“Well, it’s not like a teacher’s assistant is such a glamorous, wellpaying job. Felicia Donahue’s coming back in two weeks, anyway, so you won’t have anything pressing to do. Think about going to
France with me, instead. Just imagine—reclining with cups of café noisette at a gorgeous little cafe, you being serenaded to by a group of cute French boys while I’m waited on hand and foot by a charming waiter who looks suspiciously like Jean Reno…”
“Okay, okay, I’ll at least think about it. Now stop daydreaming about inappropriately aged men and get out of here! Don’t keep Sean waiting.” The girl shoos away her friend, who walks on after one last wave. Only when she is finally out of sight does the teacher’s assistant sigh, her face troubled.
It is then that she notices Sandra by the swings, singing softly to herself.
***
“And what makes you think she won’t believe you?”The boy snorts. “Some days I wish I didn’t believe me, either.” “Would you like to tell me all about it?” the psychotherapist asks. The boy glares at her with a suspicious eye. One hundred and twelve, one hundred and thirteen.
“And what’s going to stop you from putting me in the crazy bin if I do?” he accuses.
“I’ll believe that it’s something you believe,” the woman says, and believes her own lie. “And if you’re worried about me telling anyone else, I won’t. Everything you say in this room will be strictly confidential. Not even your father has to know. The only reason for me to divulge information to anyone is if I have reason to believe
that you are a danger to yourself or to the community, and I believe you are not a threat.”
The boy considers this for a few minutes, then laughs. It is not a humorous sound.
“Sometimes when I look in mirrors, I see a strange lady.” To her credit, the woman does not blink.
“She’s in a black dress, and she wears a mask. All she does is watch me, and not with that I’ve-got-a-crush-on-you kind of stare. Less infatuated, more homicidal. I always get this feeling like she’s waiting for something, but I don’t know what that is. She pops up in places I don’t expect—mirrors, usually. She’s fond of mirrors, unfortunately. If that makes me crazy, then you better have a straitjacket ready, because that’s the truth.”
“I see.” The woman’s voice does not change. She picks up her cup again. “How long have you been seeing this lady?”
“I don’t know. For as long as I can remember, I guess. Maybe since I was five, six years old. Sometimes I don’t see her for months at a time, but now I see her almost every day, especially after moving here. It’s—have you ever had the sensation of feeling eyes looking at you, except you know they’re not really eyes?”
Even the woman’s detachedness hesitates at such a description. “And you’ve never told anyone about this?”
“Dad’s got some fuzzy notion about what’s been getting my goat, but he doesn’t believe me. He never does. He thinks I’m imagining things. It’s hard to talk to him about anything, really.” The boy’s tone is surly. One hundred and twenty-eight, one hundred and twenty-nine.
“Has anyone else ever seen her?” “I’m not sure. I don’t think so.” “What about Callie?”
“Sometimes Callie looks at me funny, like she knows there’s something wrong. But she’s never said anything. And I don’t want her knowing, anyway. Whatever this is, I want her out of it.”
***
“Hello, Sandra,” the teacher’s assistant says. The girl smiles back at her but says nothing. The young woman takes the swing beside hers.
“I was wondering about this woman you told me. The woman standing behind Tarquin.”
“Oh, that woman,” the girl says. She stops swinging. “The lady with the funny mask.”
“A mask?”“I thought it was a face at first, but it’s not. It has holes instead of eyes.”
“Why don’t you like her?”“Because she’s in prison. And she’s been trying to get out.”This does not make much sense to the young teacher, so she tries again. “When did you first see this woman?”
“When Mister Tarquin came to class. He doesn’t like her, either.” “Why don’t you like her?”
“Because she wants to hurt Mister Tarquin. She wants to hurt me. She wants to hurt everybody. Except she can’t. Not while she’s still in prison.”
“Sandra,” the young woman says. She pauses, trying to frame the question right. “Sandra, where is this prison?”
Bright green eyes look back at her. “Mister Tarquin,” the girl says. “Mister Tarquin’s the prison.”
***
“Let’s talk a little bit about when you were younger, Tarquin,” the therapist says. “What do you remember about your childhood?”
“Not a lot. Dad used to tell me stories about when I was little, though. Like I once nearly fell into a manhole, and I used to have a pet dog named Scruffy. But I don’t remember anything. It’s like the stories happened to someone else, not to me. You’d think I would have at least remembered the dog.”
“What is the earliest memory you can recall?”Another pause. “My mother,” the boy says, and his voice is quiet and vulnerable. “I remember that she used to sing to me before I went to sleep.”
“Was it a lullaby?”“I don’t know the song’s name.” The boy hums a little, and the melody is a strange, haunting one. One hundred and forty-three, one hundred and forty-four.
“I’m afraid I’m not quite familiar with that song,” says the
woman who specializes in caring for children and knows exactly one hundred and thirty different lullabies in her head.
“It’s the first thing that I really remember,” the boy said. “And then my mom had to…Well, she went bonkers, excuse the political correctness. Dad had her checked into Remney’s. And shortly after they took her away, I started seeing that…that.”
“I see,” the therapist says. This, too, is a lie; she does not truly see. “Your son is an exceptionally bright boy,” she tells his father later, once the session is over. The boy is leafing through a small stack of magazines while the man and the therapist conduct a hushed conversation behind the door. “Much more intelligent than an average teenager his age, but he tends to express this through sarcasm and self-deprecation. It’s a better outlet than other forms of rebelling I know of, but still not something I would like to encourage. He also suffers from a very deep-seated psychosis, very similar to post-traumatic stress disorder.”“Was it because of the McKinley boy’s death?” his father asks, troubled.
“It doesn’t seem likely. His hallucinations have nothing to do with any kind of flashbacks from the incident, which I find puzzling. I believe this may stem from feelings of abandonment caused by his mother leaving, though his symptoms are still quite peculiar. He exhibits no aggressive behaviors, as far as I can determine.”