Sanctum

  “Yeah, of course,” he’d replied, waiting for her to unlock the passenger side door. “It’s just, they’re remodeling the house. Trucks everywhere. We can’t even park in the driveway right now. But they were happy to hear I was headed to see Felix.”

  After these awkward pleasantries—exchanged in a McDonald’s parking lot—Dan had gotten in the car, and the ride had been silent ever since.

  Not that he wasn’t dying to know more about what he was in for, exactly. He just couldn’t muster up the nerve to ask.

  Instead he stared at his phone, reading responses from Abby and Jordan to a message he’d sent that morning, informing them both that he was going to visit Felix. This proved they were still reading his messages, at least. But right now, Dan was wishing he had gotten their responses sooner, before he was trapped in someone else’s car.

  Lipcott, Jordan

  to me, avaldez

  So I read your message and thought, “Are you sure about this?” And that was before my mom brought in the mail. Somebody mailed me a photo, Dan. Abby got one, too. It feels like some kind of sick joke. Circuses and sideshows and crap. I’ll attach the picture for you, but there was no return address. What the hell is going on?

  —J

  PS Wait until you see the back, blegh.

  [Download Attachment 2/2]

  And Abby’s response proved even more surprising. . . .

  Valdez, Abby

  to me, jlipcott

  I’ve been trying to move on, Dan, but I got a picture in the mail, too. I really, really don’t want to rehash the past, but . . . I don’t know. Did you get a photo? It seems weird that only Jordan and I did. This is freaking me out, Dan. It feels like someone is targeting us. Be careful, okay? Let us know how it goes with Felix so I don’t worry so much.

  Why can’t we just be allowed to move on?

  Abby

  [Download Attachment 2/2]

  It was all well and good to want to move on, but that was such an abstract, nothing phrase in his head. How was he supposed to forget that he had been strapped down to a gurney and almost killed? Forget that after he broke free, he was almost the one doing the killing? How did a person move on from something like that? Abby’s use of the word just was especially cruel. Just decide to move on. Just decide to forget. Just stop having nightmares. As if it were as simple as unpacking a bag of groceries and putting the milk and juice away in the fridge.

  Dan tapped on the two attachment links and waited for the network to kick in and download the images. His foot shook anxiously as he watched the black-and-white pictures fill his screen—first Jordan’s, then Abby’s.

  He squinted, turning them this way and that. They looked like they could have been taken on the same day at the same place—they were even torn as if maybe they had been ripped from the same photo. When he examined the backs of the photos more closely, he understood why Jordan was so creeped out.

  A single word in black ink was scrawled on the back of each picture. Jordan’s read, “You’re,” and Abby’s read, “finished.”

  You’re finished.

  Dan glanced up and away, then focused on Felix’s mother. She didn’t notice his darting eyes. Why did they get photos and not me? If it’s some kind of warning, why would I be left out?

  That’s a good thing, Dan, he reminded himself wryly. Nobody should want to get a note saying “You’re finished.”

  Though it was orange and red now instead of green, the densely wooded terrain outside the car triggered a memory. He could practically smell the cheap air freshener from the cab that had first brought him to New Hampshire College.

  “How much farther?” Dan asked, glancing up from his phone.

  “Half an hour,” Mrs. Sheridan said. “Maybe forty minutes.”

  Dan’s knee bounced; they had been driving for an hour already. The only way to Morthwaite Clinic, apparently, was through miles and miles of forest far from any main traffic arteries.

  A text message arrived from his mother.

  Hope you are having fun with Missy and Tariq. Please be responsible but call if you need a ride after the party tonight! Love you.

  At last there came a break in the trees and Dan pressed himself closer to the window, watching as they drove up a steep climb that brought them to a wide-open field, fenced and gated. Dan had hoped to find a cheerful, modern clinic, but Morthwaite looked like it could be Brookline’s twin. It was cleaner, at least, although nobody had bothered to clear the vines overtaking the stone facade. Gray and tall, the building perched like a weary sentinel on the hill, and even at this distance Dan could make out grates protecting the windows.

