The Dead Girl in 2A

by Carter Wilson

  In the house, he looked again, finding an assortment of the usual crap. He felt the slight twinge at a bright-pink flyer, remembering the flyer that had started everything. But this wasn’t an ad for a revolutionary clinical trial. It was the announcement of a new car wash.

  Tucked inside the small bundle was the last piece of mail he inspected.

  A postcard, with a picture he knew well. A photo of the Maroon Bells.

  He almost didn’t turn it over to read the back. He almost didn’t want to know who had sent this and why. It could be good; it could be decidedly not good. But in the end, he flipped it over and was glad he did.

  Should have ducked was the extent of the message. That, and a signature, which was nothing but a letter of the alphabet.

  L

  Epilogue

  The Book of Clara

  1/7/2019

  Final Entry

  I’ve just come from a visit with Em, and upon my arrival home, I saw this journal where I left it at the far end of the kitchen counter, tucked next to the coffee maker. It’s been sitting there for over two months, collecting dust, as I have a daily wrestle with myself over what to do with it. It is, after all, a suicide note. A collection of scattered memories of a fractured and incomplete life, peppered with deathly overtones and moments of wonder. I can’t bring myself to throw it away, because, after all, it is me. But it saddens me to look at it, as if reminding me of something from my past that has long slipped away. So this is nostalgia, I suppose.

  After visiting my niece—a niece I never knew I had until recently—I am reminded again of how beautiful life is and have decided this book should have one final chapter, one filled with hope, such as I define it. In my daydreams, I imagine taking this book and having Jake add to it, telling what he remembers since the day he went to visit Landis in his little Boston office. We’ll add in the photocopies of the Müllers’ journal, and perhaps the letter Landis received from the anonymous teacher. An illustration from The Responsibility of Death. We’ll bundle it all together and maybe have it published as a curiosity, or even a warning. I have even thought of the title. The Dead Girl in 2A.

  Truth is, I’m not allowed to say anything to anyone. I will likely just bury everything in the back of a closet somewhere and let it sit untouched, until either it disappears for good or someone finds it after my bones have finally settled into silence.

  I have a brother.

  I knew Jake and I were connected at a deeper level than merely orphans thrown together at a school, but it all came together beneath that rotten water. In the slideshows that flashed as my air ran out, I saw us all together. Jake, myself, our parents. I remembered Jake holding me when we were told our parents had been killed in a car accident, knowing what death meant but not understanding the foreverness of it all. He squeezed me tightly and told me everything would be okay, but he was also just a child, scared, confused, full of tears, and suddenly lost in the world.

  Washburn.

  That’s our real last name. Jake and Clara Washburn. Brother and sister orphans, and one-third of the enrollment of Arete Academy, a school that technically never existed. We were drugged after the death of the Müllers, then separated and given new names, new stories. Just like that, the only family ties we each had left were conveniently severed by those for whom the truth only sears and burns.

  It makes sense to me now the Müllers used orphans in their program. It wasn’t just the convenience of having little family left. The program hinged on an innate understanding and acceptance of death. The orphans in the school were already tragically qualified.

  After Eaton took his final breath underwater, Jake and I spent the night at the school, cold and uncomfortable, with him in considerable pain. Yet it was also wonderful, being there with him, talking of our past lives, each of us filling in gaps for the other. We slept some, and when we woke at dawn, we went back into the Müllers’ house and called for Landis. He did not answer, nor did we find him anywhere else on the school grounds. The man in the gray fedora disappeared from our lives as quickly as he’d entered, like a specter from a Dickens story. Whether he’s now alive or dead, I like to think he’s where he wants to be.

  On the way to the hospital, Jake called his wife, Abby, and could hardly talk through his tears. He wept and wept, not out of sadness, but I think out of love. He explained little but promised Abby he was fine and would be coming home soon. For her part, I think she was rightly concerned about his state of mind, but they hung up with her telling him she loved and missed him. It was what he needed to hear.

  Jake’s injuries were treated back in Denver. We knew the police would become involved once the gunshot wound was revealed, and indeed they were. Jake and I had discussed this, deciding there was no way around the truth, so the first person to whom we began telling our truthful story was a young patrol officer. She did a poor job hiding the disbelief on her face and quickly summoned a detective. The detective seemed more curious, especially with Jake’s revelation about the man he killed in a Denver office park and of Eaton’s body, which could be found floating in a small indoor therapy pool in the mountains. We even inquired if there was any interhospital information about a woman named Elle—last name unknown—treated for a gunshot wound. The hospital staff replied they couldn’t reveal such information, were they even to have any.

  Neither of us was charged with a crime or held for psychiatric observation, which surprised me. We were simply told to remain in Denver for a few more days in case there were follow-up questions.

  We went back to the Four Seasons, with Jake bandaged for the gunshot wound and wrapped up with three bruised ribs, and both of us shot full of antibiotics. Eaton’s credit card was still on file, so we used it to secure an extra room. A small favor the dead man could do for me.

