faded Playboy Bunny tattoo, and along her forearms, needles secured with gauze-colored tape. A breathing machine pumped, slow and predictable. Audrey swallowed, patted her thighs.
“Momma,” she said.
She took Betty’s hand. It weighed heavy. The sockets of her eyes were hollowed out and skeletal.
Betty Lucas, a madwoman, who’d spray-painted trailers, set her own shit on fire in front of a bar to piss off the patrons, and yes, once tossed all of Audrey’s belongings into the street because she’d been so ungrateful as to complain that she had nothing to wear.
But it hadn’t been all bad, had it? No. She never let herself admit this—it was too painful, but it hadn’t been all bad. It was no coincidence that, growing up, not a single stranger had ever laid a hand on Audrey. Like a heat-seeking missile, every place they’d lived until Hinton, Betty had befriended the most large-hearted neighbor. In her absence, that neighbor had kept Audrey safe from harm. At night, they’d almost always shared a bed. Betty’s arms had always banished the nightmares, even if she did squeeze too tight. Betty had taught her to draw and read, too. Two skills that had proven very handy.
And here was the other thing. The big thing that she had pushed so squarely to the back of her mind that she’d forgotten it. She’d been lonely at the University of Nebraska. Two separate roommates had kicked her out. At night she’d sat inside her small studio and listened to the kids playing their games in the halls. Sometimes, she’d come out, pretending to need to take a shower, hoping they’d invite her to watch television or take a swing at beer pong. Instead, they got quiet and waited until she was gone. Weird Audrey Lucas, who reported them to RAs for talking after quiet hours and wore flip-flops and panties in the shower. Her wrists were scarred like damaged goods. Before Betty came back into her life, she’d been on the verge of dropping out. Without that Russell Stover cherry candy appearance her senior year, she would have done it.
She sat down in the fold-out chair and watched her mother. An hour passed, then two. Saraub got coffee, then came back, then got lunch, then came back. Nurses shuffled in and out, shouting baby talk to the slumbering women, as if to show they cared, they really did: “Time for your penicillin, sweeties!”
The day passed and visiting hours ended. She kissed Betty’s cheek and rested her head in the crook of her bony shoulder. Betty Lucas, hometown beauty. Talented artist. Saucy heartbreaker. Mother. Psychotic.
And now she knew the answer to the question she’d been asking for the better part of three decades. It wasn’t her mother she hated. It was the disease. That fucking disease had cheated them both.
21
Where Do They Go When The Light Leaves Their Eyes?
Betty’s old room was in Ward C4. After Audrey collected herself, they headed there. The scenery was familiar, only more depressing. Apparently, recessions hit hospitals, too. Over the last four years, the white walls had turned dingy gray. Instead of clean Lysol, the entire wing smelled like cream of corn.
While Betty got adjusted to hospital life, Audrey had visited once a week. They used to watch television in the community room, which had been tuned to soothing programs like Golden Girls and Seinfeld. “Why can’t they just shut up about their stupid problems?” Betty would ask while dipping an IHOP buttermilk biscuit into packaged margarine. “I want to watch cowboy movies, Lamb.”
Saraub flipped through the document Burckhardt had given him as they walked. “I read this over. It’s fine, but it says you won’t sue them for wrongdoing. The thing is—how did she get all those pills? And by the way, what kind of doctor uses the word ‘zombie’?”
The corridor was long. At least a thousand feet. They were halfway down, and the only window was at the far end. It was quiet in Ward C. Nobody was screaming they were Marie Antoinette, or fleeing from their rooms because big black spiders were chasing them. She peeped inside the doors that were open and saw something even more disturbing: patients sitting quietly. Perfect-posture erect, gazing at nothing. Wearing open-backed hospital gowns, street clothes, jeans, and frumpy dresses. It didn’t matter how they looked, they each acted the same way. They stared at the gray walls ahead of them with dead eyes. Biding their time until the inevitable big black.