  Mrs. Sheridan stopped the Prius at the gate and a security guard asked to see both of their IDs. The pimply, heavyset guard scrutinized Dan’s license with hooded eyes, looking skeptically from the card to Dan’s face before finally calling up to the main building to confirm their appointment.

  “Looks like you check out. Here’s your guest badge,” the guard said, practically tossing Dan’s ID and a plastic name card back through the window. “Have a nice day.”

  Dan tucked his license away and clipped the visitor badge to his coat. The car slowly navigated the gravel driveway, then idled under the stone overhang that enclosed the entrance to the clinic. Dan wiped his slick palms on his jeans and looked across the center console to Mrs. Sheridan.

  “So this is it,” Dan murmured.

  “If you need a minute . . .”

  “No,” he said. “Let’s get this over with.”

  Gravel crunched under Dan’s shoes as he got out and stared ahead into the clinic. He shuddered, struck by the same sense of foreboding he’d felt when he first set foot in Brookline. He couldn’t believe this was an actual, functioning mental hospital, where people still went for treatment and even, in some cases, long-term stays. Maybe this summer he had been one more fainting spell away from just such a fate. He put his hand in his jeans pocket and closed it around the familiar shape of his pill bottle. It felt like an anchor, like a ward. He was seeing a counselor and keeping up with his meds; there was no reason he couldn’t live a normal life.

  Why couldn’t Felix do the same?

  Right. Normal. Because having nightmares every night and obsessing over your dead great-uncle is completely normal. And bonus! Your best friends are receiving threatening messages.

  As he walked up the driveway to the front entrance, Dan glanced at the windows on the first floor. A face peered out at him, stark and white, and for a second he could swear it was Warden Crawford’s, smug smile and all. But another step closer, Dan realized it was only a docile old man.

  A nurse in tidy blue scrub pants and a chunky-knit sweater greeted them just inside the door. There was another series of gates here, though smaller, and the nurse asked Dan to empty his pockets and step through a metal detector. He handed over his wallet, his keys, and his water bottle, then gave her his medicine quickly, hoping she wouldn’t ask him about it. The nurse just took his things and put them in a plastic bag, then labeled it.

  “You can have these back when you’re all done,” she said.

  Another wave of dread overcame him, this one harsher than the last. Without his things, Dan felt that much closer to being a patient instead of a visitor. But the nurse smiled and directed him through the security gate, chatting amiably as she led him down the brightly lit halls.

  “I’ll wait here in the lobby,” Mrs. Sheridan told him. “You go on ahead.”

  Dan paused. “Are you sure? He probably wants to see you.”

  She shrugged her tiny shoulders and looked anywhere but at him. “No. He’s seen enough of me. He only wants to see you, I think.”

  “You’re the one Felix keeps asking for?” The nurse furrowed her brow, giving Dan a closer look. Her name tag said “Grace.”

  “I am, yeah. We know each other from summer school.”

  “He was doing so much better,” she said with a sigh. They rounded a corner, leaving behind the lobby an
d Mrs. Sheridan. “Nobody really comes to see him except his parents and the occasional teacher. I’m sure he’ll be glad to see a friend. His room is just down this way. You’re Daniel, right? He talks about you all the time.”

  “Dan,” he corrected instinctively, “but . . . yeah. He does? That’s . . . really something. What does he say about me?”

  The nurse was slightly shorter than him, and had to look up to meet his eyes. She leaned against the doorframe and chuckled. “All good things. That you were always so kind to him, and one of the only real friends he’s ever had.”

  Dan’s face burned. Felix rarely entered his mind these days, and when he did, it wasn’t for pleasant reasons. His pace slowed, his hands sweating again as he hid them in his pockets. Maybe he should’ve visited sooner, cared more.

  Nurse Grace coughed politely, nodding toward the door.

  “Ready to go in?”

  “Sure . . .”

  “There are a few rules, obviously,” she said, taking out her passkey. “Don’t touch the patient, don’t accept anything from him to take out of here. We’ll be observing, of course, in case he becomes overstimulated or upset. I need verbal confirmation that you understand these rules.”