  That first night away from the school, I slept a long, dreamless sleep, and when I woke, I was disoriented and unsure of my surroundings, needing a full minute to remember where I was. I had a moment of panic that the solid sleep had erased my old memories, shaking me like an Etch A Sketch, wiping me clean. But no, I could still remember whole swaths of my distant past. Disney World with Jake and our parents. First grade at an elementary school, before Arete Academy. Later, dinners in the mountains, citronella-filled tiki torches blazing the mosquitoes away.

  The memories were still there, and moreover, new ones kept coming, as if a tiny fissure in my mind was opening wider by the moment, allowing my old life to spill into my current one.

  I was no longer bothered by the outside world, no longer afraid to be around people. If anything, I gained more a sense of wanderlust than anything else, wanting to soak in the world as much as I could. I had a sudden, innate understanding that life was short, precious, and not to be wasted tucked inside a shoe box like a keepsake.

  On the second day at the Four Seasons, a man came to visit Jake and me. An avuncular man, short gray hair, compact, round glasses, and a gray suit a bit too large for his body, as if his advanced age had caused him to start withering away.

  He introduced himself as Charles Manheim and claimed he knew the Müllers quite well when they worked first with the Department of Defense, and then with Arete Academy. Mr. Manheim said he still worked with the government in an advisory capacity, but didn’t provide any specifics.

  He said we were free to return to Boston and that there would be no continued criminal investigation against Jake for what was clearly a self-defense killing. But he made it very clear that the condition for our freedom was to keep what happened to us a secret, telling no one other than those closest to us. If the story of the school and what happened there began appearing in the media, they might have to reassess Jake’s criminal culpability.

  Manheim stressed the school site would be appropriately sanitized—something poor government communication had prevented from happening long ago—and that were Jake to make claims, proving them would be a
n impossible task. The only residual evidence amounted to no more than bizarre children’s books, some unlabeled medication, and photocopies of a journal and a letter. He was confident our story wouldn’t register with more than the fringiest of conspiracy theorists.

  Jake and I agreed to his demands. Jake did, however, tell Abby everything. She reacted appropriately: disbelief and anger at first, as if he was concocting an impossible story for no discernible reason. Then gradual acceptance, coupled with a fresh volley of anger for keeping it a secret so long. Then the anger shot outward—to Landis and Eaton, to the Müllers, to the government as a whole, for creating and fostering such a program to begin with. Jake didn’t tell Abby that Raymond Higgins was one of the orphans, fearing if he did, she might not remain silent.

  Yet her anger was ultimately overpowered by concern and her love for her husband and, perhaps, relief there actually was a reason for his changes.

  They are working things out. Abby has gone back to work in marketing, and Jake has contracted for two more ghostwriting projects, so they seem to be keeping up with Em’s medical bills. He’s also landed an agent for his novel, and she’s starting to shop the manuscript out to publishers. I asked to read it, and as I did, I had a constant catch in my throat, a heaviness in my chest, and a tear always falling (or threatening to). It’s about all the things we lose in life, and having lost so much myself, I was caught in the ineluctable current of his narrative and swept away. It’s beautiful, haunting, and sometimes desperately sad. A perfect parallel to life.

  The best news is Jake’s moved back into the house. He and Abby are going to make it, he assures me. Actually, what he said was “Everything’s going to be okay.”

  Abby and Em also had to accept a new woman in their life: me. The sister-in-law and aunt no one ever knew existed. I’ve visited a handful of times, awkward at first, and then smoother with each subsequent meeting. And Em. Oh, what a wondrous girl. She and I have developed a bond, and she has told me quite a bit about her accident and recovery. Her occupational and physical therapy have helped immensely, and she tells me the doctors believe there will be no long-lasting effects from the accident. Good as new, she tells me. She even says she’s growing to like the scar on her face. That it makes her feel special, like Harry Potter.

  I see much of Jake in her, though truth be told, I still hardly know my own brother. I have finally found my family, and I’m going to make sure I continue to build memories with them.

  As for my adoptive parents, I haven’t told them anything. I will someday, when I’m ready to reconnect. To them, I’m sure, I’m as damaged as ever.

  Eaton is gone, his body sanitized by those responsible for such things. Jake received a postcard we’re certain was from Elle, and finding out she was alive filled me with immeasurable joy. Though I only knew the woman a few hours, I’d felt a responsibility for her, wanting to save her as much as she was trying to save us.

  As for Landis, I like to picture him very much alive and holed up somewhere, experimenting with the program, with himself the sole test subject. Perhaps he’s becoming the great person his parents envisioned for all of us, blossoming from his natural talents. Maybe in the process he’s adopted the same philosophy as Jake and me, which is to appreciate what we’ve become and to seek no further. We have new memories. We remember the good things along with the bad, and through life, however long it lasts, I’m not sure how any person can ask for more than that.

  I remember.

  How I’ve wanted to say that for so long.

  I remember.

  So no more book and no more pills for either Jake or myself.

