Psychic Visions 08-Now You See Her... (26 page)

She’d gotten a job, rented a small studio and had indulged. In a big way. All the food she’d heard about. All the food she’d thought about. She’d eaten until she was sick. Loving some and hating others. She actually took on a second job so she could eat more – this time on the boss’s nickel. The small restaurant had been known for its good home cooked food and she’d learned. First by doing dishes, then doing prep work and finally doing some of the simpler dishes and helping with the rest. She’d enjoyed eating and they’d enjoyed teaching her. They’d kept the questions to a minimum. Maybe she’d made it very clear in the beginning, maybe not. She couldn’t remember. It was a long time ago.

She’d also had an affair. Several of them. She’d inhaled romance books and thought the words on the paper would mimic real life. That hadn’t worked out so well. Groping in the dark, sweaty hands, smelly bodies and bad breath.

Gross. She’d given it a fair sampling with three men, and that had been enough for her. At one point she wondered if she was more in tune with other women and should go that route.

But she never felt the urge to follow it up. In fact, she wanted to read the romance novels – they were much better.

She’d made friends but never close friends. After all, you shared things with friends. Simple things like your history, where you went to school, first kiss. How did one say all three of those had occurred while in an institution?

Not exactly a conversation starter. Besides, she was a private person. She didn’t want to be viewed as an escapee from a mental hospital.

“Heavy thoughts?”

“Sure. Like sex, romance and death.” She snorted. “Especially the last one.” She tapped the papers in front of her. “This patient died.”

He reached over and plucked the sheet out of her hand. He narrowed his gaze. “This was twelve years ago.”

“Yes, I was there at the time.”

His gaze zeroed in on her face. “He died while you were there. Did you know him?”

“I don’t remember him,” she said shortly. “I heard rumors of a death, several, in fact, but it was never confirmed.” She shrugged. “But I didn’t know him.”

“Was he the only one?”

“I don’t know.”

“What killed him?” Dean wasn’t going to let it go.

“No idea. Maybe these papers explain it. They are all about him.” She handed over a paperclip full of papers. “I thought this file was on one person, but each clip is a different person.” She riffled through the folder, counting. “I think twelve people. Hell, there weren’t that many people in the lab at any time.”

“Likely over the dozen years it was operational. Twenty-two participants is hardly anything. You need a lot of people to show viable results for treatments.”

“Not many of us weirdos out there. He was damn lucky to have this many. Am I here?” Her fingers flicked through the stack. “Jason. Michelle. Roberta. Bobby. Jerome. Sergei. Calendar.” She went silent as the memories of all those people rippled through her psyche.

“Jesus. So many.” She went to the second to the last file and pulled it forward. She tapped the top paper in the clip. “He was a pain in the ass. He hated being there, and he’d scream at the top of his lungs for days. We all hated it.”

“How did they stop him?”

She paused and looked over at him. “No idea. But he stopped. From one day to the next he was silent. Actually…” She frowned. “He might have just been kicked out. I remember it was a constant noise in the background and then it was suddenly gone.

Dean flicked through the papers and came to the last sheet. “Or maybe they killed him. According to this, he was dead six weeks after arriving. Are you sure he wasn’t the one who died.”

She reached over and grabbed the papers. “No, it was Calendar. I think that was his name.” She frowned as she read the form on the last page. “He was the only one I knew about.”

Dean tossed another packet in front of her. “This girl died too. And this one and this one.” He dumped the stack in front of her. “Your name doesn’t appear to be here for a very good reason – you’re the only one still alive.”

*

The shock on
her face made him want to laugh, but there was nothing lighthearted about the subject matter. If he was correct, all these people had died. And they’d been just kids. Children. Teens. In theory she’d crossed paths with all of them. At one time or another she’d likely met these people face to face, maybe whispered about their crappy lives together. “No,” she whispered. “It can’t be.”

“Why is that?”

“Because I saw some of them leave.” She lifted her shocked gaze to Dean’s. “As in I saw the parents come and take the kids away.”

“And you’re sure it was the parents doing that?” Dean waited for her to understand. When she stared at him blankly, he added, “Maybe it was someone else other than their parents.”

She blinked. “Why would anyone do that?”

“I don’t know, but the thing is we now have something to go on. Something golden. There are names and dates here. We need to get this off to Jones. Have him track these families down and find out what the hell happened.”

“Wait.” She reached for the pages. “Does it actually say what happened to these kids? Given the way they died?”

“No. It just says deceased.”

She shook her head. “This is wrong on so many levels.”

“Yeah, that’s one way to put it,” he muttered. He reached over, grabbed a stack of papers and took a closer look. “This is an intake form. And then dietary restrictions, medical history. There are a few notes as to how the patient settled in. But nothing on the treatment. Nothing on medications given. Nothing on meetings and impressions from the doctor about each new arrival.”

“He was a rabid note taker,” she exclaimed. “There’s a lot of information missing here.”

“Sure, but then why this condensed version of events?”

