’t think of him romantically. Something happened, especially the night of the prom, when we danced together and then he was chosen king and I was chosen queen. We let things continue to develop. I told him I felt like a commoner in England having an affair with a royal.
“There’s nothing common about you,” he told me.
I brought his words and his kiss along with me into my dreams every night. And then all that had come crashing down around us in that spring storm. It was as if what we had been doing was so forbidden that even nature was outraged.
“Why is everyone mad at you?” I heard Samantha say now, interrupting my reverie. I turned around, poised to pounce. She even took a step back when she saw the look in my eyes.
I smiled coldly, my lips surely resembling two streaks of ruby-tinted ice. “Aren’t you happy about it, Samantha? Aren’t you so pleased?”
She shrugged, called on some courage, and came in a little farther to lean against the leather chair, running her fingers up and down the arm of it and avoiding looking directly at me. She was acting strangely, which ironically calmed me.
“Why should I be happy about it? It’s like a morgue down there, and as soon as I say anything, they tell me to stop shouting and go find something to do. They won’t let me invite anyone over, either. Whatever it is, it’s not fair! Why are they punishing me, too?”
“Please, Samantha. I’m not in the mood right now to hear your silly complaints.”
She didn’t move.
I thought for a moment and stepped toward her. “Why did you say what you said to Dillon? Why did you tell him Ryder would be upset if Dillon was my boyfriend?”
She looked at me guiltily and then looked down.
“Why?” I insisted.
“Ryder always asked me more questions about you than anyone else when you weren’t there. I thought maybe he liked you more than he liked me.”
“What do you mean by always? When exactly did that start?”
“After he came home from the clinic.”
“Soon after?”
“Yes,” she said. “He didn’t ask questions about me as much, and when I told him things I was doing, he looked bored.”
“What did he ask about me, exactly?”
“Stuff.”
“What stuff, Samantha? Please be specific. Give me an example or two.”
“Who were your friends? Did you go on dates? Did you have a boyfriend? When I told him about your going to the movie, he wanted to know if you would be going with a boy. I said I didn’t know, but then, the next day, you were going to a lunch date wit
h a boy, so I told him. I said the boy’s name was Dillon Evans. I told him I’d heard that he was weird, but that was before I met him.”
“How did you know about my lunch date?”
“I heard you tell your mother and Mrs. Marlene before I went to Raegan’s house. That’s when I ran upstairs and told him about Dillon.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing, but I could see that he wasn’t happy. I told him I was going to my friend’s house and couldn’t do anything with him. I was sorry he would have to be alone. I guess he was just upset he had to stay home all the time. He liked me to tell him things,” she added adamantly. “You didn’t tell him much. He even asked me why you hardly spoke to him.”
“He asked you that? When?”
“I don’t know. A while ago. I told him not to worry, I’d tell him stuff. And I did!”
“That’s why you gave him that picture, right, Samantha?”
“I didn’t.” She paused, stopping herself from saying something else.
“You gave it to him because, as you said just now, you thought you could get him to remember things, and then you would be so important, be able to brag and make our father proud of you. I’m right, aren’t I? Aren’t I?” I shouted.
“No,” she said. “I mean, yes, I tried to remind him of things all the time, and sometimes he did remember. And he thanked me, too. I was helping him more than you were. You only made him sad.”
“That’s why you gave him the dress, too, right?”
“What dress?”
“Never mind. I think I’ve learned enough. You have a mean heart, Samantha. Someday all this jealousy will eat you alive. You’ll be horribly alone, because you’ll drive away anyone who would even dream of liking you.”
“I will not.” She smiled. “You’re the one being punished now. What did you do? Why won’t anyone tell me?”
“I suppose you’re right about that, sly Samantha. I am the one being punished, not you.” I sat on my bed. “But the biggest punishment might be the biggest gift I could receive after all.”
“What? Why would you get a big gift? That’s not fair. What’s the big gift?”
Echoes in the Walls Page 21