  Now I begin a journey, this one physical instead of mental. I’m going to take the funds I have left and visit all those places I’ve only explored within the stacks of books in my tiny apartment. Venice, Istanbul, and Paris…just for starters. I’ll run out of money, and then I’ll figure things out from there. I’m sure I’ll eventually come back, but for now, I have the deepest, insatiable desire to wander. Perhaps wandering has always been my natural talent, and now I will become exceptional at it.

  I never used to believe the cliché Life’s too short. Life always felt painfully slow to me, a job that had to be done, clocking in and out every day with little understanding of purpose. But then a strange man with a fedora appeared in my life, and now I get it. I’m awake. I’m alive. I can breathe, and that’s a gift not to be wasted, because some day, those breaths will stop and I will be gone, as lifeless as that old crow on the leaf-strewn grounds of the woods.

  So here’s my promise to myself: Whatever time I have left I will fill with joy, love, compassion, and—above all else—grand adventures.

  So goodbye, Dear Reader.

  I’m walking out of these woods.

  It’s my responsibility to do so.

  Clara Stowe

  Boston, Massachusetts. For now.

  Author’s Note

  The chemical compounds fictionalized in this book are rooted in the quite-real drug scopolamine, which is derived from the borrachero (“drunk”) tree found throughout regions of South America and most prevalently in Colombia. The drug has been used recreationally for inducing hallucinations, used by the CIA as a truth serum during the Cold War, and employed by the Nazis during WWII in experimentation on prisoners. Side effects consist of pronounced memory loss and a relinquishing of free will, which is why the compound has become a horrifyingly effective weapon for street crime around the world. It can be transmitted by simple touch, rendering the victim susceptible to any suggestion the assailant chooses.

  In this novel, William Müller created two derivatives of scopolamine, one of which was meant to magnify the suggestibility effects of the drug and pair its administration with other psychological methods, with the intention of creating high-achieving children. The other derivative intensified the memory-loss aspects and was only to be used to wipe the memories of the children in the case of an emergency or abject failure of the program. Müller was, at best, only guessing to the best of his scientific abilities as to the efficacy of the compounds, not actually knowing how each child would ultimately react.

  For a more detailed look at the powerful effects of scopolamine (also known as Devil’s Breath), I highly recommend the VICE documentary on the subject, which is easy to find. Just launch your browser and search “world’s scariest drug.”

  Reading Group Guide

  1. When we first meet Jake, he is struggling to come to terms with his responsibility for the car accident that wounded his daughter. How is he dealing with the guilt he feels? How much responsibility do you think he bears for the accident? Have you ever been in a situation where you felt responsible for hurting someone close to you?

  2. The Dead Girl in 2A is a book about memory and how the things we remember or forget shape our lives. How do you think Jake’s life would have been different if he had never forgotten the things that happened to him as a child? How might his life have been different if he never sat down next to Clara on the flight to Denver? Are there things from your own past that you wish you could forget, or do you feel that all your experiences have made you the person you are today?

  3. When Clara announces to Jake that she intends to kill herself, he feels a deep sense of responsibility to stop her from doing it. How do you think you would react if you were put in the same situation? Would you do anything to try to prevent the death of a stranger? If so, what?

  4. Jake and Clara both agree to participate in Landis’s trial. What do you see as their motivations for doing so?

  5. The Dead Girl in 2A is written in multiple points of view. Did you feel more connected to the story through one point of view versus another? How do you think having access to the internal thoughts of multiple characters affected your understanding of the story?

  6. Many of the characters in The Dead Girl in 2A have faced trauma in their pasts. How do you think each c
haracter has coped with the events they lived through? How do their coping mechanisms line up with what you know or have experienced regarding the aftermath of traumatic events?

  7. Part of the narrative is closely tied to the Maroon Bells, a significant place to several of the characters. Do you have a place in the world that feels significant to you or that you are drawn to time and again? If so, why do you think that is?

  A Conversation with the Author

  The Dead Girl in 2A has a very clear theme: memory. Why did you decide to tackle the idea of memory and how it shapes us in this book?

  A lot of my books deal with memory in one way or another. I think a large part of this stems from my father’s death at the age of sixty-nine from Alzheimer’s-related issues. One of my greatest fears is losing my memory, and I think somehow it’s therapeutic for me to write about it. Beyond that, memory is simply fascinating. It’s this intangible, weightless, disembodied thing that makes up so much of who we are, guides so many of our decisions, and forms our opinions about emotions ranging from happiness to terror. We are our memories, and we don’t even really understand them.

  Why did you choose the Maroon Bells as a significant place in this story?

  Though I live in Colorado, I don’t set many scenes here. In general, I like to write about places I’m not all that familiar with, because then I get to discover a new world. But in crafting this story, I knew I wanted a secluded mountain area as the setting for the school, and I wanted a location that plausibly had an air of the fantastic about it (like the Oceanic survivors’ island in Lost). The Maroon Bells has that kind of mystique, and I thought it would provide the kind of setting necessary to imprint so strongly on my characters.

  You have published several previous novels. Does it get easier to write the longer you have been doing it? Was there anything particularly challenging about writing this novel?