The Last Girl: A gripping psychological thriller with a killer twist Page 18

Floyd took his time smiling. Not that he didn’t want to. He just didn’t want to hang onto false hopes. “What do you mean?”

  “A steadier heartbeat. No fluctuations,” she said. “Probably because her beloved husband never leaves her bedside.”

  Floyd smiled feebly. “I’m a bit skeptical about my presence helping her.”

  “I noticed,” she said. “Also, the nurse told me.” She tucked her hands in her white coat and approached him. She stood next to him, staring out the window then pointed at the book in his hand. “Then why are you reading to her?”

  Floyd stared at the book. He’d somehow forgotten about it. It had been a good read, he had to admit to himself. Only disadvantage was that waking up from the fantasy world of ink and paper was a disappointment. “The nurse told me reading to August helps keep her mind alert.”

  “But you said you don’t believe in your presence helping her, let alone reading books to her.”

  “I’m human.” He smirked like he had a toothache. “I don’t always act on my beliefs.”

  “It’s because you’d do anything for her.” She gently touched his arm. “Even if it contradicts your own beliefs.”

  Floyd shrugged, looking out the window. “Of course. I’d do anything to bring her back.”

  “She hasn’t gone anywhere.”

  “True.” He nodded. “But I miss talking to her.”

  “You know what I think?”

  He turned to face her.

  “Though you claim you don’t believe, you actually do,” she said. “Deep inside you, there is this nagging voice that calls for hope and miracles.”

  He couldn’t debate her, so he remained silent.

  “You’re a practical man. Your men use science to search for surviving passengers from the crashed plane now. Your life is calculated and factual with no room for glitches or errors.”

  “I hate glitches and errors.”

  “I love them.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “In my book, glitches and errors are miracles,” she said. “Wouldn’t you love for a glitch to wake up August?”

  He nodded again.

  “It doesn’t matter how much you resist the idea. We all believe in something bigger, an unreasonable hope that defies all the science in the world.”

  “Are you telling me that, scientifically, August will never wake up, but that I should still hope by reading her the books she loves?”

  “I didn’t say that. In fact, scientifically, she feels you and maybe hears you when you’re beside her. Studies have shown us this, but not conclusively.”

  “If it’s not conclusive then it’s not scientifically proven…”

  “Yet,” She raised a finger. “Science is like a baby. It still crawls. It’s still new. And it needs nurturing.”

  “I’m not here to debate you, Dr. Hope,” he said. “It’s good to know that August’s vital signs improved, but it’s not because of me. I’ve been nearby for the last three years”

  “It must be the book then. You have never read to her before.”

  Floyd was about to counter the argument but felt he couldn’t. The book did mean a lot to August.

  “My grandmother used to tell me that books save lives,” Dr. Hope said.

  “My men in the field save lives.”

  “It doesn’t mean that books don’t,” she said. “Do you know why we tell stories?”

  “To kill time?” he said.

  “No.” She chuckled. “We tell stories to share.”

  “Share what?”

  “Experiences, life, and dreams, and sometimes a few facts.”

  “This book is fiction.” He pointed at the one in his hand.

  “Fiction is only facts retold,” she said. “Fact is what inspires fiction. They feed each other.”

  “Sounds like too much of a twist on words to me.” He glanced at his phone back by the chair, wondering why Dixon hadn’t called yet.

  “Words are fuel for our thoughts, and thoughts are the basis of creation,” she said.

  He tried not to belittle her by laughing. He was a polite man but had no interest in poetic metaphors and over-the-top quotes about life.

  “Let me ask you this,” she said. “How long have you been reading to August?”

  “A few hours.”

  “The book is that good?” She winked.

  He chuckled. He had to give it to her. She didn’t give up, just like August.

  “Actually, it is that good,” he said. “I was about to read the second part. The first was about a courageous girl who survived a plane crash.”

  “Sounds promising.”