  “I understand,” Dan said.

  He swallowed uneasily. The last time he had seen Felix face-to-face, it had been in an operating theater, and there’d been a scalpel flashing between them. The door beeped softly as the nurse used the passkey over the electronic lock. A soft hiss, a click, and the heavy white door swung open. They stepped into a small antechamber with a few plastic chairs and a glass window that looked into the adjoining patient room. There was Felix, sitting behind the observation panel, dressed in crisp white flannels with blue pinstripes. His hands were folded in his lap, resting on a checkered blanket. He was looking out the actual window, the one with bars over it, his eyes far away.

  This was not the same tidy, upright Felix Dan remembered—it seemed as though he had shrunk, now just a frail husk of the muscle jock he had become over the summer. All the weight Felix had put on from his strict diet and exercise regimen seemed to weigh him down now, his whole body drooping toward the floor.

  The nurse let Dan through another electronically locked door into the room with Felix. Dan heard the door whisper shut behind him and lock into place. It seemed as though all the air rushed out of the room, leaving them in a cool, hermetically sealed box.

  Felix didn’t even turn at his entrance, though Dan saw the beginnings of a smile tug at the corner of his thin lips.

  “Hello, Daniel Crawford,” Felix said calmly. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

  An empty chair waited not far from where Felix sat gazing out the window.

  It wasn’t a padded cell, exactly, but Dan would hardly call it a living space. An antiseptic scent permeated the room—it smelled like every high school bathroom Dan had ever been in. The only object with any personality whatsoever was the blanket draped over Felix’s lap; everything else was either white or pale blue.

  “Hi,” Dan said, meandering awkwardly to the chair. He sat down, fidgeting. “Your, um . . . your mom sent me a letter. She said you wanted to see me. Or maybe want is a strong word. You were asking for me, is what she said.”

  Felix swiveled to observe him. No more glasses, just his mother’s thin, steep nose. Were Felix’s eyes always so huge and staring? Dan saw his own face reflected back at him, glinting in Felix’s stare.

  Felix twitched as if to shrug. “No more spectacles. The frames, you see, could be snapped and used for self-harm. I now use contacts instead.”

  Dan nodded, clasping his hands together and forcing them down on his leg.

  “Personally, I think sawing through the carotid artery with a piece of jagged plastic would be a crude and inefficient way to die, but I’m told it has happened before and so . . .” Felix tapped just under his right eye. “Safety first.”

  “I’m sure they know what they’re doing.”

  “You don’t look well, Daniel,” Felix observed matter-of-factly. “Sleep proving elusive?”

  “Nightmares,” Dan explained. He didn’t see any point in being coy. Felix wasn’t coping with the aftermath of Brookline and neither was Dan, no matter how much he might try to pretend otherwise. “But I bet you know that already.”

  Felix nodded, looking out the window again. “I do, I do. . . . The nightmares are what hurt the most. I dream of all the sculptures I had yet to make, and even though when I have control over my mind, I know that wasn’t really me, those failures still haunt me. But I’m sure you understand. You’re special, too, special like me. You see things you shouldn’t be able to see. You know things you shouldn’t be able to know. Things like other people’s memories. . . .” He paused, smoothing the blanket across his legs. “The doctors here do what they can. The violent urges are gone. But the dreams, the burning in my head, that will never go away. A bright burning star . . . It burns when my eyes are open and when they’re shut. It burns right now when I look at your face.”

  “I’m sorry? You lost me for a second there. You know what? Never mind. Honestly, man, I don’t know what to tell you. I thought once we left that place the nightmare would be over for good.”

  A short burst of laughter almost caused Dan to fall out of his chair. He hadn’t expected Felix to laugh, let alone so suddenly. Then Felix fell silent, pursing his lips.

  “That was very naive.”

  “I guess so,” Dan admitted. “Still, there are worse things than being naive.”

  Felix leaned forward, gesturing for Dan to do the same. When he did, a waft of strong soap smell hit him hard. Felix grinned, his eyes wrinkling at the corners. He laughed again, almost gleefully, as if a secret waited to burst out from behind that toothy grin. “Are there?”

