for a long time, neither of us speaking. A long time later, he whispers, “Remember what I said about seven a.m.” He touches my face with one hand and opens the door with the other. Darkness swallows him as he steps into the hall.
“Bowen, wait,” I whisper. He stops and looks at me. “I love you.” I’m glad for the dark that hides my flaming cheeks.
Bowen stands perfectly still for a drawn-out minute and then he steps up to me, cradles the back of my head in his hand, and presses his mouth to mine. Without a word, he releases me and strides into the hall’s darkness.
Chapter 25
I sleep until the sun rises, heating the hotel room like an oven. With the gun in my lap, I sit on the bed, eager to run away with Bowen, watching the seconds tick away on his watch. I bring it to my nose and inhale. The band holds his scent.
When the watch shows twelve o’clock, I’m too restless to continue sitting. I go into the bathroom and sort through the old suitcases, putting things we might find useful—fingernail clippers, mouthwash, concealer, panties, and oversize T-shirts—into one pile, and the things we won’t need—other makeup, lingerie, dresses, and high heels—in another. At the bottom of the suitcase I find a news magazine dated the year I turned thirteen—four years ago. I take it and the pile of useful supplies into the bedroom and drop them on the mattress, then lean against the headboard and open the magazine. The headlines make my head spin.
“New Bee-Antivenin Vaccine Discovered to Trigger Violent Behavior in Recipients.”
“The Price of Life May Be Death.”
“Cities Urged to Take Individual Government Control—White House Can No Longer Offer National Protection.”
“Roving Gangs Taking to Streets, Preying on Women.”
“Pediatrician-Induced Coma in Nine-Year-Old After Parental Consent. ‘Anything to Stop Our Daughter from Attacking Us.’”
Reading the headlines, a fog seems to lift from my brain. I can remember hearing things like this, remember screaming at my mom that the vaccine wasn’t making me violent. I wasn’t going to start attacking people.
Lis sat behind me, humming, her back against my headboard, and ran the hairbrush through my long hair. Since I wasn’t feeling well she’d skipped her nursing classes and had been sitting with me all afternoon while Mom took Jonah to the doctor’s again.
“Do you want me to braid it?” Lis asked, gathering my hair at the nape of my neck. Before I could answer, Mom walked into my room, arms crossed over her chest, sting-proof netting still pinned in her hair like a bridal veil. At least she’d remembered to take it off her face when she came inside this time.
“How is Jonah?” Lis asked before Mom could say a word. “Where is Jonah?”
Mom’s lips thinned and she studied the carpet. I leaned away from Lis and shivered—not because Jonah had gone to the doctor again; he’d been going on a weekly basis for the last two months—but because I was freezing on the outside while a fever burned hot inside of me, making my blood pulse through my body at an alarming rate.
“What did the doctor say?” Lis asked, dropping my hair around my shoulders before climbing from the bed to stand beside Mom. I buried my hands in the quilt’s folds so Mom couldn’t see the veins bulging beneath my skin.
“The doctor put Jonah in a straightjacket. That way he can’t keep pulling out the morphine drip.” Tears pooled in the corners of Mom’s eyes and trickled out. Lis put her arms around Mom and spoke quietly in her ear.
Heat filled me. Sweat broke out on the bridge of my nose, and my blood vessels began aching with my pulse. I pushed my quilt off and swiped my hand over my forehead. “I don’t see why you still give him morphine. It doesn’t help anymore,” I blurted, glaring at Mom.
Mom nodded and her bottom lip quivered. “I know. The doctor said there’s another alternative.” She sniffled and wiped her nose on the back of her hand, and for some reason that made me even hotter.
I clenched and released my jaw, poked my tongue in the hole where I’d lost my last baby molar. “What alternative?” I asked, fanning my face with the corner of the quilt.
“A medically induced coma. It might buy him some time while they try to find a cure.” Mom looked up, right into my eyes, and I felt like I might throw up. Her tears were gone, replaced with