  “She not only managed to survive for eleven days but used her hallucinations as fuel to keep her mind from collapsing—” Floyd realized he’d just agreed with Dr. Hope’s assumptions.

  “See?” She winked again. “The girl used the power of fantasy to survive the real world.”

  “Hmm. It’s still fiction.”

  Dr. Hope grimaced all of a sudden. He didn’t want to offend her. Her belief in fantasy fueling reality seemed to be a dear idea to her, though she was a neurosurgeon.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “It’s not that.” She put a finger on her chin. “Did you say the girl in the book survived using her hallucinations?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was her name again?”

  “Uhm.. Koepcke. Juliane Koepcke,” he said. “It took me a time to pronounce it. German.”

  “Show me, please.” She snatched the book from his hand and read the title, then she raised her eyes to meet his. “Is this your wife’s favorite book?”

  He nodded, wondering what the fuss was all about.

  “Mr. Floyd, this book you’re reading…”

  “What about it?”

  “It isn’t fiction,” Dr. Hope said. “This really happened.”

  81

  My daughter is dead. I’ve been chasing shadows of regret. I was once a mother, the worst mother of all.

  Dr. Suffolk tells me I need to be alone and think things over, maybe remember and confirm he is telling me the truth. My next dose of medicine is in one hour. Turns out the syringes are sedatives that help me with my withdrawals.

  Until three days ago I’d been advancing my recovery, until I slipped again and fancied a toot of cocaine. No one knows how I obtained it, but they suggested that I certainly like to call my secret dealer Manfred Toot.

  Why Manfred? They have no idea. I’m the one who knows but can’t remember.

  I ask him about the correlation of forgetting and cocaine. He drops some medical terms on me, and I end up with no definite answer.

  I end up asking for permission to take a bath and change my clothes again. My mind is too much on fire. I’d like to think that soaking myself in water will cool it down.

  He leaves, and so do the nurses.

  A few minutes later, I’m in the bathtub, not quite present, not quite alive.

  The water pouring into the bathtub is hot, but I’m still cold. My body and soul are numb to exterior circumstances. The world is spinning around me, yet it’s still. I’m alive, yet I’m dead. I’m June, yet I’m not summer.

  Fuck, I hate my mind so much. I wish I could live without it for a while. It doesn’t leave me alone though. It offers me another suggestion: what if I fall asleep and slide deep underwater and just die? Will dying ever solve the mystery of living?

  Thankfully my body opposes the idea, and I keep my head rested on the edge of the bathtub, staring at the ceiling again.

  It’s a white ceiling. A blank slate, like a movie screen, just before they put the projector on. How I wish this could be my life. How I wish I could just write it from scratch. A new beginning. A new novel. I’d write a happy beginning, a perfect childhood. A rough middle, crisis and learning and growing up. An even happier ending, modest but with children and grandchildren and the feeling of having contributed to the world. Then I’d scribble the words the en
d at the bottom of the last page and send it for publication. And for years after I’m dead, people will remember me. Yes, how I wish I’d be remembered, not for being a crack whore, or even insane, but for having left a unique footprint on the map of mankind.

  “Fuck me to the grave,” I mumble, washing my face with water.

  I look away from the ceiling. None of my memories have come back yet. Nothing but assumptions, and facts told by people I don’t trust. I glance at the needle marks on my hand. If one thing is definite it’s my addiction. There’s evidence I can’t deny. I’m an addict, a slave to the needle, and the worst kind of mother.

  Tears trickles down my face, like water from a stone. Did my daughter really die when I was a teenager? Did I fuck up her life by being a crackhead whore at fourteen?

  Your daughter is closer to you than you could even imagine.

  Adriana’s words ring in my head. A momentary hope flutters in my chest, but I remember… Adriana doesn’t exist. I’ve been in this room for three years. I’ve never left. The walls of concrete are simply the inner walls of my brain. I can write on these walls all I want. None of it will ever be real.

  I’ve been trapped inside my brain, trying to escape my shameful past. A prisoner of my own regrets and addiction.

