Missing

Chapter Twenty-One

…..

A note on last week's update: The deed has been done, my novel should be on Amazon within the next day or two. If you have enjoyed Missing, you may enjoy my original work and I hope that if you do find yourself buying it that you like it just as much if not more.

The name is The Hothouse Princesses, under the name S.A. Hemstock. Thanking you in advance, and thanking you for your support and attention so far!

And now, on with the show.

…..

Arnold juggled his boarding house duties and spending time at the hospital like he had never juggled before. His grades were slipping again, but his Grandpa was mollified for the moment. The boarders got their meals, the fixtures were repaired or at least repaired enough to keep them ticking until they inevitably broke down again.

Gertie was home now, and it was clear she wasn't able for her regular tasks anymore. She had picked up an infection during her stay at the hospital and she was noticeably frail, and although she could still clean and cook to an extent she tired so easily that someone else had to take over whatever she had started. She seemed slower mentally too, and she slept a lot.

They were lucky that most of the boarders had been there long enough that they had a good relationship with Phil and Gertie, but even they were getting to the end of their patience with how slow everything had become. They sometimes murmured about paying lower rent, and Phil refused to discuss the matter with them because lowering the rent would mean the entire boarding house going under.

Still, the boarding house was hardly a concern for Arnold; he was reading up about catatonia, brain injury and memory loss. Medical journals were incomprehensible but he had found some decent sources in layman's terms that described the recovery period for people who had experienced these things.

What he learned, mostly, is that brain-injured patients were unpredictable. Helga's doctor had mentioned that she had developed traumatic encephalopathy as a result of being shot in the head and that it would take a long time to figure out exactly how much damage had been done, but he told Arnold to watch out for signs of aggression, loss of focus and sudden clumsiness.

So far, she had been doing well. She was attending physiotherapy to get her walking again, she was always happy to see visitors and she was doing everything she was supposed to. Her memory was coming back in little trickles. She seemed perfectly okay, really. The only symptom of note was that she had some extreme food aversions; she wouldn't eat any kind of meat, or food that was mixed up. Every ingredient had to be separate and eaten slowly, one by one. When you asked her, she couldn't say why, but putting a pork chop or a bowl of curry in front of her induced wincing at the very least and vomiting at most.

It was only a matter of time. Both Arnold and Phoebe were dreading the day she'd remember what her father had done to her, and what had followed.

…..

Arnold, I just got in and she's not here.

The doctor said she remembered

something but wouldn't talk about it.

I don't know what to do.

Hang tight, I'll be

there soon. I'm on the bus.

Jesus Christ, just when I thought

it was all going well! What are we

going to do?

Don't panic, she can't

have gone far. She

can't walk.

I'm serious, Arnold! Goddammit, I

thought the nurses were keeping

an eye on her.

When he arrived, he exchanged two words with Phoebe before she was rushing to the nurse's station. She was white as a sheet, trembling. Whatever had happened, it was pretty bad. He figured it was best to go to Helga's room, maybe it would give an indication of where she had gone.

And when he got there, he spotted what Phoebe had clearly missed in her panic; Helga's IV pole was still there, just dragged over to one side.

"Helga? Are you in here?" he asked.

There was a quiet answering cough from under the bed.

He crouched down low on the floor. He couldn't see her at first, the hospital bed's crank and gears blocked his vision, but when he looked a little closer he could just about spot her foot at the far side, near the wall.

"What are you doing down there? How did you get down there?"

"With a lot of effort, duh," she said wearily.

He smiled, despite himself. That snippy wit of hers was making its way back, slowly and steadily.

"Phoebe texted me in a panic," he told her.

"Well, I tried to tell her I was down here but she ran off before I could. She knows I can't walk, right?"

"That's what I said."

The IV pole clattered off the side of the bed as Helga turned towards him, just enough so he could see her face.

"Do you want to tell me what happened, or would you rather not?"

She sighed, fidgeted, curled in on herself tighter.

