Jesus Christ.
I flip the channel.
This is going to be worse than last time. Now that I’m over eighteen, all bets are off. I’m fair game.
They think I know where he is. They think I helped him. They think I’m protecting a man who stole from grieving families and tried to kill me and my whole family. But do I think he’s alive?
No. Yes.
The real truth? I don’t know. Because I saw him go. And I know they told me it was a hallucination, I know the DNA test results, I know the evidence. I know and yet…the body in the study wasn’t wearing his jacket. It didn’t feel like him. It just didn’t. And I don’t know where he is, or where the money is, and I don’t know the whys of any of it, but—do I think he’s alive? Yes. I think of Matthew in his hospital room, and I can’t help but wonder if locked away inside him is some kind of answer. After all, he was looking for me.
On the next TV station one of the bombing survivors speaks to the camera: “Who exactly paid for this woman’s medical training? That’s what I’d like to know. Isn’t it a bit convenient that all that money disappeared and she shows up fourteen years later a doctor? We should be asking where the money for that came from. Why haven’t the police followed up on that?”
Chris, who has come up behind me unnoticed, gently takes the remote from my tight grip and turns off the blaring screen. I realize I haven’t blinked for a while, and it feels strange to do so now. He pulls me in close to him and I let him. It feels so good to be held.
“Call your family,” he whispers gently. “Let them know you’re okay.”
I call Joe, it’s a brief conversation. His voice is tight and it’s blindingly obvious that I should have followed his advice on Friday, although he does me the extraordinary kindness of not bringing that up. He’s going straight to Mum’s, he tells me. She’s seen the news. Apparently, there are already people outside her house. I feel awful. The guilt is almost too much to bear. And even though it feels ridiculous to be giving my brother advice, I feel obligated to give him the same warning Peter gave me. “Don’t talk to anyone, Joe, don’t answer the phone unless you know who it is first.”
I want to call Mum but I can’t. The guilt is too sharp. I don’t think I’d be able to hold it together. And I definitely don’t want her to feel she needs to reassure me. God, I don’t think I could handle her being brave for me. I text her that I love her and I’m sorry and I leave it at that.
At 8 A.M. Peter calls.
“Listen, Emma, we’re happy to accept your resignation. If you’re not up to continuing, we completely understand. The press attention is fairly unprecedented, and given the circumstances, if you’d rather take some time for yourself, to be with your family…”
I’ve thought a lot about it this morning, about what Peter might say when he rang, why on earth they chose me in the first place, why they’d want such a media liability hanging over their heads, and it occurs to me that I still don’t even know who Peter works for. I don’t even know that much. It is entirely possible that I’m here to deliberately make people look bad, that that’s my whole purpose.
Because how convenient for some if this whole situation were to become a media disaster. Wouldn’t that be perfect? Wouldn’t a series of monumental blunders before election season be just the sort of thing that might serve certain people very well? A government scandal, an immigration scare, and good old-fashioned healthcare mismanagement all rolled into one. A winning formula for someone.
But none of that is important. What’s important to me now is Matthew. Finding out who he is. We’re in this together, he and I. I promised him.
“I think I’ll stay, actually, Peter,” I say. “There’s not a lot of point in leaving now anyway, I’m guessing the damage has been done. Today will be the worst of it, I’m sure it’ll settle down afterward. And I’m supposed to be here to help Matthew. I’d like something good to come of all this. I’ll just keep going, if that still works for everyone?”
Peter hesitates on the line, he obviously wasn’t expecting me to say that. But then, what can he do? He can’t fire me, I’m sure of that; I’m fairly certain that dismissing someone because they have an inconvenient history is completely illegal—even more so if you knew that history prior to employing them.
“Yes, yes, of course. If you’re sure you’re happy to continue?” he replies cautiously. “We can do our best to make sure you’re protected to a certain degree from the backlash, but there would be only so much we can do….”
“That’s fine, Peter. There’s security at the hospital for Matthew. Officer Poole is here and Officer Graceford has said she’ll shadow me at least for today, and after that…well, I’m sure I’ll be fine. I’d only be facing the same thing if I was to go back to London.”
* * *
—
I follow behind Chris’s squad car as we head to the hospital. He leads me in through the back entrance, to keep me away from the growing crowd at the front. I park my little rental car in the service area and head in as Chris watches from his car. I don’t know why I haven’t been parking there from the beginning, I guess no one thought to tell me, but I’m grateful for it today.
Thankfully, I don’t see the extent of the crowd outside the hospital until I’m safely in my office up on the fourth floor. I look down at it through the thin hospital glass, and my stomach flips, the drop below dizzying. The whole thing takes on a surrealist quality from this vantage point, my fear of heights kicking into overdrive as the rush of vertigo makes everything swirl at the edges. Below, the oblivious carnival of media, picketers, and protesters is still awaiting my arrival. I realize I’ve become politicized. Matthew and I both. We aren’t people to them right now, we’re symbols. The car park below, littered with protesters from all over the country on pilgrimages with their homemade signs, proves as much. We have been chosen against our will. A man with no memory and a woman with too much. And our fellow villagers, carrying placards instead of pitchforks, have come to drive us out.
They want to know where I’ve been for the last fourteen years. They want to know where their money is, the money my father stole before he disappeared. That’s all they cared about before and I’m guessing it’s all they care about now. They think I know where the money is hidden, as if it were pirate treasure only I have the map to find. But I don’t have a map. And I don’t know where the treasure is buried. That much we all have in common. That and the fact that they don’t believe he’s dead either.
I think of Matthew in his room on the ward two floors below me.
I let my mind go to a place I haven’t let it yet. I know the thought is slippery and dangerous but I indulge it for a moment. A man shows up, out of the blue, who knows my real name, he knows what happened fourteen years ago, and he says he’s been looking for me.