Free Position: A combination of straight, pike, and tuck positions used only in twisting dives where multiple positions are required during different parts of a dive.
IF GREEN Hill were capable of generating sound it would be the lowest tone audible by human ears—a warning knell. And its flavor would be ash. Uncle Phil once told me it was an architectural legacy bequeathed to Ellis Hollow by its founders, which must account for the sharp intake of breath I hear from Iris as we pull closer. But awe is nowhere close to the feeling this place gives me.
She sticks her head out the passenger window, rotating at an extreme angle to get a better look at the clock tower whose time is permanently frozen at 6:50. Day or night is anyone’s guess.
Iris jumps out of my truck the second we’re parked to marvel at the imposing stone building. “Look at the portico.”
“The porta-what?”
“The columns supporting that brick overhang.”
“Looks like a giant mousetrap.”
“Not to me. I’m torn between majoring in journalism or architecture,” she explains. “I love to relay people’s stories, but buildings also fascinate me because they tell stories too. Etchings in cement, leaded windows. Victorian-Gothic. They don’t design public structures like this anymore.”
“Don’t get too excited, Iris. It’s still a mental hospital. Once we check in, we might not check out.” I take her hand and lead us up the stairs under the portico.
Heavy medicinal air greets us as soon as we open the heavy wooden doors. I squeeze her fingers involuntarily.
“You really hate needles that much?” She studies my face like one of her cards.
“More. My dad told me all people are born with only two innate fears. Falling and loud sounds. I’m almost positive I was born with three.”
We approach a rail-thin receptionist with skin as transparent as a jellyfish. “I’m Theo Mackey. I’m here to see Dr. Maddox.”
She stares at me blankly for too long before checking the appointment calendar. “Do you happen to know whether we have all your current information on file?” she asks, her tone freakishly robotic. She doesn’t wait for me to answer before handing me a clipboard with shaky hands. “You should probably fill out the intake forms anyway.”
“That’s probably not necessary. I’m not a patient. Dr. Maddox is my uncle.”
“Oh.” Her eyelids flutter, finally flashing a tangible emotion. “I’ll let him know you’re here right away.” She falters, jerking back and forth like a broken windup doll deciding which way she should go. “You can take a seat in the lobby.”
Iris tugs me toward the waiting area. “Does she seem okay to you?”
“They probably have patients work the front desk as part of their therapy.”
“She reminds me of the doppelganger mom from Coraline. The Other Mother.”
“I only saw the movie trailer. But I’ll take your word for it.”
Iris crosses and uncrosses her legs while we wait, swinging her foot as she flips through psychology journals. I can’t stop glancing at her dark hair, or the thick fringe of lashes casting spidery shadows on her cheek as she reads. I swallow nervously and keep my hands on my lap, fingers laced, trying to steady my pulse under the deep nagging feeling that bringing her here may have been selfish.
The receptionist reappears, flitting her eyes around the room like she’s watching a fly that never lands. “Sorry about the wait. An orderly will be here shortly to escort you. Sorry about that.”
“Is it me or is she a nervous wreck?”
“No, I caught it too.”
A minute later a guy the size of a Mack truck enters the lobby. “You Theo?” His baritone voice booms through the chilly reception area.
I stand, facing the twenty something orderly who looks official enough in his green scrubs, despite the tattoos across his knuckles that read GAME OVER. I’d hate to be the patient that pisses him off. One punch and your eyelids would probably read K.O.
“Come with me. Dr. Maddox asked me to put you in room two-twelve.”
We start following him to a door with a wired rectangular window, and he says, “So you’re Sophia’s kid, huh? What was it like growing up around shrinks?” He stops abruptly when he notices Iris walking quietly beside me. “I don’t have clearance for both of you. Snow White’s gonna have to wait in the lobby.”
Iris looks at me, eyes wide.
“I’m not leaving her out there with the creepy mom from Coraline.”
The orderly fixes me with a stare, unsure how to handle his boss’s nephew, so I add, “And since you asked, growing up with shrinks sucked. Do something right, get psychoanalyzed. Do something wrong, it’s your mom’s fault.”
“Hmph. I bet. What’s with the shiner? You mouth off to someone?”
“Springboard diving mishap.”
“An athlete. That makes sense.” He takes a moment to reassess Iris’s threat level. “Did you bring a handbag with you, princess?”
She shakes her head. “I left it in the car.”
“Anything in your pockets?”
As she turns her pockets inside out he gives her the once-over like a creeper. Iris shows him a cherry lip gloss and Life Savers and he flicks her a suggestive grin.
“You look like you could do more good than harm with those, Snow White. Let’s go.”
