Do You Hear the Music?
Chapter 2
I wake up to the sound of hushed whispers surrounding me. My head heavy and my body aching. I feel like opening my eyes but I will myself to keep them shut in order to hear what the voices are saying.
"What on earth happened?" an angered whisper says, I think it might be Mum. "How did this happen?"
"We always knew there was a chance of this happening Rachel," a hushed voice answers, Solomon. "We knew they wouldn't have let her go without being sure they could control her. Though getting her to … kill herself is a bit… disturbing. And Dr Steve being involved, well, he would have been feeding her things since the beginning. Offering to help her made it that much easier for him to do. We just didn't know who to look for. Tell me exactly what happened Rachel?"
"Well you know she has been acting weird lately, humming the song and spacing out all the time." My mum murmurs back, her voice taking on a more concerned tone than anger. "Well the girls, Bex, Liz and Macey, have been really concerned about her, for obvious reasons and they have been tailing her around, which they say has been disturbingly easy. But today they lost her."
They have been tailing me? All this time? How have I not realised? I suppose because… because they were with me all the time… weren't they? I was never by myself… was I?
"How could they have lost her? They should have been better!" my mum's voice raises to a near yell and I flinch slightly, though it appears to go unnoticed by the other two in the room.
"Rachel, come on, you know that the girls did the best they could," Solomon whispers soothingly. I hear a rustle of fabric and a squeak of a plastic chair as if someone has moved closer to another. "They kept as much an eye on her as they could but you and I both know that if she wants to disappear, she will, no matter how easy she had made it to tail her in the past, she is still the Chameleon. Now continue with what happened today."
"They knew that she had been going to see Dr Steve, so they went to check there first. When they reached his office, all his things were packed and there was no sign of either Dr Steve or… or Cammie." My mum's voice breaks as she says my name, she sounds as though she is choking back tears. "They knew immediately something was wrong, they sent Liz to get me and Macey to alert the security team. Bex started tracking her, and discovered her already out the window and over the edge of the balcony. She was swaying on the edge of the roof, humming louder and louder. That carnival music, just kept repeating it. Then I got there with Liz. Me and Bex climbed out onto the roof on either side of her. She noticed us, she did, but… she didn't seem to care. She started… started to dance. She only showed concern about where she was when Liz climbed out on the room and slipped. She dived to get her, swung her back on the roof and… and then … she s-slipped."
Her voice breaks and she dissolves into tears. There are a few minutes of the sound of sobs filling the room before she speaks again.
"If… if me and… and Bex hadn't got there in time she would have….she would have died." My mum stutters and gasps as she is trying to catch her breath. "My baby girl would have … have died."
I feel the need to move, to hug her, to… to do anything to stopped the pained cry of my mother, but something stops me. I need to hear what Solomon thinks. I need to know if… if … I don't even know. I just need to know.
"No she wouldn't have Rachel. There is no way you wouldn't have gotten there in time. You would never have let her die." Mr Solomon says, his tone of voice gentle.
"But if… if the girls hadn't… hadn't of been tracking her, if they hadn't of panicked over losing her, there is no way we would have gotten there on time." Her voice is quiet, scared.
"But you did get there on time, you saved her." Solomon's voice is reassuring. "Don't keep contemplating what could have happened. Because you saved her, she is safe."
"Is she really?" she whispers and I feel a hand clasp mine tightly. Her skin is soft and warm. Reassuring. I want to squeeze her hand back but that would alert her to the fact that I was awake. "Dr Steve, he's gone. He did this to her. He made her hear things, think things, do things. How do we know that he hasn't…. hasn't put something else into her head?"
"You said she stopped hearing the music, right?" Solomon answers, I can hear him shifting in his seat. "My understanding is that, that was what he used to make her do things. If the music has stopped, then, in theory, she is safe."
At that moment I open my eyes.
