“What the hell are you doing?” asks the cabbie, surely wishing he had run me over at this point.
“There’s something on me!” I shout.
He flips the overhead light on. I immediately see it and scream my head off. It’s a cockroach… except it’s not on me.
It’s in me.
The thing is crawling under my skin, the ghastly shape unmistakable – legs, body, antennae – marching up toward my elbow. I keep striking myself, beating my arm.
Then I see another roach and another after that, forcing their way beneath my flesh. And what I can’t see, I feel. In my legs, my stomach, my face. The cockroaches are everywhere!
I’m thrashing in the backseat, my arms flailing. I have to get out of this taxi! But as I reach for the door, the locks snap down. At least I think that’s what just happened. I pull in vain on the handle. I’m trapped.
“UNLOCK THE DOOR!” I yell at the cabbie, but he doesn’t. Maybe because I’ve succeeded in scaring the hell out of him.
Up ahead, I see the brick wall of a building getting close in a hurry. It’s a dead end in the worst sense of the word.
I can’t bear to look at this. I close my eyes and cover my face with my arm.
Then WHACK! BAM! CRASH! As though my life is a cartoon.
Everything goes black.
Chapter 66
“WHAT’S THE NAME of this hospital?” I ask the thirty-something doctor as he looks up from the clipboard in his lap.
“Our Lady of Hope,” he answers.
“And how did I get here again?”
“A cabdriver dropped you off. He said you started screaming in his backseat so he slammed on the brakes. That’s when you hit your head on the divider. Apparently, it knocked you out.”
Dr. Curley, as his name tag reads, squints at my hairline. “Now, are you sure I can’t get you some more ice for that nasty bump?” he asks.
“No,” I say. “I’m okay.”
But I’m clearly not, and he knows it. The nurses and doctors in the emergency room were quick to grasp it too. All it took was five minutes of my rambling on about bizarre photographs, devils, a recurring dream, the Ponytail, and subdermal cockroaches before the consensus concern for my head officially had nothing to do with the nasty bump on it.
Kristin, say hello to Dr. Curley – our staff psychiatrist here at the hospital.
I’m sitting across from him in a small office near the waiting room. There’s no desk, no pictures on the wall, no phone – just two folding chairs. Cozy.
“You think I’m crazy, don’t you?” I ask.
Dr. Curley, a warm and fuzzy type with a mop of longish blond hair, taps his pen a few times on his clipboard before shrugging. “Do you think you’re crazy?”
“I must be if they called you down here to see me. Don’t you think so?”
“Don’t read too much into that.” He leans in as if sharing a secret. “Between you and me, the hospital is usually just trying to get their money’s worth from having a shrink on staff. And they like to protect their butts.”
“Though I suppose I can’t blame them in my case,” I say.
He glances down at the notes he’s been taking. He certainly seems nicer than my ex-therapist, Dr. Corey, and from what I can tell, he doesn’t smoke a ridiculous pipe.
“Well, you’ve definitely had an eventful week,” he says, looking up again with a reassuring smile. “I’d like to try something if you don’t mind. Won’t take long, I promise.”
I listen to him explain his “simple exercise.” All I have to do is fill in the blank.
“For example,” he says, “I consider myself a blank person. And you would answer…?”
Nothing.
I sit there like a lump. “It sure would be easier if this were multiple choice,” I say, stalling, trying to figure out what the game is here and if I really want to play.
He chuckles. “I suppose you’re right. Just remember there are no wrong answers, so don’t overthink it. All I ask is that you be as honest with your answers as possible.”
“Because there are no wrong answers,” I say.
“That’s right.”
He repeats the sentence for me. I consider myself a…
“Decent person,” I answer.
“See? Nothing to it. Okay, next one,” he says, picking up the pace. “The world is getting moreblank. ”
“Dangerous,” I say. No indecision about that one.
“I think most people are…”
“Lonely.”
“When I’m under stress I like to…”
“Work in my darkroom.”
“If I could change one thing about myself it would be…”
“My career. I mean, I’d like to be more successful at it. I’m a photographer.”
“The last person I got upset at was…”
“Myself.”
“The most important person in my life is…”
Without thinking, I open my mouth to answer “Michael.” I barely catch myself. I can’t tell him that!
“What’s wrong?” asks Dr. Curley.
“Uh, nothing,” I say, shifting in my seat. “I had to think about it for a second. The most important person in my life is Connie, my best friend.”
He nods. He’s been nodding all along, only this one is a little different, slower. Does he know I’m lying? Of course he does. The guy’s no dummy.
“Okay, last two,” he says. “I had a blank childhood.”
I hesitate before answering. “Difficult.”
“And last, the thing I’m most afraid of is…”
That’s easy. “Dying.”
Chapter 67
I WATCH AS Dr. Curley makes a few more quick notes, his pen gliding back and forth across his notepad. Given my lack of sleep, the effect is like the swinging pocket watch of a hypnotist. I can barely keep my eyes open. But I do not want the dream to come again!
“Still with me, Kristin?”
I snap to. The pen’s down, and he’s staring at me. “Yes. Sorry about that,” I say.
“Quite all right. No problem.”
“So, did I pass?”
“Like I said, there are no wrong answers. No trick ones either. But I do appreciate your honesty.”
“What now?” I ask. Speaking of honesty.
He adjusts his wire-rimmed glasses. “Here’s what I’m thinking,” he begins. “It’s getting late, you’re miles from home, you’ve suffered a minor concussion, and you’re clearly exhausted. How would you feel about spending the night here at the hospital?”
When you put it that way…
The thought of not having to make the trip back to Manhattan immediately appeals to me so much. So does the prospect of – at long last – a good night’s sleep. Who knows? Maybe being in a hospital will stave off that damn dream, the burning smell, the bug thing.
“Sure, why not?” I say.
Dr. Curley tells me to “hang out and relax” for a moment, as he needs to clear it with another doctor. He leaves, closing the door behind him.
I sit and wait. I’m getting a little bit antsy now. And paranoid? Of course.
A few minutes go by, followed by a few more. I’m hanging out, but I’m definitely not relaxing. Where is he? C’mon, c’mon. I’m clearly exhausted, remember?
I get up from the chair and walk to the door, opening it just enough to poke my head out. Sure enough, I spot Dr. Curley down the hall, talking on his cell phone. He’s standing with another man, who I assume is the doctor he mentioned. But I can’t quite see him thanks to Curley’s bushy blond hair.
Then Dr. Curley shifts his feet, and I manage to catch a glimpse of the other doctor’s face. I immediately do a double take, and my heart does a little flip-flop. Make that a big flip-flop.
I know him!
Or at least I used to.
Before he was murdered in my hometown of Concord, Massachusetts.
Chapter 68
THIS IS A MONSTER CLUE in the ongoing mystery called “my life of late.” It has to be.
I whip my head back from the hallway, quickly shutting the door. I’m alone in the room and desperately want to keep it that way.