Blood and Bone(70)

“You were so small and so obstinate.” She lifts her face, revealing a grin. “I suppose that’s the reason you are still alive, though, isn’t it?”

I shake my head. “I don’t know.”

“This was your sister, Jane. She was so sweet and calm. She was the girl every parent thought their child should be.”

It’s like being punched in the guts. She is my twin. We are identical, even the eyes.

“You were so spicy. I always called you sugar and spice; she was the sugar, and you were the spice.” Her eyes are fixated on the pictures of the small girls with brown hair and blue eyes and peacoats like Paddington Bear. A tear rolls down her wrinkled cheek. It’s slow and lonely, the only one she sheds.

“Where is she?”

Her face lifts. “Oh, my poor darling. She’s dead. She died in the car accident. The one you nearly died in too.”

“Three years ago?”

She shakes her head. “No, some time now.” She narrows her gaze, thinking. “It’s been seventeen years.”

“What!”

She nods slowly, still lost in the movie she’s so obviously watching in her head. It starts as a picture but grows into a moment with each photo. “It’s why they wanted you.”

“The government, you mean?”

“Yes.” Her tone sinks. “They wanted to test memory stimulation on you, and then they wanted to use you as a candidate for something else. Derek hasn’t explained it to me well. I don’t like hearing about it.” She adjusts herself in the chair, trying to get more comfortable, maybe. “You and your sister were best friends. What was that song you girls always sang again?” I shake my head but she nods. “You know it. The one about the bullets are made of blood.”

I scowl, wondering how she could know about a song I was given by a doctor. Did I tell her about the song? Is this a trick? “I don’t recall it.” I lie, but I don’t know why. She doesn’t scare me, but her knowing the song does.

The butler brings in the tea, offering me a cup with a drop of cream first and finishing with lemon, just the way I like it. “Thank you.” I take it, inhaling a deep gulp of the aroma and then the tea. It’s the perfect temperature to drink. The smell and the taste attempt to bring a vision, but it flickers like a radio not quite on the station. The words are lost in the fizz. I sip again, noticing the way my grandmother takes her mug, placing it down without drinking any and leaning back a bit. She smiles at me. “Biscuit, my love?”

I blink three times, and suddenly it’s there. I feel as if I’ve sat in a field and a cloud has landed atop me, blocking me in its bright fluff. My eyes don’t see and my ears don’t hear, but there are sounds and movements. They’re inside me, dancing in my head and making me believe I see them.

I squeeze my hands, to grip the cup, but it’s not there, none of it’s there.

“Where did you hide the monsters, Sam?” The question whispers in my ear.

The answer is there. I know this question, even if it is coming from a place I don’t recognize.

“Where did the monsters go?”

Black images flash in my eyes, jerking and moving quickly, like a lightning strike. One second it’s there in my eyes and then it’s gone, but the flash remains in my view.

My lips part. I don’t know what to say but I speak anyway. “The monster was gone, and I went to look—to look—to look—to look.” I am stuck there. Hot tears trickle down my cheeks. “I only wanted to look. But the pretties were gone. He took them so I followed.” The words are a whisper. “I can’t say the rest aloud or the monster will hear and he will strike all he sees. Sometimes I think he strikes even the pretties who aren’t there anymore. He speaks and shouts like they’re in the room with us, like they made him do it, but I don’t see them. They hide from me.” The world becomes a blend of shapes and colors, but my eyes won’t let me see. “I went to look and he was gone so I followed.”

“Where did you follow the pretties, Sam?”

I shake my head, swearing I feel the sting of a lash against my skin. It makes me jerk, my back straightening harshly.

“If you tell us we will let you see them again.”

I want that. I do. “I rode my bike to the water—the lake. It took me all day. I was hot and dusty. He was gone, on the boat with the pretties. But they were different.” I shake my head, forcing the image of the blue wrapping from my mind. “They were different and then they were gone, to swim without me in the blue.”

“The blue water, Sam? Were they like mermaids?”