Chapter 6, continued
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"What is the last thing you remember?" Mara bit her lip and tried to decide what to answer. She could tell the truth and be admitted, or she could lie and have the beneficial prospect of being considered sane. She didn't know what to do. The thing was, she knew what she had seen, just like she knew that what was going on was not normal. She was attacked, oh yeah, Mara was convinced of that now, but she wasn't attacked by anything that some detective was going to catch.
"I. . . I don't know," she answered. She squirmed under Don's stare. He was taking in everything. Sucking up her facial expressions like some kind of dust-buster. His voice was calm and coaxing when he spoke next,
"Yes you do. Think about it." Mara sat silently. She really wanted to answer him. Maybe if her mom hadn't been in the room, she could have; but she didn't want to see the expression on her mother's face when she realized that her eldest daughter was completely insane. Don smiled at her,
"Alright. Let's do it the easy way. Do you remember your fourteenth birthday?"
Mara couldn't help but let out a smile, "Yes," she said.
"How about the last week of school? Remember that?" Mara smiled again,
"Yes, I remember last week."
"Okay, how about fighting with your mom?" Her mom made a muffled kind of grunt next to Mara, but she kept her eyes focused on his, and his gaze didn't falter for a moment, either.
"Yes," Mara answered. Her smile had slipped off her face though, just as Don's face had faded from friendly to intense.
"Going upstairs?"
"Yes."
Don nodded. "Well that's where you lose me, kid. Once you went up those stairs, my tunnel's pretty dark. So anything after that helps." Mara looked back down at the white blankets across her legs, she was chewing on her lip again. Don shifted so that she had to look up. "What was the first thing you did when you went upstairs?" Mara closed her eyes. Not answering wasn't gonna cut it.
"I went to my room. I was really mad and I laid on my bed. I called Juji." Don's eyebrows raised, and Mara wondered. Had she already said something useful? But he didn't comment, he simply inclined his head to ask her to go on. "Then. . . I felt bad, so I went to find Chailyn and say I was sorry. But. . ."
Don was watching her intently, "But what?"
"But I couldn't find her. She wasn't in her room. I called, but then I. . ." she bit her lip. "I heard a noise in the attic. So I went back to her closet where it leads to the attic. And. . ." She stopped. The time had come to make a decision and Mara didn't know what to do. She closed her eyes. She had to help Chailyn now, but she couldn't do that from the psychiatric ward, she also couldn't do it without help. She threw a sidelong glance at her mother. "And that's all I remember." Mara dropped her eyes again and tried to block out the image of her baby sister lying bloody on the floor. A tear slid out of the corner of her eye. She looked up, Don was watching intently. "I. . . I'm sorry."
Don nodded, looking grim and. . .unconvinced. Mara turned and stared fixedly at the wall. She heard Don slowly stand up. In a low voice he said, "Mrs. Richard, I need to speak with you." Mara's mom reached to her and turned her face toward her.
"Are you all right?" She asked quietly. Mara forced a small smile,
"Yea. I'm not gonna relapse again." For the first time, the attendant in the corner moved.
"Ma'am? If I may say so, her stats look stable. I think she'll be fine for the moment. I'll be here if anything happens, but that's very doubtful." Mara's mom stretched her features in a weak smile, gave Mara a sidelong glance, and stepped out of the room after Don.
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