He swipes a badge that opens the door to the wards.
“Are you drawing my blood today?” I ask. Because this guy looks like he’d crush the needle, and my bones, in his club-like hands.
“Nope. I’m damage control.” The door clicks behind us and locks with a series of beeps.
Iris looks around the hallway like she’s curious where all the doors lead. I know exactly how she feels, even if the checkered linoleum floor, dull yellow cement walls, and curved ceiling aren’t what I saw in my dream state.
“Still glad you came?” I ask, swaying into her.
She nods then leans closer and takes my hand when a patient shuffling toward us starts muttering to herself. The elderly woman stops infront of Iris and tilts her head.
“How you came back?” she asks in a thick European accent. “They say you dead.”
“What are you doing up here?” The troll-like orderly asks her. “That’s the bigger question.” He tries to grab her arm but she jerks away faster than I imagined possible for someone her age.
“I curse you.” She spits at him, waving a crooked finger. “Te ćernol ćo mas pa tu! The flesh shall rot off you.”
The orderly picks up the walkie-talkie on his hip. “Valentina is loose on two again. Come round her up.”
The receiver crackles before a male voice on the other end whines, “You-know-who keeps letting her out. Be right there.”
“I’ve never been here before,” Iris tells the patient kindly. “You must have me confused with someone else.”
“No. It’s you. The gypsy girl. Just like the ones they run from my village. You see things. I know. Leave this place before it’s too late.” The woman shuffles away, murmuring unintelligibly in a foreign language.
“She’s Romanian,” Iris whispers.
“She’s a pain in the ass,” the orderly replies, leading us along.
I watch the way Iris looks at every door with her brow furrowed. She scans left and right then over her shoulder to take in one or two she’s missed along the way, analyzing some bit of information about the rooms.
“If this is the first floor,” she asks openly, “why are all the rooms labeled in the two hundreds?”
“Observant little thing, aren’t you?” The orderly scans Iris in a way I don’t like again. “The floor beneath us is ward one. It’s where Dr. Maddox and his team do research.”
“What kind of research?” Iris asks. “Not on animals, I hope.”
“That depends on your definition of animal.”
Iris scowls disapprovingly.
“See this?” he says, showing Iris the employee access badge attached to a retractable clip. He extends it all the way out for her. “Floors two through seven only. The research lab requires a backstage pass, and I’m no VIP. But maybe your boyfriend here can fill you in on the secret workings of Dr. Maddox.” Iris passes the badge to me and I read his name: Derek Smalls.
A serious misnomer, considering his size.
Derek opens room 212 for us. “I’d say you two lovebirds have ten minutes tops before the nurse shows up. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
Total creeper.
We step inside the empty exam room and Derek closes the door. There’s a phlebotomist’s chair, an examination table, cabinets. Everything you’d expect to find in a physician’s office. Plus a phrenology model, which is straight-up shrink.
Iris slinks through the room opening drawers and cabinets.
“What are you hoping to find?”
“I don’t know,” she says. “This whole place feels like a mystery. It’s so historic. Can’t you feel it?”
“A little. But it’s being overpowered by my desire to leave.”
There’s a soft rap on the door. Universal hospital code for: are you decent?
“Yep,” I say. “Come on in.”
Iris hops onto the examination table and plays with the velcro blood pressure cuff.
A tall nurse with dark hair slicked into a tight bun enters and makes brief eye contact. She gives Iris a quick scan before setting up her tray. “Who’s this?”
“She’s my um…”
“Friend-slash-date-slash-project partner,” Iris explains.
That sums it up, I guess.
The nurse slides translucent amber eyeglasses down her nose, pouting burgundy lips as she considers the predicament that is Iris, sitting cross-legged and doe-eyed on the examination table.
“Bringing a guest isn’t usually allowed. But apparently we’re bending a few rules around here lately.” She flips my chart open. “I see here you’re not a fan of needles.”
“I’m not a fan of a lot of things. Needles are just way up there on the list.”
The nurse puts my chart on the examination table next to Iris and pulls three collection tubes from her pocket.
“My uncle said he only needed one vial.”
“The order says three.”
“What else is he checking if one was for my liver panel?”
“You’d have to ask Dr. Maddox that question,” she says. “I’m not at liberty to say.” She snaps a pair of latex gloves over her hands. “I’ll try to make this quick and painless. You just sit back and let me take care of you, ’kay, darlin’? Straighten your arm and make a fist.”
I suck in a breath. It’s the ’kay, darlin’ that throws me, even more than the needle in her hand. The hint of Southern accent detectable in those two words. I could swear I’ve heard someone say that exact phrase to me with the same Southern regionalism before.
