Asylum (13 page)

“How’s it going?” Yi asked, drumming his fingers on his pastel-blue tray.

“You know, the usual. Studying. Classes.”
Threatening notes, psychos.
“Yourself?”

“So amazing.” Yi pulled a slip of paper out of his cargo pants and handed it to Dan.
Oh God, did Yi get a strange note, too?
But when he unfolded it, Dan saw it was only a printed-out dating profile for someone with the screen name Chloe_Chloe13. She liked skiing and
Amélie
.

“I’m studying abroad on a scholarship in the fall. Conservatory in Paris …” Dan handed the paper back and watched Yi smiling dreamily down at it. “Just a few more months and I’ll be swimming in hot, foreign women.”

Dan coughed.

“Yeeaaaah, I could have phrased that better.” Yi put Chloe_Chloe13 back in his pocket. The line moved forward. “How’s things on the Abby front?”

“Hm?” They sidled up to the buffet. Dan slopped macaroni onto his warm plate. “How did you … ?”

“Jordan mentioned a date or something. How’d it go?” Surprisingly, Yi bypassed the mac and cheese and went for the vegan offering, something with lentils and unidentifiable chunks of vegetable matter.

“Things with Abby are good!” Dan managed to croak. Honestly, he didn’t know what to think, considering how Abby had been this morning. “And I guess it was a date. We just got dinner at Brewster’s, hung out.… It was a nice time.” Dan dug the big metal ladle into the macaroni again, preparing to take another serving.

“Bullshit. You get any?”

Dan dropped the spoon, and it clattered against the edge of the buffet. He caught it, but not before splattering himself with globs of cheese product. “Crap, that’s hot!” He half elbowed, half bumped the spoon back into the tray and tried to brush the neon-orange cheese off his forearm.

Yi chuckled, moving away from the line. “I’ll take that as a no.”

Swearing, Dan grabbed a dinner roll from the pile and then walked over to their usual table. He dropped into the chair nearest the window, brooding over his steaming plate of food. His time with Abby last night felt private—not something to be discussed casually over the dinner line. Or maybe it was just that he didn’t know how things stood, and he didn’t want to jinx them by bragging. He rubbed at the splotchy red marks on his skin. They were still smarting.

“Hey.”

It was Abby. Her hair was in a damp tangle and her eyes were red. She set her tray on the table and sat down slowly, as if moving through water.

“Hey,” Dan said, forgetting his burn.

“Can I sit? I mean, I
am
sitting already but …” She looked down into her soup, sighing. “Do you mind?”

“No, by all means,” Dan said. “I was hoping you’d turn up.”

“Yeah?” Smiling, Abby put her elbows onto the table. “Thanks. I was … I was pretty horrible at breakfast. But I have a good excuse, I promise. I wouldn’t just … I wouldn’t just
be
like that.”

“It’s okay if you were,” he replied. “We all have rotten days.” He nodded to the window behind them, where the rain fell in noisy sheets against the glass. “See? The weather’s feeling like crap, too.”

“No, I like the rain. It’s relaxing. Refreshing.” She gazed out the window. Puddles were forming in the low dips of the grass and along the pathways, and the mist was swirling so that the rain and fog couldn’t be teased apart. “I needed a bit of rain.”

Dan smiled. Already she was making him feel better. He decided he’d wait for Jordan to get there before mentioning the note, so he and Abby more or less ate in comfortable silence until Jordan stumbled into the dining hall. After a quick breeze through the food line, he sat down with just a cup of piping-hot coffee and a slice of Boston cream pie. He didn’t even say hello. Rain and the steam from the coffee fogged his glasses.

But Dan couldn’t wait any longer. “I got a note,” he blurted, startling Abby and Jordan. He reached into his back pocket and took out the card, dropping it onto the table between them. Jordan picked it up. “ߢHow do you kill a Hydra?’ What the hell?”

“Turn it over.”

Jordan read the back, his face a mixture of confusion and distaste.

“What is this? Where did it come from?” Jordan pushed the card away with a grimace, and Abby grabbed it.

“It was on my desk when I got back from class. Felix didn’t see who left it, but someone managed to get into the room even though I’m sure I locked the door. You guys didn’t get anything like this?”