“I don’t know.” She grabbed the file. “Billy arrived on June 17
^th
. Okay, then he was allergic to dairy. Hey, I didn’t know that.” She pondered that information as if trying to match it up to her memories. “It’s possible I suppose.”

“You don’t remember?” he asked her curiously. “How well did you know these people? Did you have a cafeteria where you could all hang out and talk?”

“Oh no. That wasn’t allowed very often. We saw each other in passing, when someone had a fit, while in the observation room. Occasionally we’d get to talk in the hallways. We whispered at night to each other.” She gave him a crooked smile. “Prisoners do find ways, you know.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” he said forcefully. “I wish you’d had the skills to break free and beat the hell out of your warden.”

“You forget, we were conditioned to think we had no choice. That we were there because we had to be there. And we were kids. We weren’t exactly docile, but for the most part we were accepting.”

“Sounds like a horrible way to live.” And it pissed him right off.

“Oh it was, but it was the only way we had to live. We were always jealous yet hopeful when someone got to leave.” She smiled with memories. “It gave us hope that we would make it out of there too. That our families would come and pick us up.”

“And you never saw your family again?” He’d pulled out a notepad from his back pocket, instinctively needing confirmation on these details. He quickly asked her a few more questions. “I’m going to contact Jones right now. See if I can scan in some of these pages for him to use as a basis to track down the families of these kids. Maybe there are others who lived. Maybe find some who would be adults now.”

She nodded. “Is there something I can do?”

“Well, you’re avoiding looking at the second folder, any reason why?”

“Because it feels like a serpent waiting to strike. It’s so fat and obnoxious looking,” she said, an odd note creeping into her voice.

“All of that from one look?”

“One peek,” she muttered. But she stared down at the empty pizza box and picked away at the melted cheese, her gaze solidly
not
on the folder. Although he wanted to rush away to Jones and hand over all this material, he needed to see what bothered her about this folder.

He pulled it toward him and took a look inside. “More intake, more pages of dietary care. Yet this one is thick.” And the writing is more illegible than the others. Older. This one barely closed for the stack of material inside. Some of it crumpled. Some of it folded and other pieces just stuffed in. “This isn’t a condensed subject folder. This is all one patient,” he said, his voice rising. “This is excellent. We should be able to track this person down.”

“Oh yeah, you should,” she said, shoving the pizza box back against the far end of the table with more force than necessary. “Hell, if you can’t, you can’t really call yourselves cops.”

He snorted. “Okay smarty pants, why is that?”

She turned and glared at him as he stood up, the second folder in his hand, ready to take it to his office.

“Because it’s my folder, damn it. Everything in there is about me.”

S
he couldn’t still
the shakiness inside. Dean had been flicking through the folder since she’d told him it was on her. Every once in a while she’d look over at him worried at what he’d see. She’d lived it. Did she really want to read about it? Then again, these notes and documents were from others. Their impressions, perceptions. Not hers.

Did she really want to not know how they felt about her? How she’d responded. The results they’d formulated. Was it normal to want to step back and completely miss out on learning more? Just because she’d had a horrible time there? No. That was just stupid.

“Damn it.” She plunked down beside him and snatched up the beginning part of the file he’d already skimmed through. She caught his concerned gaze and said, “I need to know.”

He nodded and shifted the file so it was between them.

She went through the intake form, noting she’d been twelve on the day she’d arrived. Shitty day. Still, there were no notes on her condition or mental state. She flicked through the first couple of pages and read the cold institutionalized type of information. No dietary restrictions. Not yet in puberty. No physical issues. No allergies.

Dropping the first pages, she snagged up the next set. There were initial notes from Wilhelm on her mental health and parental concerns. “Nonconforming. Belligerent. Willful.” She snorted. “What did they expect when they yelled at me to stop all the time? Stop what, for heaven sake? It’s not like I was having an easy time of it.”

Dean reached across and grasped her hand. He squeezed gently but didn’t lift his head from the paper he was reading. “I got the impression he started with the intention of helping you, but somewhere along the line he became fascinated.”

“Exactly. I’d already been through every doctor in town. In fact,” she thought back, “I guess they did try.”

“Until your parents found Wilhelm. But why would they have walked away at that point?” Dean’s tone was harsh. “Even if you had been found to have mental health issues, surely walking away wasn’t a good answer for someone in that situation.”

“My brother,” she said pensively.

He turned to look at her. “Sorry?”

“My brother came along. And I think they figured they had a second chance, but if he picked up any of the same traits, they’d lose him too. So they cut all ties.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“That’s fear,” she corrected quietly. “If all they wanted was a normal family but got a freak first time out and a perfect example the second time around, many people would ditch the first one and try to wipe the stain out of their lives permanently.”

“They aren’t parents then. You can’t collect perfect specimens to have in your family. Your children are a gift – with all the challenges and joys inherent in giving birth.”

She liked him better all the time. Actually, she’d gone past like to something so much more. She just didn’t know how much more. But damn he was good looking, alpha male, protective and caring. He was a damn good father to his son and a caring son to his mother. Tia doubted his partner would receive any different treatment.

“We see it happening all over the world,” she said.