"No," I said. "It's dye."
"Oh," he said. "They made you dye yourself?"
"It's in the clothes," I said.
"I see," he said. Then he made an appointment for me with the In-clinic psychiatrist, who had experience with people who'd been snatched by cults. My mother would have to be at those appointments as well.
Which was how I found out what Lucerne was telling them. We'd been grabbe
d off the street while in SolarSpace doing some boutique shopping, but she couldn't say exactly where we'd been taken because she'd never been allowed to know. She said it wasn't the fault of the cult itself -- it was one of the male members who'd been obsessed with her and wanted her for his personal sex slave, and had taken away her shoes to keep her captive. This was supposed to be Zeb, though she said she didn't know his name. I'd been too young to realize what was going on, she said, but I'd been a hostage -- she'd had to do the bidding of this madman, service his every twisted whim, it was revolting the things he'd made her do -- or my life would have been in danger. But she'd finally been able to share her plight with one of the other cult members -- a sort of nun. She must have meant Toby. It was this woman who'd helped her to escape -- brought her shoes, given her money, lured the madman away so Lucerne could make a dash for freedom.
It was no use asking me anything, she said. The cult members had been nice to me, and anyway they'd been duped. She'd been the only one who'd known the truth: it was a burden she'd had to carry alone. What woman who loved her child as much as she loved me wouldn't have done the same?
Before our psychiatry sessions, she'd squeeze my shoulder and say, "Amanda's back there. Keep that in mind." Meaning that if I told anyone she'd been lying her hair off she'd suddenly remember where she'd been imprisoned, and the CorpSeCorps would go in there with their sprayguns, and who knew what might happen? Bystanders got killed a lot in spraygun attacks. It couldn't be helped, said the CorpSeCorps. It was in the interests of public order.
For weeks Lucerne hovered around to make sure I wouldn't try to run away or else rat on her. But at last I got a chance to take out Amanda's purple phone and call. Amanda had texted me with the number of the new phone she'd lifted, so I'd know where to reach her -- she thought ahead about everything. I sat inside my closet to make the call. It had a light inside, like all the closets in the house. The closet itself was as big as my former sleeping cubicle.
Amanda answered right away. There she was on the screen, looking the same as ever. I longed to be back at the Gardeners.
"I really miss you," I said. "I'm running away as soon as I can." But I didn't know when that would be, I said, because Lucerne was keeping my identity locked in a drawer, and I wouldn't be allowed past the gatehouse without it.
"Can't you trade?" said Amanda. "With the guards?"
"No," I said. "I don't think so. It's different here."
"Oh. What happened to your hair?"
"Lucerne made me cut it."
"It looks okay," said Amanda. Then she said, "They found Burt dumped in the vacant lot, out behind Scales. He had freezer burns." "He'd been in a freezer?"
"What was left. There were parts missing -- liver, kidneys, heart. Zeb says the mobs will sell the parts, then keep the rest in the freezer until they need to send a message."
"Ren! Where are you?" It was Lucerne, in my room.
"I have to go," I whispered. I tucked the phone back into the tiger. "In here," I said. My teeth were chattering. Freezers were so cold.
"What are you doing in the closet, darling?" said Lucerne. "Come and have some lunch! You'll feel better soon!" She sounded chirpy: the crazier and more disturbed I acted, the better it was for her, because the less anyone would believe me if I told on her.
Her story was that I'd been traumatized by being stuck in among the warped, brainwashing cult folk. I had no way of proving her wrong. Anyway maybe I had been traumatized: I had nothing to compare myself with.
40
Once I'd adjusted enough -- adjusted was the word they used, as if I was a bra strap -- Lucerne said I had to go to school because it was bad for me to be moping around the house: I needed to get out and make a whole new life for myself, as she was doing. It was a risk for her -- I was a walking cluster bomb, the truth about her might come popping out of my mouth at any time. But she knew I was judging her silently, and that annoyed her, so she really wanted me elsewhere.
Frank seemed to have believed her story, though he didn't seem to care about it one way or the other. I could see now why Lucerne had run off with Zeb: at least Zeb had noticed her. And he'd noticed me, as well, whereas Frank treated me like a window: he never looked at me, only through me.
Sometimes I dreamed about Zeb. He'd be wearing a bear suit, and the fur would unzip down the middle like a pyjama bag, and Zeb would step out. He'd smell comforting, in the dream -- like rained-on grass, and cinnamon, and the salty, vinegary, singed-leaf smell of the Gardeners.
The school was called HelthWyzer High. On the first day I put on one of the new outfits that Lucerne had picked out for me. It was pink and lemon yellow -- colours the Gardeners never would have allowed because they'd show the dirt and waste the soap.
My new clothes felt like a disguise. I couldn't get used to how tight they were compared to my old loose dresses, and how my bare arms stuck out from the sleeves and my bare legs came out from the bottom of the knee-length, pleated skirt. But this was what the girls at HelthWyzer High all wore, according to Lucerne.
"Don't forget your sunblock, Brenda," she said as I headed towards the door. She was calling me Brenda now: she claimed it was my real name.
HelthWyzer sent a student to be my guide -- walk me to the school, show me around. Her name was Wakulla Price; she was thin, with glossy skin like toffee. She was wearing a pastel yellow top like mine, but she had pants on the bottom. She gazed at my pleated skirt, her eyes wide. "I like your skirt," she said.
"My mother bought it," I said.