They both shook their heads. Dan was dismayed. He hadn’t realized how much he was counting on this being a bad joke. Rubbing his temples, he said, “I think it could be from Joe. I don’t know who else would leave something like this, or even be able to get into the room. But I was sure he’d have left them for you guys, too.” Dan pushed his macaroni into a little hill. “I don’t like feeling singled out.”

“So what are you going to do?” Abby asked, giving the card back to him.

Dan shrugged. He knew it would be impossible to explain to anyone else why this bothered him so much. He wasn’t even sure he fully understood it himself.

“Just ignore it,” Jordan said. “Joe’s trying to rile you up, that’s all. That’s what bullies do. Trust me, I know. It’s better if you let it slide off your back.”

They were silent for a moment. Then Abby said, “There’s something else. Your note … It’s important and all, but I wanted to tell you both something, too. It’s what I was going to bring up at breakfast, before I got so … well, mad.”

She paused. “I’m not quite sure how to say this,” she said, twisting her hands around each other. “So I’ll just go for simple. Simple is probably best, if anything about this
is
simple.”

As she talked, Dan noticed that her entire demeanor changed. Her shoulders sagged, and the light went out of her eyes.

She took a deep breath. “My aunt. My father’s sister. She was a patient here.”

There was silence. Dan and Jordan looked at each other.

“Um … how do you know?” asked Dan.

“Here, look what I found last night.” Abby pulled an index card out from her raincoat. It was from the card catalog in the warden’s office and looked just like the one for Dennis Heimline. So Abby had taken something, too.

Hands shaking, Abby turned the card around so that both Jordan and Dan could read it. There were just four lines, typed.

Valdez, Lucy Abigail.

DOB: 7.15.1960

DOA: 2.12.1968

IMPROVED: N

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

.....................................................................

CHAPTER

N
o
 16 

F
or a moment Dan didn’t understand. The words didn’t make any sense. Then they slowly came into focus.

Lucy
.
Abigail
.
Valdez
.

Abby Valdez.

“It’s a common-enough last name,” Dan said at last, stammering a little. “Right?” He looked up into Abby’s wide eyes.
“Right?”

She shook her head, pressing her lips tightly together. “That’s my aunt. Aunt Lucy. I was named after her.”

“Come on, Abby,” Jordan said. “That’s not your aunt, that’s just not possible.”

Dan sat back, silent, waiting for a reasonable explanation. If one existed.

“I’m afraid it
is
possible.” A gust of wind hit the windows, rattling the glass. The rain slapped down on the glass like a shower of pebbles. Abby looked out the window and then back again. She was clearly trying to keep from crying. “My grandparents were really strict on my pops when he was growing up. His sister Lucy never got along with them, from the time she was a little girl. She never listened, she’d talk back, scream, break things, stuff like that. One day there was a huge fight. My pops doesn’t know what it was about, he was only five, but he remembers that Lucy ran out the door and slammed it behind her. That night, he woke up from a nightmare and Lucy wasn’t in her bed. Seven years old, and she was gone. Just …
gone
. My grandparents acted like everything was normal, and when my pops would ask, they’d get really angry and tell him he wasn’t allowed to say her name any more.”

Dan was at a loss. The story lined up, but what were the odds? “Maybe it’s just a coincidence, the name,” he said, not really believing that himself. He just wanted so badly for it to be true.

“A coincidence is you and me both picking pie for dessert,” Jordan said. He gestured to the patient card with his cup. “What
Abby
is suggesting is flat-out strange.”

“What, you don’t believe me?” Abby said. Her voice sounded like she was kidding at first, waiting for Jordan to contradict her. But he didn’t. “That’s it, isn’t it? You don’t believe me.”

“Can you really blame me? I mean, what are the chances you just randomly wind up here for the summer, at the place where your aunt used to be a
mental
patient?” Jordan sat back, arms crossed. “I think there’s something you’re not telling us. Or you’re just not telling us the truth.”

