Sense of Rumor (Mount Faith Series: Book 6) (8 page)

She looked at Alric. Her eyes were dry and flat. "You should have let me kill him."

Alric grinned. "No. That would be the ultimate. You know out of all the rumors I have heard about you, murder has not featured in any of them. I have another lab in an hour. Want to hang out here for a while?"

Arnella shrugged and turned back, putting her knapsack down on the table closest to her and sat down on one of the chairs. She put her head on her hands and looked at Alric lazily.

"I didn't know you taught classes here."

Alric nodded. "It was a favor for a friend of mine. I did it for the summer, and I will continue for this semester. It will look good on my resume when I apply for the teaching hospital here. They consider everything."

"Good for you. Sounds fascinating." She looked down on her nails. There was a little hangnail on her pinky, that she was itching to bite off. She resisted the urge and looked back up at Alric who was watching her intently.

"Chewed up nails is a sign of nervousness," he said, pointing to her battered nail pads.

"I am not nervous," Arnella said, though she was feeling a little jittery inside. The feeling had persisted from she saw David in class today. Her body had not lost that feeling, even after an hour.

Alric leaned back in his chair. "Can we play twenty questions?"

"No. Too childish," Arnella said, lying on her hands. " Besides, I don't want to know anything about you."

Alric grinned. "I was thinking of questioning you."

"Okay, shoot," Arnella said. "I do reserve the right to not answer anything I don't want to though."

"Good." Alric rubbed his hands together. "Did you really run away to live with Father Michael?"

"No," Arnella said lazily, "I ran away from home. I had to get out of the house. Father Michael was a convenient escape route. He was at his church and he was packing supplies to go to Kingston. He left all his car doors opened and I was passing by so I went along for the ride."

Alric shook his head. "So where'd you go?"

"Lived with nuns in a children's place of safety in Kingston," Arnella said smiling. "They served rocky road ice cream on Sundays."

Alric frowned. "Why'd you run away?"

"I was unhappy." Arnella closed her eyes.

"Why were you unhappy?" Alric asked softly.

Arnella shrugged. "I am always unhappy. That day I was unhappier than most." She looked at Alric, smiling slightly. "Here's a rumor that's true: I used to cut myself."

"I heard that you were trying to commit suicide," Alric said. "I overheard a teacher from your school talking about it at church."

" Nurse Green saw me cutting myself in the bathroom at school and told one teacher at my high school who decided to tell the whole community that Nurse Green delivered me from suicide."

Alric chuckled and then sobered up. "What's the deal with you and David Hudson?"

Arnella pulled in a deep breath and straightened up on the chair. "That topic is off the table." She glanced at her watch. "I have to go."

Alric looked at her, confused, as she hurriedly stood up. Obviously that was a sore wound. He wished he hadn't brought it up. He had been enjoying getting to know Arnella.

"See you next class." She didn't look back to hear if he responded; she just left the classroom.

He steepled his fingers under his chin and thought about Arnella for the next few minutes. His mind barely concentrated on the class activity sheets that he had to mark. He was close to admitting that he liked her. For the life of him, he couldn't understand why.

Maybe it was the way she said "I am always unhappy." That touched a sympathetic chord within him.

*****

Arnella couldn't sleep, though she was in a queen sized bed that was more comfortable than any she had ever slept in. The temperature was just right—it was still chilly for summer, but not chilly enough that she had to get a blanket—yet she tossed and turned like a caged bird.

She looked at the clock. It was midnight. She had tried to go to bed early this evening so that she could paint early in the morning, but it was a no go. Her body was tired but not exhausted enough to sleep. She got up and glanced in the floor length mirror while passing it. She saw her messy hair and her puffy eyes and sighed. She was not looking too stellar for a twenty-year old. She looked trampled on. She headed out the door and to the landing. The place was quiet. Charlene had long gone to bed. She tiptoed down the hallway and down the stairs, entered the kitchen and headed for the fridge. A cup of hot milk would do her good. At least, it should help her sleep.

She closed her eyes briefly, and David's face loomed in her mind’s eye. If only she could just blot it out of her mind that she was assaulted, but her mind was having none of it. She was no psychiatrist but she knew that this was the big reason for her restless sleep, especially since she saw David in class yesterday and knew that he and his cronies were on campus. Those creeps. If Alric hadn't intervened, she would surely have done some significant damage to David. She wished that kick she gave him yesterday could have broken him for life.

Maybe she needed to see Taj after all. She was willing to talk now. She felt so angry. She put the milk in the microwave and set the timer for 10 seconds. The timer went off in no time and she sipped the warm milk slowly, waiting for the soporific effects of the milk to kick in. When it didn't, she headed down to the basement, switching on all the lights and looked at her half finished work that was stacked in a corner.

She'd finish the sea scene first. She grabbed her newly bought paint, putting the milk on the worktable, and set up her canvas. What was it that Taj said he saw in the scene: despair and loneliness? She looked at it keenly. She was going to add some angry waves in the distance, making the painting even angrier than she had originally intended. She worked steadily through the night, eventually getting up from before the canvas when the first light of dawn was peeping through the skies. Painting, as usual, was cathartic. She went upstairs and saw Charlene rummaging in the kitchen.

"I thought I heard you down there last night," she said to Arnella brightly. "Couldn't sleep, huh?"

"No," Arnella said, shaking her head, "but I finished one piece of artwork. So maybe sleepless nights are not that bad."

"Would you like some breakfast?" Charlene asked.

"No, thanks. I am going to sleep. I have class in four hours. I may miss it as well as I may not."

Charlene laughed. "Don't let your uncle come and get you."

"I won't answer the door," Arnella said tiredly.

