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fore.
Yes. The answer felt right. She didn’t know why, because on the surface it was both stupid and paranoid, but—yes.
Okay. The best thing to do, then, was to not let people know she’d flipped out, and just act normal—sick, but normal.
She got her cell phone from the table where she’d left it, and turned it on. She always turned it off at night, because … She didn’t know why. No answer came to mind; she just did.
When the phone had booted up, she scrolled through her contacts until she found “Maryjo,” selected the number, and hit the green call icon. She heard ringing almost right away, but she’d read that the first couple of rings were placebo rings, put in place so the caller would think something was happening, when in reality the connection took a few seconds longer to happen. She tried to think where she’d read that, and when, but came up blank. Maybe it no longer held true; cell phone technology changed so fast—
A click, and “This is Maryjo” sounded in her ear. Lizette was so caught up in thinking about cell-phone technology that for a second she was blank, trying to remember why she’d called. Sick. Right.
“Maryjo, this is Lizette.” Until she spoke, she hadn’t realized how ragged she sounded, her voice thick from throwing up, her breath still too fast. “I’m sorry, I won’t be able to make it to work today. I think I have a bug. Trust me, you don’t want me spreading it around.”
“Throwing up?” Maryjo asked sympathetically.
“Yes. And a splitting headache.”
“A stomach virus is going around. My kids had it last week. It lasts about twenty-four hours, so you should feel better tomorrow.”
“I hate that it’s such short notice.” Though how she could have anticipated getting sick, she didn’t know.
“Not your fault. This is the first sick day you’ve had in three years, so don’t sweat it.”
“Thanks,” Lizette managed to say. Something rang an alarm bell deep in her mind, something that felt as if there was something else—Her stomach lurched. “I’m sorry, I have to run—” And she did, stumbling, gagging. She hung over the toilet and awful choking noises tore out of her throat, but there was nothing else to come up.
By the time she could catch her breath, every muscle was trembling. Straightening, she held on to the vanity for a moment, then turned on the cold water in the sink. Bending over, she splashed water over her hot face, over and over again until she felt calmer and could breathe without a hard ragged edge tearing at her throat.
Better. This was better. But she didn’t let herself look at the stranger in the mirror; instead she closed her eyes and just stood there for a moment. Finally she grabbed the towel and blotted the water from her eyes, swiped it across her face and neck.
Her heart was still pounding. What on earth had set off this last bout? Was it something Maryjo had said? Nothing jumped out at her, yet she distinctly remembered that sense of alarm, as if Maryjo had ventured into dangerous territory. She mentally replayed the conversation, trying to find anything out of whack, even something trivial. Maryjo’s kids had had a stomach virus, it had lasted about twenty-four hours, blah blah blah. There literally was nothing else, except for the comment about how long it had been since she’d taken a sick day.
Pain streaked through her head like a warning shot. She gripped the edge of the sink and waited it out, trying to keep her mind clear of thoughts, and the pain faded.
Okay.
Something nagged at her, something she felt she should remember but that stayed maddeningly at the edge of—
No. There it was. And so trivial. Exactly when had she last taken a sick day?
She hadn’t, not that she could remember. Not in the entire five years she’d worked at Becker Investments. So why had Maryjo said she hadn’t taken a sick day in three years? When had she been sick? Surely she’d remember, because she was almost never sick. The few times she had been really stuck in her memory, such as when she was twelve and picked up a gross, nasty bug at summer camp that totally knocked her on her keister. She didn’t even catch the normal assortment of head colds that circulated around the office every winter.
So when, other than now, had she ever been absent from work?
She thought back to when she started work at Becker.
This time the pain simply exploded in her head and nausea twisted her stomach. She hung over the toilet, heaving and gasping—and while she did so, she dropped her cell phone on the floor and stomped on it, breaking it apart.
That was insane. And yet—the impulse to destroy her cell phone was so strong that she’d simply acted on it, without hesitation, without question.
When she got control again, she first blew her nose, then splashed more cold water on her face, as she fought for a logical explanation.
There was none. She couldn’t remember ever being sick enough to be out of work, but that wasn’t what had made her insides curdle with fear. She felt as if a stranger were fighting her for control of her body, and sometimes the stranger won.
Whatever was going on, whether she was having a complete mental breakdown or there really was something colossally off, she’d find out, and she’d deal with it.
Until then, she could only go with her instincts, such as stomping the cell phone to smithereens. She felt almost painfully foolish, but—
Maybe not.
