"She does. Daddy said he would bring her to the mansion. He's taking me to see Mommy and Ian. He's getting a special car so he can drive me." Suddenly I felt a burst of verbal energy, a need to say everything. "He wants to be a better father. He isn't full of self-pity anymore. He's getting someone to be with Great-aunt Frances. I made a friend named Alanis and she's... coming to see me, too. I learned how to talk to Mommy with telepathy and she's coming home. She is. We're all going to come home, and you should try to come home. too."
I thought that made her laugh, but she could have just been choking on her effort to speak. Why did she have me brought here? I wondered. She is tying to find out things behind my father's back. She does want me to be like a little spy. Well, I won't be.
I stood up. The anger in me felt like boiling oil.
"My daddy shouldn't have been born in the attic," I said. "You better come home and tell him the truth. No secrets, no lies." I declared.
Then I turned away and ran out of the room, not even looking back.
Epilogue
. Daddy's car came, but he had to spend time learning how to drive it before he would take me anywhere in it. Felix drove us to my old school and wheeled Daddy in to meet with the principal and take care of the reenrollment. My teachers were happy to see me. I thought some of the students I had been with now looked at me in a very different way. It was almost as if I had been in some war or involved in some major event and had returned. I could see their curiosity, and afterward, many of them did attack me with questions about where I had been, what it had been like, why I had been brought home.
I found myself becoming Alanis, enjoying the elaborations and exaggerations I could create. They believed everything and were envious when I described the wild parties and being on my own. I could almost see the way their pity for me turned into respect.
Everyone seemed to want to be my new best friend. It was as if they expected I could guide them into maturity, teach them how to handle boys and be sexually sophisticated, especially when they saw the name Stuart written on my white shoes. They competed for my attention, each trying to impress me with what she already knew. Some even revealed things about their own sexual experimentation and experiences, begging me to keep their secrets locked away. When I looked at them all now. I thought my lenses had been washed clean and I could see each for who she really was. I felt I instinctively knew whom I should trust and whom I shouldn't.
Thank you, Alanis , I thought as I sauntered down the hallways, my head never held as high. Even my teachers looked at me differently. I could feel it in the way they spoke to me. They all saw me as older, wiser.
Was I really?
If only Ian could see this I thought.
By the weekend. Daddy was confident enough
in his driving to take me to visit Mommy. He'd even mastered getting his wheelchair out and unfolded. although I leaped to do that for him. The hospital had ramps, of course, and we took the elevator up to the floor Mommy was on.
When the elevator door opened. Daddy wheeled himself out, but then stopped. I stood there. waiting.
"Okay. Jordan," he said. "I haven't told you everything because I didn't want to get you frightened or disturbed when you were readjusting to returning home and your old school."
"Mommy's not better?" I asked quickly. "No, she's better, a lot better. She's conscious. but--"
"But what?"
"She doesn't remember very much. It's like being in a haze or a daze."
"You mean she doesn't remember the accident?"
"No, honey. She doesn't remember anything. She didn't remember me, for example. She probably won't remember you, so don't be upset. In time--"
"She'll remember me," I said. smiling. "She's been talking to me. Daddy. Remember? I told you about the telepathy?"
He sighed deeply. "Okay, Jordan. Let's go," he said and continued wheeling himself down the hallway. I followed alongside.
The nurses at the station midfloor saw us coming, and I saw the nurse I remembered Ian calling the case manager. Her name was Mrs. Feinberg, and she had been very angry at us when she'd found out Ian had brought me here without permission. It seemed like just yesterday.
"Mr. March." she said, smiling as she drew closer.
"Hello, Mrs. Feinberg. I believe you know my daughter. Jordan," he said.
"Yes." she said, looking at me with her head tilted a little and a wry smile on her face. "How are you doing?"
"Fine," I said quickly.
"She's doing a little better every day. Mr. March," Mrs. Feinberg told my father. "It's going to take time."
"Yes," Daddy said, He started to wheel himself toward the room.