  “What do you mean?” Dan whispered. He glanced over Felix’s shoulder at the observation glass. Felix burbled out another high-pitched laugh, then squinted, squeezing his eyes shut tight. “Maybe I shouldn’t have come here,” Dan added.

  “It’s . . . It’s all right now. I . . . The star burns but I . . . Yes, I can hold on for just long enough.” Felix leaned in even closer—any closer and his chin would have brushed Dan’s shoulder. Dan was so riveted, he almost didn’t feel the object that fell on his leg.

  “Don’t let them see it,” Felix hissed. “Cover it with your hand. There. There, that’s good. Don’t let them take it from you. If they take it, you’ll never find your way, and then it’s trouble for me. So much trouble for me. More burning.”

  “What is it?” Dan pressed his hands over . . . a card? A letter?

  “Follow them, Daniel. You’ll see. You’ll see!” Felix rocked back into his chair, covering his face with both hands. A half-choked cry escaped. “Forgive me, Dan. What we did to you . . . Awful. Terrible. I don’t know if it can be undone.”

  “What? Are you okay? Are you in pain?” Dan looked around frantically, and just as he expected, he heard the lock mechanism on the door click. The nurse was coming. “I think we need help here!”

  “Follow them,” Felix sobbed through his fingers. “Follow, Daniel!” Every word sounded as if it were being tortured from his throat. “It’s okay to be afraid!” he cried. “I’m afraid all the time.”

  Nurse Grace rushed in behind Dan, pushing on his shoulder. “You’ll need to leave now,” she said, then kneeled down in front of Felix. “Please,” she said as an orderly appeared to escort Dan out. “It’s time for you to go.”

  Dan stood, numb, and backed away, watching as Grace tried to sooth the frantic Felix, who clawed at her shoulders, pushing himself up until he could see Dan again.

  “Follow, Daniel! Follow! It’s time for me to wake up now. Wake up, Felix! Wake up!”

  The sound of Felix’s screaming echoed in his head, following him out into the corridor. A male nurse guided him back out to the main hall and Dan slumped along behind him, carefully palming the note Felix had slipped him. He flicked it into the kangaroo pocket
of his hoodie just as they reached the lobby. Mrs. Sheridan stood up from a low, worn couch. Dan didn’t say a word, but the corner of her lips began to tremble.

  “Do you think it helped?” she asked softly.

  “I don’t know, maybe,” Dan said. His cheeks burned with the lie. “No, I don’t think it did. I’m sorry.”

  Mrs. Sheridan nodded, placing a shaking hand on his shoulder. “Thank you for trying.” Without another word, she turned and led him to the security gate. Dan picked up his bag of personal items, lost in a haze.

  Nurse Grace appeared just as they reached the doors to the outside. She pulled Mrs. Sheridan aside, speaking to her in hushed tones. That was Dan’s chance to sneak a look at the card Felix had given him.

  He turned to face the wall, his nerves buzzing with excitement and fear as he reached into his pocket and drew out the note.

  No, not a note—a photo on heavy card stock. Black-and-white faces stared at him, vacant—two little boys in front of a striped circus tent. He was sure of it now: Abby’s and Jordan’s photos were connected. The photo in his hands was the missing link.

  “What the hell is this?” Dan mumbled.

  He flipped the card over to find rows of numbers scribbled hastily on the back. Felix’s voice echoed in his head.

  Follow them, Daniel. You’ll see. You’ll see!

  “Follow what?” he said aloud. “And to where?”

  Under the numbers he found a single word: not. He imagined this photo in a line between Jordan’s and Abby’s, and he realized the message was only now complete. Felix must have sent them those pictures, then. Or maybe he had some help.

  The hairs at the back of Dan’s neck stood up as he pieced together the sentence.

  You’re not finished.

  Dan peered at his friends as, in two pixelated windows, they blinked into their webcams, momentarily mute. Abby pushed a piece of black hair behind her ear, flashing a thin wrist blotched with ink and paint stains.