  An agonizing chuckle chatters out of my chest when I remember the phrase a toot of cocaine. Oh, the mysterious ways the mind works.

  I find myself looking for a sharp instrument in the bathroom. The nurses told me they made sure I never had one, since I’ve attempted suicide a couple of times in the past. Dr. Suffolk explained that this is why I imagined the sharp shard of glass as an instrument on an imaginary operating table. I was feeding my suicidal needs, that’s all. Now, that I’ve seen the room outside my bathroom has no operating table, I can’t argue about it.

  Yet I stand up and look for a sharp instrument.

  My naked figure in the mirror supports Dr. Suffolk’s story. Tattoos everywhere. Tattoos I’ve never seen before—or so I deluded myself into thinking.

  The needle marks cover the length of my lower arm. Some are big enough to be cigarette burns. Maybe they are. Something tells me they’re called track marks. Maybe I’m remembering. A few of them show on my left hand, left leg, and left thigh. I’m right handed, so I must have been injecting myself. Maybe for years. There are also cuts on my right thigh. Not needle marks. Razor cuts. I’ve been cutting myself.

  How haven’t I seen any of this before, or is it that we only see what we want to see?

  Like a stranger, my skinny figure approaches the mirror. She hates me, but I don’t hate her. I want the best for her. She won’t let me. She is my past. I’m her future. But she is going to win. My daughter is dead. There is no point in arguing with her—or living.

  I glance at the only thing I’m wearing. The wristband. I check it out one last time:

  June West. Ready.

  At least I didn’t imagine that, whatever Ready means. As for my name, it makes sense now that I remember the soldiers asking me not to look west. My name is June West. In my crack-head, toot-infested reality, I made sure I never saw my real self. Just like in the mirror.

  I wanted to live my fantasy of a good mother trying to save her daughter. I didn’t want to look at west.

  The real June West.

  Me.

  I bang my head into the mirror and enjoy my cracked reflection. I locate the sharpest splinter and pull it out. My grip is too tight. I’m bleeding already. Slowly, I’m bringing the edge toward my wrist. It’s time to end this mess, but then the loud blare in my ears returns…

  82

  I’m back in the fissure. In that place in the bottom of that place I can’t accurately describe. The blaring horn is as loud. I’m so sure it’s the horn of a car now. Its noise is so amplified that I imagine it’s very near.

  The water is covering half my horizontally stretched body. Soon it will cover me. Soon I will drown.

  My body is weak. I can hardly move. My eyelids are drooping, giving in to the pain. I have nothing to rely on but my will to live. Where does it come from? I have an idea.

  My right arm is still stuck underneath that dead person next to me. I have no energy to look again but try to see his face.

  My left arm seems numb. Knowing it’s the arm I shot with cocaine, I force myself to look at it. My neck burns with pain. I think part of it cracks. Now that it’s twisted sideways, I don’t think I can move it back again. I see my arm. It’s there. It’s not cut. I just can’t feel it because of the needle stuck in it. I must have just had my fix. Or is it that I’m overdosing and dying?

  I don’t think so.

  I might be dying, but not because of the drug. I’ve been in some kind of accident. The man next to me has something to do with it. Did I fall out of the plane into a fissure in the earth? What a silly thought.

  A breeze reminds me there is a world outside. I look up and see the faint opening. It’s nighttime. A shy moon looms behind some faraway clouds. The sound of waves is audible in the distance. I hope I’m not imagining it.

  “Mommy!”

  Her voice brings a tear to my eye. I know she isn’t there. She is dead.

  I close my eyes, praying for her. May my daughter have a good afterlife, if there is one. May she forgive. May I burn in hell, so she can live.

  Her voice disappears. I still feel the pain, whether she is near or far. It’s never going to be all right, either way.

  When I open my eyes, the light above is partially gone. The silhouette of a man is blocking it. He is back. I can’t see his face or what he is wearing. I feel that I know him. His smell is the same. That of oil from a car. Images of the Furnace attack me. The tires and car tools I saw there. Is he a mechanic?