She swabs the inside of my elbow with alcohol and looks at me, really looks at me this time, and her haloed green-hazel eyes take me by surprise. The catlike luminescence is unnatural.
“Are you wearing contacts?” I ask.
She gives me a flimsy smile and ties a rubber tourniquet around my bicep that becomes uncomfortably tight within seconds. “A lady never reveals her secrets. Isn’t that right?” She hastens a glance at Iris.
“It’s true,” Iris agrees, pumping the blood pressure cuff on her own arm. “We’re all about smoke and mirrors.”
“Have we met before?” I ask, watching my largest vein rise to the surface like an eel. “You seem crazy familiar to me. Your accent.”
“I don’t believe so.” The nurse clears her throat and taps my vein. “Relax your hand, darlin,’ so I can insert the needle. If that part bothers you, look away.”
I turn my head when the cold syringe is resting against my skin, ready to break the surface. I meet Iris’s eyes and hold her gaze until—
“It’s just a little pinch,” the nurse says.
My seat turns cold as metal when the needle slips into my vein.
Just a little pinch—
* * *
“It’s okay. You’re safe.”
I didn’t know who or what I was safe from until my butt plunked down on a slab of freezing metal and I punched away the blankets. A woman dressed in official blue was leaning away to avoid being struck. When I stopped swinging she helped me rewrap the blank around my shoulders.
I looked past her and saw a burly fireman jogging away in the snow. He must have been the one who carried me outside. I stared at the neon-yellow stripes stretching across the back of his canvas coat as he rushed back toward our house.
The woman in blue turned my chin to look me in the eyes. And for a minute, it felt like we were alone inside a snow globe. “You’re okay,” she said. “There’s been a fire. I need to take a listen to your lungs, ’kay?” She had traces of a Southern accent and spoke slowly.
She pulled out a stethoscope while I stared at her smooth, brown skin. “Are you a nurse?”
“I’m a paramedic. But I’m gonna be a nurse real soon.” She listened to my chest as I watched flames rise behind her on the hill. Shooting out of the windows, licking the yellow siding, threatening to swallow our house whole. A dozen firefighters were working on putting out the fire with powerful sprays of water extending from mile-long hoses being dragged through the snow. But even I could tell they were fighting a losing battle. I gaped at the blaze, mesmerized, until a blast of heat reached us on a gust of wind and snapped me to attention.
Cameras flashed behind me. I turned my head to see a few news camera crews.
“I don’t want my picture taken,” I shouted. “Where are my parents?”
“I don’t know,” the paramedic answered. “Just sit back and let me take care of you, ’kay, darlin’?” She gave me a forced smile and clamped a tiny machine on my index finger. A blue light began blinking on the top, reading something I didn’t care about. All I wanted to know was that my parents were safe.
I stretched my neck to look over her shoulder, my heart beating fast.
“I’m a little dizzy.”
The paramedic pulled a purple juice box from a cooler and unwrapped the straw. “Drink this.” She nudged the drink box toward me, her eyes stern. “Otherwise I have to put it in your arm. Doctor’s orders.” She pointed to a plastic pouch hanging in the truck, filled with clear liquid. I was about to take a sip of juice when I saw Uncle Phil marching toward us.
I ripped the little machine off my finger and dashed forward, throwing the juice box on the ground.
“Where are my parents?” I tried to dash around Uncle Phil, but he held me back by the arm. “Where’s Mom?”
“I don’t know. They’ll find them.”
“Mom!” I yelled for her but my voice cracked and I coughed up a lung. I tried to jerk out of his grasp. “Let me go! I’ll find her myself. This is all my fault.”
“Do it,” Uncle Phil hissed.
But he never let me go. He wasn’t giving permission to me.
I turned my head as the paramedic said, “It’s just a little pinch,” piercing the skin on my upper arm with a needle.
I winced. “What was that?”
She hurried away without answering as a warm tingle spread over me from limb to limb. Her form shrinking as my eyes grew heavier and I swayed on my feet. Someone picked me up and I relaxed my head on their shoulder.
“I’m too big to be carried.”
“Take it easy, son.”
“Dad?” I whispered.
“That’s right. Get some rest. Everything is going to be fine.”
* * *
“YOU DOING okay?” The nurse’s voice jolts me back to the present.
We have met before. She’s the paramedic who was working the night of the fire. Same brown skin, same vocal distinctions. My fear of needles isn’t so irrational after all. I blink my overly dry eyes and I replay her words. “You just sit back and let me take care of you, ’kay, darlin’?” Uncle Phil hissed “Do it” to her, not me. And she injected me with something that made me sleepy. I stare at the nurse and imagine her less refined, dressed in navy blue, without the colored contacts that hide her brown eyes. Her hair is pulled back, same as that night. Only this time, she’s missing an earring, and the one still in place is a diamond stud in the shape of a triangle, just like Mom’s.