Dan could see Abby’s shoulders beginning to shake as she tried and failed to control her breathing. It was too late to intervene, and he couldn’t think of a damn thing to contribute anyway. Jordan had a point about how impossible the coincidence was, but Abby wasn’t the sort to mess with them for kicks.
Or was she?
a little voice whispered in his mind. How well did he really know her, after all? Her mood in the last twenty-four hours had certainly been unpredictable. He stopped himself. She wouldn’t make a joke out of something like this. She just wouldn’t.

“Fine,” Abby finally said, composing herself. “I wasn’t going to say anything, but I guess we’re a little past this now.”

Dan shared a nervous glance with Jordan.

Abby picked up her fork and dragged it softly across her plate as she began to speak. “When I was little, I used to go through my mom’s clothes looking for hats and skirts and scarves and stuff to play dress up. She and my pops shared dressers, and one time I found this … this box.” She inhaled deeply, then pressed on. “I didn’t know what it was, but when I opened it and saw a bunch of papers, I—I started reading them. They were all letters. From my grandpapa. He was already dead by then, and my pops never talked about him, except to say what a mean man he’d been.… But these letters … Grandpapa just kept apologizing. He kept saying he was sorry for sending his little Lucy away. Away to
that place
.”

“And let me guess, that place was Brookline,” Jordan said coldly. He obviously still wasn’t convinced.

“It had to be,” Abby replied quickly. “There was stuff about how she was dangerous, and how he had sent her away for her own good. And there was more.… Grandpapa kept talking about ‘making a trip to New Hampshire.’ He never mentioned Brookline by name, but …”

“But I can see how you would put two and two together,” Dan finished, trying to show at least a little support.

She nodded. “It all adds up. I mean, listen, I didn’t think it was possible, either. Part of me always assumed I was imagining it, or had completely read them wrong. After that first time, my pops found out I’d read the letters and moved them all. But I never forgot. And when I got the letter about this program, well, I thought the fact that it was in New Hampshire was a sign.”

“A sign of how
ridiculous
this story is,” Jordan protested, sinking down lower in his seat. “I mean what, you just thought you’d come work on your art skills
and
find your long-lost aunt at the same time? Kill two birds with one stone?”

Abby looked horrified.

“Jordan …” Dan warned.

But Jordan barreled right on ahead, gesturing first to Dan and then to Abby. “Let me guess, you guys made this up together, thought you’d have a harmless laugh at my expense. Well, ha ha. Very funny. It’s not working, okay? I am
not
that gullible.”

“Jordan, why would I make something like this up? It’s too sick.…”

Jordan shrugged. “Who knows? Attention? Fun? Take your pick.”

“God, you’re such an asshole sometimes!” She clenched her jaw and looked at Jordan as if she had never really seen him before.

“Let’s all calm down and just think for a minute,” Dan said, hating to see the anger between them. “First of all, Jordan, I have to ask—do you really think I wrote this note to myself? For attention?”

Jordan sighed. “I don’t know anymore, man. You. Abby. I don’t know what’s going on. I feel like you’re trying to make me look stupid. Like the two of you are ganging up on me.”

“Okay, and Abby, do you think there’s
any
chance this could be a different Lucy Valdez?” he asked.

“No,” she replied firmly. “I know it’s her, and I bet there’s more evidence somewhere in the old wing about what they did to her.”

Jordan snorted.

Suddenly Abby slammed her fist down on the table. Both boys jumped in their seats. Dan’s plate rattled, his hill of macaroni crumbling.

“What would it take for you to
trust
me?”

Jordan didn’t say anything.

“I trust you,” Dan said in a placating murmur.

“Uh-huh, Peeta Mellark over here believes you. In other news, rain is wet,” Jordan said. “Color me sur-freaking-prised.” Taking his coffee and pie, he left without another word. The rain and the sounds of the dining hall rose up to fill the silence left by Jordan’s angry departure.

“Are you all right?” Dan asked.

“Would you be?”

“No. No, I guess not.”

“Then there’s your answer.” She took a spoonful of her minestrone. “Ugh. It’s cold.”

Dan scrambled for something helpful to say. All he could think about was how, if Abby could keep such a big secret so well, there might be any number of things she still hadn’t
shared. Not that he was any better. “You know what? About Jordan? I think he’s still upset about the date thing. He’s probably worrying that we can’t be a duo and a trio at the same time, you know?”