"I remembered some stuff. It was pretty bad," she said, and he got the sense that was all she wanted to say about it.

"Are you hiding from it?"

"I don't know, going under the bed just seemed like a good idea."

It was risky to bring it up, it could just have easily been her experience at the hands of Waring that she remembered, but...

"Didn't the officer tell you that your Dad is in jail? He can't hurt you. Even if he gets out, he won't be able to get to you."

She stiffened, and in the dark her eyes were wide, horrified.

"You know?"

Arnold's stomach dropped. In his eagerness to reassure her, he'd just let her know that someone she knew had seen those pictures.

"Yeah, I...I gave the evidence to the police..." he stammered, mentally kicking himself for being so stupid. "I didn't really look, I just saw enough to know what he was doing..."

"Who else has seen them?" Helga said, her voice thick with unshed tears.

"Just me and Officer Plaskett. Phoebe knows but she hasn't seen anything."

He gulped; there was no point in keeping all the details from her now.

"Rhonda saw one, it was apparently one of the more normal ones. She just thought it was a regular picture."

"Rhonda Wellington-something? Holy shit," she laughed, half-crying. "Of all people..."

"She can't say anything though," Arnold tried to reassure her. "She sent some pictures out herself apparently... and she doesn't really talk to anyone these days anyway..."

She said nothing, but he could hear her sniffling. Her back was turned to him, she was pressed up against the wall as close as she could get.

This was exactly what the doctor had wanted to avoid. If she was ever in danger of slipping back into catatonia, it was now.

"I'm sorry," he said, helplessly, on the verge of panicking. "I'm...he's a monster. But he'll never be able to hurt you again."

That's not true. He's up for parole next year.

"Listen..." he kept going, knowing he was probably just making things worse, but what else could he do? "Most people would have just given up if they'd been through what you've been through. You never gave up, you kept going even when it nearly killed you."

She was still silent, but her sniffles had died down a little.

"They convicted him after you went missing, with whatever evidence they had, but they never got to hear your story. You can change that now. You can put him away for longer."

"I can't even get out of this bed without help," she said. She sounded worn out, already on the verge of sleep.

"Well, yeah," he nodded. "But you have help. You have me, and Phoebe...and that Ambrose guy, I think he'd do anything for you. You have Officer Plaskett...hell, that's just now, wait until people in Hillwood find out you're alive!"

The D-notice at the hospital was being upheld until the doctors thought Helga was strong enough to face media attention. What little had been told to the press was that a patient had woken up from a long sleep, and it was going relatively unnoticed.

"Your father ruined your life," he said. "We're going to give it back to you, one way or the other. People will be falling over themselves to give you back your life."

The silence stretched between them. Had she gone back to sleep? Arnold didn't think he could bear it if she had.

"Arnold?"

He was so relieved to hear her speak he nearly burst into tears himself.

"I'm kind of stuck here," she said. "Could you help me out?"

He half-laughed, half-sobbed. He hurriedly wiped his eyes and got up.

"Sure."

He pulled her out as gently as he could by her ankles, picked her up and put her back in bed. She was far too easy to carry, her spirit had had more weight in her. Even so, she didn't look as gaunt as she had when he first saw her in the hospital.

"Oh, I forgot," he said, grabbing the bag he had brought with him. "I have something for you."

Her face had lost that stricken look, he was endlessly thankful for that. She even managed to smile when she opened the bag.

"Clothes? How do you know if they'll fit?"

They were the clothes he'd bought for her ghost, and they had fit her reasonably well, but they'd probably be too big on Helga right now.

"The saleslady said they're mostly stretch to fit," he told her with a shrug. "I figured you'd be sick of wearing hospital clothes by now."

"You're a good guy," she sighed, looking on the verge of tears again. "I'm not sure I deserve you."

"Of course you do," he replied. "You deserve as much as I can give you."

She really did cry then, but she hid it by clapping her hands over her eyes, even though they were still holding one of the sweaters he'd brought for her.

"What did you do?"

