Eye of the Storm

"What? What's wrong? I'm not as pretty? Even like this? Is that what you're thinking."

  "No," I finally muttered. "No. I'm just surprised."

  Her eves remained narrow for a moment and then widened and she smiled.

  "Of course you are. That's the fun of it though. surprise. Well, wish me luck," she said.

  Page 417

  "For what?"

  "For what? For my date. You always need a little luck on a date. You can't plan and plot every reaction. Youknow."

  "You're going on a date?" I wanted to add. "like that?" but I didn't.

  "Of course. I told you earlier. You just don't listen unless it involves you. Well, tonight is my night," she said. "And you have to stay home. You're the wallflower tonight, but I'll think of you when I'm eating something delicious and listening to the music and riding in the convertible and afterward. Yes, they'll be an afterward for me, too.

  "Mind the store,' she said with a wave and a laugh. "I'll fill you in on all of it tomorrow, if you're good."

  She turned and started away.

  "Wait. Aunt Victoria," I called after her and wheeled as quickly as I could into the hallway. She walked toward the front door. "Where are the keys to the van?" I called after her. "Aunt Victoria!"

  She turned at the door.

  "What? What?" she shouted, her face reddening.

  I wheeled closer toward her.

  "I need those keys," I said as calmly as I could. "You promised if I signed the paper. Please," I said. "We made a bargain."

  "I don't know where they are. I'll look for them tomorrow. Don't tell me about papers and signing things. I don't want to discuss business now, you foolish little girl. Don't you have any sense of timing at all? My mind is full of jelly beans. I can think seriously. You of all people should know that.

  "Just try to be a good girl until I return."

  "Aunt Victoria!"

  She stepped out and closed the door. I sat there staring after her in disbelief. Then I spun around and wheeled myself down the corridor to her office, hoping she had forgotten to lock the door, but she hadn't.

  She's mad. I thought. She's not going on any date. She's lost in some wild fantasy. I can't stay here a moment more, but I wasn't going to try to get down to the road again. That was for sure. I wheeled back to the staircase and contemplated it. Mrs. Churchwell had said the phone upstairs was working. The question was did I have the strength and the nerve to try to pull myself up all the steps? If I should slip and fall... At least I'll end up in the hospital and out of here, I thought. And then I thought, she might very well just pick me up and deposit me, broken bones and all, back into that bed.

  Should I just wait and hope Austin returns as he promised? Or has Austin and his uncle been

  sufficiently terrorized by Aunt Victoria's attorneys to stay away, especially after what had happened yesterday? I wondered.

  My heart was pounding with indecision. How could I just return to my little prison of a room and simply wait? I'll take my time. I promised myself. Even if it takes me all night to do it. I'll go slowly and extra carefully and I'll get myself up these stairs and to that phone.

  I'll get there if it's the last thing I ever do. That's just an expression normally, I thought, but for me, it might very well prove to be true.

  Practically inching my way out of the chair and down to the first steps. I sat and took deep breaths. My heart was racing so. I thought I could possibly faint halfway up. Calm down, Rain. I told myself. Calm down or don't even attempt to do it.

  It really wasn't all that difficult to go up a stairway, even with dead legs. I had the strength in my upper arms and shoulders, thanks to all my therapy with Austin. I sat on a step, put my arms behind myself and lifted myself up to the next step. I rested every two steps, holding onto the balustrade. To keep my mind from rushing into any panic. I counted the steps and then I became a little silly and sang. "Twenty-four steps on the stairs. if I do two more steps on the stairs, only eighteen left to go."

  It took me the better part of an hour, but finally. I reached back to place my hands on the upstairs landing and lifted my body one final time. I was upstairs. My heart beat for joy now instead of in fear and trepidation.

  I gazed down at my wheelchair at the foot of the stairs. I felt like I was looking over a cliff. Now, full of hope. I started down the upstairs hallway. All of the rooms had phones. as I recalled. but I felt most certain I'd find the working one in what had been her bedroom and where she staved now.

  As I moved down the hallway, however. I noted that the door to Grandmother Hudson's bedroom was wide open. Since it was closer. I decided to ao for the phone there. After all, why would she have had that disconnected? Somehow it seemed right for me to make my desperate call for help from Grandmother Hudson's bedroom. Spiritually, she would be beside me as she had been when I needed her the most. I thought.

  I turned into it and pulled myself up enough to flip on the lights.

  What struck me first was the heavy scent of Grandmother Hudson's perfume. An aroma could linger, but certainly not as long as this nor as redolent as this. It seemed to have just been sprayed. Perhaps Aunt Victoria had used some on herself. I thought. but I didn't recall the scent downstairs when she spoke to me nor did it timer in the hallway, trailing behind her as she left. It surely would have.

  Grandmother Hudson's phone was an antique, one of those brass telephones with the biz receivers and mouthpieces. It was situated on her nightstand to the right of her bed. I decided I would use the side board of the bed as a brace and lift myself up and onto the bed. From there I would have an easy time using the phone.