What the—
My throat tightens. “Were you at my Uncle Phil’s house last Saturday?”
She nods. “I was dropping off a few things.”
Taking a few things, too, I think.
I stop myself from demanding why she’s wearing my mom’s earring by fixating on the syringe in my arm. I freaking knew it was weird to see her at his house more than once. He lied. The cleaning crew at Uncle Phil’s didn’t miss vacuuming the earring up. He gave them to her. Unless she stole them. Mom was always leaving stuff there.
She twists the first collection tube loose and rocks the dark blood back and forth to incorporate the contents before placing it on a metal rolling cart for safekeeping. I tense, averting my eyes, as she inserts the second tube. My pulse is racing, causing my blood to gush into the tube faster.
“Relax.” Her voice is smooth as coffee with cream.
There something else about her, scratching at the deepest recesses of my mind. I look for an access badge similar to the one Derek the orderly was wearing. There isn’t one, at least not visible. I adjust my position on the hard seat and duck my head, but she doesn’t catch my eye again.
I try a different tack. “I just realized I didn’t introduce you to my new friend-slash-date-slash-project partner. Must be the needle. Or the loss of blood. This is Iris.”
“Nice to meet you, Iris,” she says politely but keeps her eyes on task.
I clench my jaw to keep from scowling. “So, how long have you been working here with Uncle Phil?”
“A few years.”
“So what’s that, three? Four?”
“Mm-hmm.” She rubs my arm with her free hand. “Try not to clench your fist. We’re almost done.”
Most professionals would have introduced themselves. Not that we bothered to ask the orderly when he escorted us to the room, but we saw it on his badge.
I take a deep breath in through my nose and watch her twist out the second tube. “Where did you work before Green Hill? Have you always been a nurse?”
“No. I had a few jobs before this.” She pulls out the second tube and inserts the third. “What about you? Do you have a part-time job after school?”
“My schedule doesn’t leave much time for anything but—”I stiffen and clench my fist again “—I springboard diving.”
Holy shit.
I didn’t recognize her from the team photo because we didn’t meet the night of the fire. Not officially. Why the hell would we while the house was burning down? My blood starts gushing into the tube. What the hell does this nurse, this paramedic-slash-springboard-diver, have to do with my mom?
“Dr. Maddox mentioned you were a diver,” she says. “The team captain. Relax your arm. Last one.”
Sweat leaches from my pores as I assess her build: broad shoulders, muscular arms, small waist. A body built by hours of training. She releases the tourniquet on my arm in one swift move, allowing blood to rush back to my brain.
“It didn’t go so well for me at practice today,” I tell her. “Sometimes the pool likes to give you a slap to remind you of your place in the universe. Know what I mean?”
“Sometimes the universe likes to give you a slap without a pool,” she says. “Luckily, small surface wounds heal easily.”
She removes the last tube and places a wad of gauze over the needle before sliding it from my arm. She adheres a strip of surgical tape over a folded square of gauze and drops the last collection tube in her pocket.
“All done. Bend your elbow. That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
“Not at all. I’ll make sure to tell my uncle what a great job you did. What did you say your name was?”
Her face folds into an expressionless mask. “L … anne.”
“L’anne,” Iris says. “That’s different. Is it an old family name? French? You’ve got a little bit of a Creole accent.”
“It’s Anne. Just Anne,” she says, correcting herself. “My family moved here from New Orleans when I was in grade school.” She peels off her latex gloves, then grabs my chart on her way to the door. “Dr. Maddox wants to see you before you leave. I’ll send Derek to escort you and get you something to drink while you wait. Doctor’s orders.”
I reel from the increasing similarities and go for a final test. “Do you have any juice boxes?” I ask. “Another nurse gave me a purple juice box once. Before she stuck me with a needle, though not after.”
She stops dead in her tracks, hand resting on the door handle. I take the opportunity to pull out Mom’s earring.
“Oh hey, did you drop this?”
She turns and I hold up the diamond stud. The pause in her expression and movements is undeniable when she sees the earring. She turns slowly to face me and the mask is off.
I hold up the diamond stud. “Is this yours?”
“I’ve been wondering where that went to.” She tugs her earlobe. “Funny. I haven’t been in this room for weeks.”
“Sometimes missing things pop up when you least expect it.”
“That’s true,” she says. “But I should probably be more careful. Stay put while I go hunt down Derek and that juice box.”