Phoebe was standing in the doorway, shooting an accusatory glare at Arnold. He could only shrug in response.

…..

"Do you think she'll remember what happened when she was living in my house?"

Phoebe glanced up at him and dropped her sandwich.

"Why would she?" she replied.

"If she remembers everything else...her doctor says there's not many significant gaps except some dates, place names and people," Arnold said. "She didn't react to the clothes much, but maybe it needs a different trigger."

She could remember what happened at the pier.

He was hoping against hope that she would remember that. She had kissed him back, he knew that for certain. She had pushed him away so he wouldn't love a ghost, but she wasn't a ghost anymore. Nothing was standing in their way now...

"I've been thinking about that, actually," Phoebe began, pushing her smoothie around on her lunch tray. "Do you know what a folie á deux is?"

"Sounds familiar but no, not really," Arnold answered.

"It means the madness of two," she continued. "It's what they call it when two people share a delusion or a psychosis. I think maybe that's what we had."

"What? Phoebe, we're not insane..."

"It happens to sane people, Arnold," she said, shaking her head. "Sometimes it's due to stress...I mean, we were both finding it hard to let go of her, and when I first 'saw' her I was in the middle of a freakin' breakdown..."

"Phoebe, she wrote you notes," Arnold insisted. "She used the shower. She lead us right to the guy that took her for fuck's sake!"

"Says who?" Phoebe shrugged, her eyes lowered down at the table. "Maybe all that was just our perception. Weirder things have happened. But both you and I know that there's no such thing as ghosts, and even if there was why would we see the ghost of someone who was alive the whole time?"

He sat back, gobsmacked. It did make sense, but...

"Either way, we shouldn't bring it up with her," Phoebe said, picking up her tray with her half-eaten lunch on it. "She's got enough crap to deal with as it is."

Lunch period wasn't over yet, but evidently Phoebe was done talking. Arnold lingered at the empty table, watched her leave. People were trickling back in the direction of their next classes. Arnold picked up his milk and took a big gulp, and nearly spat it out again when someone took up Phoebe's seat across from him.

"Hey Arnold!" Gerald said.

Arnold swallowed with difficulty. He and Gerald hadn't exchanged so much as a greeting in years.

"What do you want?" he said, and it came out a little harsher than he meant it to.

"Nothing, I just wanted to see what's going on with you," Gerald shrugged and smiled his achingly familiar carefree smile.

"Gerald, you haven't spoken to me since middle school. What do you really want?"

The smile dropped, Gerald leaned back and crossed his arms.

"Fine," he snarled. "I want to know what's going on with you and Phoebe."

"What?" Arnold snorted. "Why do you care?"

"I have my reasons," Gerald replied. "She's looking better these days, you got anything to do with that?"

"God, you are such an asshole," Arnold laughed in his face. "You gave her the cold shoulder when her best friend went missing and now that she's finally doing better you're suddenly interested?"

"Look, I know I'm an asshole, okay? I don't need you to tell me that," Gerald snarled. "I was a dumb fucking kid and I didn't know what to do, sue me. If you were in my shoes you wouldn't have done much better..."

"Yes, I would have."

"Fine, you would have done better. Because you're so fucking perfect, you can solve everyone's problems. I didn't come over here to convince you I'm a good guy, okay?"

"Why did you come over here then?"

All of Gerald's anger seemed to drain out of him then, and he was slouching, awkward. He rubbed the back of his neck and met Arnold's eyes with difficulty.

"I want to know that she's happy," he said. "Is she happy?"

"Uh...yeah, I guess," Arnold said, puzzled.

"You guess?"

"She's happy as anyone could be, in these circumstances."

"Right. Well, that's all I wanted to know," said Gerald, rising to his feet. "This is going to sound weird coming from me, but...you make sure you treat her right, okay? Don't do what I did."

He didn't even wait for a reply, just strode off back to his group of friends. Arnold, baffled, went back to drinking his milk.

He only realized Gerald though he and Phoebe were dating hours later.