  I did it in two smooth motions, smiling to myself at how proud Austin would be if he saw me. With a final burst of strength. I lifted my body onto the bed and flopped backward to fall on the pillow.

  Only. I didn't fall on the pillow. My cheek rested against strands of hair instead. It was so unexpected, I froze for a moment and then slowly, I turned and immediately screamed such a shrill, long scream, it rattled every bone in my own body.

  A wig the shade of Grandmother Hudson's hair had been put on a mannequin's head and rested on a pillow. The sight of it simply took my breath away like some vacuum cleaner hose sucking it all out of my lungs.

  My head spun and then suddenly, all went dark.

  15

  Prisoner of Madness

  .

  I couldn't have been unconscious very long, but

  during the time I had taken to get myself up the stairs and into Grandmother Hudson's room. Aunt Victoria had traveled through the tunnel of illusion she had created for herself. She had gone on what I believed was her fantasy date and returned. I opened my eyes to see her standing over me.

  She smiled.

  "I'm not surprised to find you here. The moment I saw your wheelchair downstairs I knew that's what you had done.

  'Of course, you want to be near her. Of course, you want to be here. How stupid of me not to have realized it from the start,'" she said.

  I lifted my upper body and glanced again at the wig and mannequin head.

  "What is this?" I asked.

  "Shh." she said. "She's asleep. I bet you're tired. too. What an effort it must have been to get yourself up here. We're all proud of you, proud that you finally decided to suffer a little pain and agony along with the rest of us."

  "I want to leave." I whined. "Please help me go. You can have everything, all of it. I'll sign any document you want, only get me out of this house tonight,"

  "That's so silly," she chided me, "especially now that we're getting along so well."

  "We're not getting along! Stop saying that!"

  "Oh, you mustn't shout, Megan. You'll wake her," she added in a whisper.

  "I'm not Megan, I'm Rain and you're ridiculous. You look absolutely ridiculous in that makeup and hair color. And there's no one to wake, Grandmother Hudson is gone. gone! Now you help me get up and out of this house or I'll report everything to my attorney. Understand?" I th
reatened.

  She stared down at me and shook her head slowly.

  "And here I thought you were improving and -that you weren't going to be a spoiled brat anymore. What a terrible disappointment."

  She turned away and started to leave.

  "Don't you dare leave this room," I screamed.

  She turned back.

  "Maybe after a night's rest, you'll have a better

  attitude." she said. "Oh," she added, smiling. "I had a

  perfectly wonderful evening with Grant."

  "You weren't with Grant. You'll never be with

  Grant!" I yelled as she closed the door slowly and

  clicked off the light. "Aunt Victoria!"

  Her heels clicked away.

  I turned and fumbled for the phone, but when I

  lifted it from the cradle. I heard only silence. There

  was no dial tone. Why did she have this disconnected?

  Did she imagine Grandmother Hudson was going to

  use it?

  Madness.

  I'm drowning in her madness. I thought in a

  panic.

  I swept the phone off the night stand and it

  banged and bounced on the floor.

  Did I have the strength to start back

  downstairs? And what would I do when I got there? I groaned and lowered my head to the pillow.

  What had I done? I had separated myself from my

  wheelchair, my only way to move myself about and I

  had trapped myself even deeper in this pit, like

  someone in a straitjacket, turning and twisting and in

  doing so, making it tighter and tighter until I could

  barely move.

  .

  I slept through the remainder of the night. The

  moment I woke. I was overcome with the urge to

  vomit. Wave after wave of nausea kept me from

  lifting my head from the pillow. I took deep breaths

  and tried to keep myself calm. What was happening to

  me? Was it a result from my great physical exertion

  yesterday? I still had dull throbbing all over my body. When I turned slightly to my left, my nipples

  tingled and then I felt a slight aching in my breasts.

  Why should that be? A terrifying hot fear shot up my

  spine like mercury moving up a thermometer. I shook

  my head to deny the possibility, however another

  realization flashed across my brain. I hadn't thought

  much about it because I had so many other physical

  concerns these days-- but I had missed my period

  weeks ago.

  All of this hit me like a punch in the stomach

  and I couldn't hold myself back any longer. I leaned

  over the side of the bed and vomited. As I did I

  screamed for Aunt Victoria: I screamed for anyone. I

  thought I was dying on the spot. Every time I paused.

  I screamed again and again. Finally, she came to my

  door.

  There was a radical change between what she

  had looked like yesterday and what she looked like this morning. As if she had woken from a dream, stopped her sleepwalking or snapped out of a coma, she was the more familiar Aunt Victoria again, at least in appearance. Dressed in one of her business suits, her hair brushed neatly, the makeup gone, including the lipstick, she stood in the doorway and stared in at me with a look of disgust emerging from within her bailey face like a bubble of air rising to the top of

  some water.

  That maddening mind of hers had slipped back

  into the present I thought. I hoped.

  "What are you doing?" she asked.

  "What am I doing? I'm sick," I said, "How

  could you leave me like this?"