  “Let’s make babies.” He snickers, sounding drunk or high. Why not—maybe he’s an addict. Maybe he is my dealer.

  “What do you want from me?” I manage to say. “Who are you?

  “Don’t you know me, Tootsie?”

  “Tootsie?”

  “Tootsie is what they call young American brats, don’t they?”

  His silhouette gets bigger. I think that at a certain angle, I’ll be able to see his face.

  “Mommy!” My daughter’s voice returns.

  I’m afraid this man will hurt her, and suddenly I realize he is the same man from the memory I had on the ledge. I realize the girl’s voice is the same too.

  BUT YOU HAVE NEVER BEEN ON THE LEDGE!

  Though I know I’m not awake—whether daydreaming or hallucinating or remembering—it feels so real. Undeniable. How do I know? The fucking pain is so real.

  “She won’t hear you.” The silhouette snickers again. “Mommy is dead.”

  What the fuck did he just say? I don’t understand. I wriggle, trying to pull my right arm from under the man next to me. It still won’t budge. I want to kick the silhouette, but I can hardly move my legs. All I can do is spit on him.

  “Bitch!” He roars with anger and rams a hand into my face.

  Blood spatters out and I feel my guts churn.

  “Let’s make Nazi babies.” He grunts, coming closer. “Just like I did with her—and the others.”

  I shiver at the smell of his sweat. I shiver at almost knowing who he is. What this is. I shiver as I realize what he meant by “Mommy is dead.”

  He spells it out to me, as I sense warm fluid running down my thighs. “If you call for your mommy one more time, there will be no toots for you again.”

  83

  Somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean

  The two divers, Jack and Irene, sat by the boat’s edge, ready to put on their masks. They held to each other as the boat rocked to the pissed-off ocean and the angry wind.

  “Sure you want to do this?” Jack said.

  Irene nodded, checking on her oxygen tank.

  “I need to hear you say it,” Jack insisted. He was twenty-six and had his life ahead of him. So was Irene. It wasn’t his idea to save the last girl. He’d have pr
eferred to go home, prepare for their wedding next week, instead of a coffin sent back to his family in Portland Oregon if he didn’t make it tonight.

  “I want to do this.” Irene, the love of his life, shouted against the wind. “It’s our job.”

  “It’s also a hundred other people’s job.”

  “They’re cowards,” she rocked to the boat. “We’re not.”

  “I don’t mind us being cowards and living long enough to have children and raise them.”

  “You don’t have to come, Jack,” she said. “I can do it.”

  “You think I’ll leave you?” he said. “Till death do us apart, remember?”

  “We haven’t taken vows yet. You can still walk,” she said. She wasn’t angry. He knew she loved him. But Irene was Irene. She would not let anyone die on her shift without making sure she did all she could. If there was still a last girl, she had to try to save her.

  “What if that last girl doesn’t deserve to live?” Jack tried to persuade her otherwise.

  “We save lives, Jack, not nuns or saints.”

  “I fucking love you,” he said, ready to put on his mask.

  “Me toot,” she said.

  “What did you just say?”

  “Me too,” she repeated. “Stop talking. Let’s go get her.”

  Jack reached for Irene and grabbed her closer, risking a fall from the boat, and kissed her as hard as he could. It wasn’t a gentle kiss. A rough one with all the intensity he had. As if saying goodbye. As if implying it could be their last kiss. He was sucking her soul into his and she took his in as well.

  “I wish you kissed me like that all the time,” she teased him.

  “I promise I will if you promise not to die,” he said. “You’re fucking twenty-two years old. We could have children and—”

  “We could grow old together, I know,” she said. “But what do I tell our children if they asked me what I do for a living?”

  “You saved lives, that’s what you tell them.” Jack said, realizing Irene had trapped him into a corner again with her smart words.

  She tilted her head with victory. “Then let’s save lives, Jack, or we’d be lying to our future children.”