Page 19 of Dark Ugly Places

He sighs, at a loss. No therapy here. No pills to numb the pain. “We’re doing all we can,” he says.

This line gets repeated to me everywhere I go these days. Doctors and nurses, attorneys and secretaries. And it’s always, without question, a big fat lie. No one is doing all they can. Absolutely no one.

“But you won’t help me? You won’t investigate this any further?”

Steve shrugs. “My hands are tied, Mrs. Holiday. Please understand.”

On the surface, I may appear calm, but inside, I’m raging. “Can I keep this?” I ask him. He nods, and as I pocket the photo, the room starts to spin. I steady myself on the corner of the desk.

“Mrs. Holiday? Are you all right?”

Overhead, the stark white lights flicker. The sickly scent of Chinese food returns, and the air in the room feels close. I can hardly get a breath. My legs start to buckle as the voice returns to me.

See? No one’s going to help you. Why don’t you let me, Nicola?

“No,” I hear myself say, my voice barely a whisper. “I can’t, I can’t.”

My stomach rolls as a thumping returns to my skull.

A sudden wave of disgust rises within me. All of us consume each other like cannibals, I realize. No wonder Emmy went vegan. We buy big fancy cars so we can drive fast on big fancy roads, fueled by our booze and our oversized plates of dead animal flesh. We barrel down our well-paved roads and our well-lit streets reserved for certain kinds of people in certain kinds of houses and take our turns crawling into our oversized California king-sized beds when we’re done with it all.

Except, of course, for those of us who get left behind, those who get left for dead in the middle of the street on a brightly lit winter afternoon.

Before I know it, I’m trapped in the elevator, heading down to the ground floor.

Everything slows down. Time stops. The world stills. I pinch my fingers between my eyes and try to steady myself.

When the doors open, I bolt for the exit and out onto the street. As my feet hit the pavement, my lungs seize, and I release a scream into the cacophony of rush-hour traffic. I scream and scream until my throat burns and my gut aches with the effort. I scream until not even a breath of air could flow out of me.

8

Nicola

I sit idling in my car outside our apartment, my phone in my hands, Jason Redfern’s address glaring at me from the photo of his driver’s license. 1900 North Alpine Drive. The exclusive hills of Beverly Hills. The winding tree-lined streets, manicured lawns surrounded by supremely tall gates and walls, behind them their mansions towering into the trees—mysterious and only partially seen. How I long to drive there myself right now, to show up unannounced. To find something, anything that could be considered proof. To see him face-to-face and let him know what he’s done.

A bolt of anger rises in my chest.

You should have dealt with him when you had the chance.

I shake my head, releasing the thought that isn’t mine.

When I get inside, I find Emmy on the couch watching YouTube videos on her laptop and eating cereal, Scotch next to her, his little white head resting on her thigh.

“How was school?”

“Yeah, fine,” she mutters and strokes Scotch’s back. “But I’ve been thinking. I would really like to take a mental health day every week.”

“A mental health day?”

“Yes,” she says matter-of-factly. “I’ve been researching it. Some schools let their students take one day a week and study from home. I want to do that.”

“As in, you go to school four days per week?”

Emmy nods enthusiastically. “It would be good for me. I wouldn’t have to stress out so much, you know?”

I nod and come sit next to her. “I do know, baby, but I’m not sure it’s the right thing.”

Emmy nods and stares at my face. “What’s wrong with you?”