moved again—this time to Ohio. Part of the reason I’d changed my name. So I could start fresh as an adult. Enter college as someone new. The gift of being a person with no history.
The twenty-year anniversary was less than two months away. Would there be more media coverage, regardless of whether they tracked me down? Was it still of public interest, all these years later?
“Have a good day, Olivia,” the clerk said, pulling my attention. My ID was in his outstretched hand. I slid it back into my wallet, then peered over my shoulder again, but the man was gone.
“Thanks,” I said to the clerk, keeping my head down as I strode for the automatic-exit doors.
He was there. Outside, waiting. Leaning against a blue car parked next to mine. Unwrapping, on the hood of his car, a breakfast sandwich that didn’t seem like it had come from the store. “Hey,” he said, all nonchalant, taking a bite. Taking his time.
The lot was otherwise empty. I unlocked the door, but kept the keys in my hand, an old instinct rising.
He chewed and swallowed, pointing his sandwich at me. “I know you,” he said.
“Don’t think so,” I said. He had the air of a journalist, if not the look. Not the clothes and not the car, from what I was accustomed to. But the way of casually lingering, pretending he hadn’t been waiting just for me.
“Olivia, right?”
I was already shutting the driver’s-side door. Mentally working through the moves to escape, tallying the seconds to get away. The time to start my car and accelerate out of the lot versus the time it would take him to do the same—and follow. I didn’t second-guess myself. I’d been born with a healthy dose of self-preservation, and I’d learned to trust my gut.
In my rush to leave, I didn’t give him another glance. Couldn’t say what he looked like if asked, other than: guy, white, average height and build. Perhaps he’d known my name to start, or perhaps he’d just overheard the clerk inside.
Whatever he was after, I didn’t have to speak—I knew that by now.
But how easily he could topple everything I’d built. The comfort of anonymity. All that I’d run from in Widow Hills. Here, the scars just scars—surgery after an accident, I always said, and that wasn’t a lie. My name was my legal name now. I stuck to the truth: Moved here from Ohio for college; fell out of touch with my family; came into some money when I was younger.
None of these things were lies.
People tended to fill in the blanks however they wanted. It was not my job to correct them.
TRANSCRIPT FROM LIVE INTERVIEW
OCTOBER 18, 2000
Yes, I found her on my porch once. I worked the six a.m. shift that day, had to leave just after five. My dog was barking, and it was still dark when I opened the door, but there she was. I remember I said, “Honey? Is your mom okay?” Because I couldn’t remember her name.
She turned around and walked back home. I didn’t realize she was sleeping.
I wish I’d told someone, but I didn’t know.
STUART GOSS
Resident of Widow Hills
CHAPTER 4
Friday, 8 a.m.
THERE WERE MANY BENEFITS to working in a hospital, in theory. Access to doctors and nurses, a behind-the-scenes look at how things worked, personal connections to book an appointment last-minute.
But what you gained in accessibility, you lost in privacy. Since I’d been with Central Valley Hospital, I visited doctors less, not more. The times I’d been sick, I’d stopped at the Minute Clinic instead. The doctors and nurses were people I saw every day. And I’d have to give a medical history, a personal history. I shuddered at the possibility of old details somehow making it into their system. Where they might notice that my arm had to be reconstructed and then fixed again as I grew, that there was a lack of full mobility due to the buildup of scar tissue around my shoulder. Where they might wonder why.
After the story ended, after the fade to black, these were the things that didn’t fit onto their carefully constructed page: the trauma of surgeries; the long process of recovery; the questions from the curious; the feeling of always, always being watched.
All I needed was a sleeping aid, possibly, to keep me in deep sleep. An easy remedy. Harmless.
The entrance to the hospital looked like a rich but rustic hotel, with log-cabin beams crisscrossing the walkway to the entrance. In the front, there