AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“May I ring the bell?” he pleaded.
“What for?”
“Because today is like Christmas,” he said.
I smiled at him. “Today is a good day indeed,” I agreed. “Yes, ring the bell all you want.”
CHAPTER 63
Up the elevator to the sixth floor, down the hall, key card pressed tight against the lock. Jordan’s done this dozens of times now, but the buzzing of the first door as it opens still makes him jump.
Two more locked doors to get through and then he’s on the ward itself, with its bright lights and security cameras. He greets the day’s charge nurse, a big, patient woman named Renée, and puts his backpack in the staff lockers.
“I need you to help Nyla with the collaging project in G,” Renée says when he comes out again. She reaches into her desk and hands Jordan a pair of hot-pink safety scissors. “Here. An extra pair so you can make a collage, too.” She grins like she’s daring him. Then she glances down at the white paper bag he’s carrying. “What’s in there? Not contraband, is it?”
Inside the bag is a beautiful eight-dollar chocolate eclair that Jordan impulse-bought for Hannah at the fancy French bakery on Broadway. “My lunch,” he says.
“Huh. Be careful Amelia doesn’t steal it,” Renée says, dismissing him.
Amelia is relatively new to the floor, a food hoarder with kleptomaniacal tendencies. The other day, a search of her roomrevealed enough packets of Chips Ahoy!, Cheez-Its, and Oreos to fill an entire vending machine.
“You bet,” he calls over his shoulder as he heads down the hall.
Room G is small, windowless, and easily the most depressing room on the ward. Nyla, one of the art therapists, is passing out piles of donated magazines, glue sticks, and more brightly colored safety scissors. There are eight patients in the room, and none of them is Hannah.
Jordan moves as if in a dream toward the table.
Where is she, where is she?
“Everything you cut out should represent something you hope for,” Nyla is saying. She holds up a finished collage. “I made this last night while I was watchingReal Housewives,” she says. “See? I hope to swim in a lake this summer, and I want to get a dog someday, and I want to learn how to knit.”
Andy, who isn’t dead today, reaches for aSmithsonianmagazine and starts cutting out a picture of a fighter jet.
Beatrix mutters, not very quietly, “I fucking hate crafts.”
Since Beatrix almost never curses, Jordan assumes that one of her alters has stepped forward. Beatrix has been diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder, and different people speak through her mouth.
He sits down next to Sophie. “Good morning,” he says.
Don’t ask “Where’s Hannah?” Just leave it at that.
Sophie doesn’t answer, but she’s smearing a glue stick all over her construction paper, which he takes as a decent sign.
Jordan looks at all the magazines fanned out on the table.Golf Digests from two years ago.Dwell.Vanity Fair. A fewCat Fancymagazines older than he is. He sure as hell isn’t going to make a collage, but if he did, what would it show?
A man in a doctor’s coat. A two-bedroom apartment south of 14th Street. A blue sky.
A dark-haired, dark-eyed girl, reading a book in a cozy window seat overlooking a garden.
He stands up again. Jesus, what’s wrong with him? “I’ll be right back,” he says to Nyla. He gives Andy’s arm a quick pat. “You’re doing great.”
“Piss off,” says Andy.
Jordan jogs down the hall to Room 5A. It’s empty.
Mitch passes by with a clipboard. “Your girlfriend’s with Dr. N.”
“She’snotmy—”