  "You're disgusting." she said and marched

  across the room to the bathroom where she plucked a

  towel off the towel rack and came back to throw it

  over the mess.

  "You've got to call an ambulance and get me to

  the hospital," I said.

  She stared down at me and shook her head. "Everything has to be dramatic with vou,

  doesn't it? Everything has to be an Academy Award

  performance. You always have to be the center of

  attention. Even today, even today you have to do

  this." "What? Today? What are you saying?" Wasn't she back to being herself? How was I

  ever to tell just looking at her? What was she talking

  about now?

  "You know this is a big day for me. I might

  have put together the biggest deal our company ever

  had. How proud Father will be. You're afraid I'll steal

  your limelight, is that it?"

  "Aunt Victoria, stop and look at me. It's Rain.

  I'm ill. I think... I think I might be pregnant," I

  admitted, expecting her to go into a tirade about

  Austin, the fortune hunter, and how he had

  deliberately made me pregnant to get to my money. She raised her head and squeezed her lips into

  her cheeks. Her eyes seemed to darken and then

  lighten as if some tiny bulbs behind them were turned

  down and then up,

  "Really?" she asked dryly, her voice devoid of

  emotion or sympathy. "Why doesn't that surprise me.

  I wonder? Why doesn't it surprise me that your own

  personal pleasures were once again put before any

  responsibility or any concern for your family and your

  family's reputation? Why aren't I shocked, Megan?" "You're not listening to me. Please. listen," I pleaded. "I'm your niece, not your sister. It's very serious for me to be pregnant. I need medical attention. You've got to call for an ambulance and call

  my doctors immediately."

  I reached up for her hand and she pulled herself

  back as if I was poison ivy.

  "Oh stop it. You think you're the first girl to get

  herself in trouble? What do you think will happen? Do

  you think we can let the world know what a mess

  you've made of yourself? You want me to call an

  ambulance because you think you might be pregnant?

  That's ridiculous. Even if you really are preriant, well

  handle this just the way we handle all of your

  mistakes. Megan, by ourselves, discreetly, without the

  rest of the world knowing just how bad you art. "For now," she added. "a little suffering will do

  you good. Perhaps it will help you to realize just how

  selfish you've been and why you should think about

  the rest of us next time you decide to throw caution to

  the wind and indulge your own fantasies and

  pleasures."

  She turned away and marched toward the door.

  "Wait!" I cried.

  "What is it? I've got to go." she said turning, "I

  have a very, very important meeting today. It could be worth millions eventually. Can you imagine," she asked, her eyes wide with excitement. "can you imagine that I. a woman, have taken Father's company

  to heights even he couldn't imagine?

  "Maybe now you'll appreciate me more. Maybe

  now they both will."

  She gazed at the floor.

  "Try not to make any more mess, will you." She

  closed the door nearly all the way,

  "Wait! Don't leave me here!" I screamed when

  she disappeared. "I'm not Megan!" I heard her

  descending the stairs. "Come back here and look at

  me! Listen to me! Aunt Victoria!'"

  Moments later the front door opened and closed

  below and she was gone. I was alone. The cramps

  continued, my nausea returned and I threw up again

  and again until I was too weak to li
ft my head from

  the pillow.

  Rest. I told myself. Stay calm and rest and in a

  little while try to get yourself to the telephone in her

  room.

  I drifted in and out of sleep. I could sense that

  things weren't going well with my bladder again. I

  was wet and my cramping became more and more

  severe. The waves of nausea moved into something else, something beyond. My body felt warmer and warmer and my mouth was suddenly so dry, I couldn't swallow. My tongue was a thick piece of sandpaper.

  Shouting for help was painful.

  The pain between my temples, over my

  forehead became so intense it brought tears to my

  eyes. It felt like someone with a thumb and a

  forefinger made of steel was squeezing and squeezing

  me there. All I could do was moan and cry inside. I

  had no idea about time. There wasn't a working clock

  in the room. I know I drifted on and off for what had

  to be hours, feeling myself grow warmer and warmer

  until I thought I might set the very bed on fire, How I

  wished I had just a sip of water.

  The movement of sunlight away from the east

  side of the house told me it was late afternoon.

  Drifting in and out of sleep I thought I had heard

  footsteps and the creak of the door being opened

  farther. Sure enough. when I opened my eyes again. I

  saw the door had been moved.

  I tried to call. I thought I had shouted. but I'm

  sure it was barely louder than a whisper. Finally, after

  what must have been another hour or so, she came

  into the room. She was no longer in her business suit,

  but what I saw now was so weird. I thought I was

  surely still locked in a dream.

  Aunt Victoria seemed to float past me. She was

  wearing only a thin negligee.

  She was very slender and I could see her ribs

  outlined under the skin. She turned and raised her

  arms, holding them frozen in the air for a moment

  before dropping them to turn herself again in a strange

  dance. The smile on her face was so different. It

  looked more like a little girl's smile of joy.

  She paused and looked at me as if she was

  pleased.

  "Oh. Megan. I'm so excited. I couldn't wait to

  come in to tell you. Daddy loves me," she said.