She went to her room and closed the door, drawing the curtains to block the sunlight. She closed her eyes and just could not fall asleep. Two hours later, she got up. She pulled on her favorite black sweater over her jeans and headed to the Psych Center. Maybe Taj was right after all. She really needed to talk about it.

*****

It was surprisingly easy to get an audience with Dr. Jackson, Arnella realized. Two minutes after driving up to the center and talking to the receptionist, she was sitting in front of Taj.

"You look like you didn't sleep last night," Taj said gently. 'Puffy red eyes and droopy lids."

Arnella twisted her hand. "I shouldn't have come by, but I have loads of things on my mind and you did say that your services are free."

Taj nodded. "I did and it is. I am glad you could stop by. What are some of the things you have on your mind?"

"Just stuff," Arnella sighed. "I have loads of things on my mind since childhood. I guess since my father died. I had a lousy time after his death."

Taj nodded. "Want to tell me about it?"

Arnella nodded. "Why not? It's not as if you are going to tell anybody? You are bound by law to keep my secrets, aren't you?"

Taj nodded slowly. "As long as you didn't kill anybody. I am obligated to report murder and child abuse."

Arnella chuckled. "You look so serious saying that. You know you are pretty cute. Too bad you are my cousin."

"Cute?" Taj frowned, "I haven't heard myself being described as cute since high school." He grinned. "You are deflecting. It's a pretty well known tactic that's used by patients who have something on their mind but don't want to talk. Remember I am not going to tell."

"I guess you've heard it all, huh?" Arnella asked. "This campus must be rife with secrets. Tell me some of them to make me comfortable."

Taj laughed. "You are testing me to see if I am going to share some with you."

Arnella shrugged, "It was worth a shot."

"A pretty obvious one," Taj said, looking at her. Arnella was a textbook case of a person in pain trying to pretend that she was tough. He looked at her perfectly symmetrical face and into her eyes. Even when she was laughing or pretending to be glib, there was a wealth of pain behind her eyes. He patiently waited for her to look around his office and then she looked back at him.

"That painting is ugly."

"Which one?" Taj looked behind him. It was an abstract of a brown vase with some sticks in it. It was meant to compliment the minimalism of the room and the soft earth tones in his office. He looked back at her. She was deflecting again.

"Who hurt you Arnella?" He asked frankly, focusing her attention to the here and now.

"I was drugged at a friend's party; some guys put something in some drinks. One of the sniveling cowards who did it said it was a bit of fun."

She closed her eyes and then swallowed. She wasn't ready to talk about it. Before Taj could react, she said quickly, "I had a good childhood till my father died when I was eight. You must have heard that Uncle Ryan had a brother, Oswald."

Taj nodded.

"Well, I was his favorite girl in the whole wide world. I knew my Daddy loved me and then he was gone. They said he died in a bar room brawl. Arnella cleared her throat. "Anyway, my mother fell apart when he died. She stopped living and started drinking. We were living in West Virginia at the time, and my brother and I used to go get her in the early mornings. Most times we would find her passed out on the streets in a ditch somewhere. One morning the local police saw us hauling her home, and they contacted social services. After the first visit, my mom decided that she had had enough of America and decided to come to Jamaica. She packed us up with one measly little suitcase a piece. She had one, Vanley had one, and I had one. My grandmother had a house out here and willed it to my Mom before she died, so we moved there."

Taj steepled his fingers, listening as Arnella painted a picture of her childhood. She was talking as if some of the details were long forgotten and she was bringing them back to mind.

She rested back in her chair and crossed her legs. "I had met Uncle Ryan in the past, you know, when Daddy was alive. Uncle Ryan used to live in Washington State. When we came to Jamaica, he was already out here. He thought we were just staying for vacation. He had no idea that my Mom was fleeing social services and the IRS and imminent institutionalization in a mental hospital."

She laughed dryly. "He found out, much later, what was going on and he sent Vanley to boarding school. My mother sobered up for a while, so I was left with her, but everything went down hill after that. She can't remember all the things she did to me because excessive alcohol abuse can cause holes in somebody's memory, but I remember. She used to starve me and beat me. One day she locked me in my room and forgot about me. I had to climb from the second story window. I was about ten…I ate out of the neighbor's garbage. I thought I was covering for her by not saying a word about how bad it was, not to my brother nor my uncle."

Taj just nodded. He didn't need to prompt her to talk. She just wanted to get things off her chest it seemed.

"I went looking for food one night, in the town, I was twelve. I was almost raped by a taxi driver. I am not new to sexual assaults. A stranger saved my butt then. I don't know why this current one should bother me so much. Yesterday I almost killed the guy that did this to me. He claimed that they raped me because of a dare."

"Do you want me to report this to the police?" Taj asked gently.

"I am not sure." Arnella shook her head. "I don't want this to be some big public thing and then there is no justice."

"They could do it to someone else," Taj said gently.

Arnella closed her eyes and leaned back in the chair. "I don't want to be a spectacle. I just want to be left alone. I feel so tired…"

Taj watched her for a minute, waiting for her to speak again, but when he heard a light snore, he smiled. He rarely had patients that fell asleep on him. He woke her up, "Arnella there is a room down the hall where you can sleep."

Arnella nodded dizzily. "Okay." He walked her to it and she fell on the bed. Soon she was off again. Taj told the nurses not to disturb her until evening.

Arnella woke up groggily to the ringing of her cell phone. At first, she had no idea where she was, and then she realized that she was still at the Psych Center. She looked on the call display. It was Tracy.

"Where are you, Nella? I heard the strangest news from David that you attacked him in class yesterday. Is it true?"