“Sorry,” Tina said. “I don’t. You kept saying you were going to get out of here. That’s it. I thought you were joking.”
Sage considered what she said. Maybe Rosemary had escaped after all. Maybe Wayne had helped, or maybe she’d done it on her own. The latter seemed more likely after what Tina said about Wayne; it didn’t seem possible that he could have dragged her out of there kicking and screaming without someone noticing. But where would she have gone? And how was she surviving?
Then she had another thought, one that hadn’t occurred to her until now, and her heart constricted. What if Rosemary had escaped and was lying dead out in the woods somewhere, slowly being buried beneath the snow?
“Hey,” she said. “This is probably another stupid question, but is there any way to get a cigarette around here?” Asking was probably pointless—even if she could sneak a smoke somewhere, she’d get in trouble if she got caught—but it was worth a try. She needed something, anything, to calm her nerves.
Tina crossed her arms and gave her a stern look. “Now, why would you want one of those nasty things?”
Sage shrugged one shoulder. “I don’t know, just to try something different.”
“Well, that would be really dumb. And I don’t know anything about that stuff anyway. You sure they didn’t do something to your brain while you were gone?”
Marla yelled at them from across the room. “Let’s go, ladies! Stop your lollygagging and move it!”
Tina looked over her shoulder, then grabbed Sage’s hand and pulled her toward the door. “Come on, we gotta go.”
Startled, Sage yanked her hand from her grasp. Tina turned to face her, a confused, wounded look pulling at her face.
“What’s wrong?” she said.
“I’m not . . .” Sage began, then stopped. She couldn’t tell the truth about why she had pulled away because it was senseless and cruel; letting Tina take her hand would mean she was one of them, one of the tormented souls who called Willowbrook home. And she would never be one of them. She wouldn’t let it happen. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’ve been feeling sick and I don’t want you to catch anything from me.”
“Well, that stinks,” Tina said. “I hope you feel better soon because I’m really happy you’re back.”
“Thanks,” Sage said. Then, before she could ask where they were going, Tina turned and headed toward the door. Sage rubbed her arms and followed, hoping she hadn’t upset the only person who’d been decent to her since she arrived. She needed an ally, someone who knew the ins and outs of Willowbrook and might be able to help her find Rosemary. But it was true that she wasn’t feeling well. Her stomach churned with acid and fear. Then she had an idea. Maybe if she told someone she was ill, they’d let her see a doctor; maybe even someone besides Dr. Baldwin.
Nearing the door, she approached Marla with one hand on her stomach. Marla had just finished separating two girls who’d been screeching and yanking on each other’s hair, and now she stood between them with her arms out, like a referee between two boxers.
“I’m sorry to bother you, but—” Sage started.
“What is it?” Marla said, giving her a surly look.
“I think something’s wrong with me,” Sage said. “I need to see a doctor.” She bent forward and winced, pretending to be in pain.
Marla shot the girls a threatening glare, then dropped her arms and looked Sage up and down, her lips pursed. “You need stitches?”
Sage shook her head.
“You dying?”
She shook her head again.
“Well then,” Marla said, “you know the rules. No blood, no broken bones, no impending death, no doctor.” She gestured toward the wooden carts lined up against the far wall. “Now make yourself useful and grab a cripple cart.”
“But my stomach,” Sage said. “What if my appendix is about to burst or my spleen ruptured?”
Marla put her hands on her hips. “Are you really testing me again, girl? What in tarnation got into you while you were out doing whatever it was you were doing? You need to remember who’s in charge around here. Now get your ass over to those cripple carts before I call Nurse Vic and have her straighten you out.”
Sage opened her mouth to respond, but Marla turned and limped away.
Fighting the urge to scream in frustration, Sage looked around for Tina but didn’t see her anywhere. She made her way through the crowd over to the line of carts, dodging unruly legs and reaching hands and swaying heads. If the attendants didn’t allow the residents to see a doctor when they were hurt or sick, how would she ever talk to anyone besides Dr. Baldwin? How would she ever find someone who would listen or care? She tried to calm down. If Marla wouldn’t listen to her, maybe someone else would. Maybe she and the other residents were leaving the ward to go to a cafeteria where a sympathetic lunch lady would believe her, or a classroom where a caring teacher would realize she was telling the truth. She took the handles of a cart and looked down at the silent occupant of the wooden box, an adolescent girl wearing nothing but a cloth diaper and staring at the ceiling. No blanket lined the box; not even a thin sheet or a flat pillow. Despite feeling anything but friendly, Sage tried to smile at her to show her she cared, but the girl gave no indication of awareness. Sage thought about saying hello and asking if she was okay but didn’t think she could do it without crying. The horror and heartbreak of the poor girl’s nightmarish existence—along with every other tormented soul struggling to survive inside Willowbrook—felt as thick and heavy as breathing lead. Instead of trying to communicate, Sage pushed the cart toward the door, concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other, and tried not to run into anyone or step on anything. All she could do now was stay out of trouble and pray for something to change.
Marla propped open both sides of the double door, then steered one of the wheelchair-bound residents into the hall. The rest of the residents followed, those who could walk pushing the ones in the wooden carts and wheelchairs. Out in the hall, more residents and attendants spilled chaotically out of the other wards to join the crowd—young girls and teenagers and adult women; some moving zombie-like, gangly and awkward and slow, others trying to hurry forward, pushing and bumping into everyone around them. Through the open doors of one ward, Sage could see what seemed like a hundred naked women on the floor, sitting or squatting or kneeling or cross-legged or bent over, but all of them rocking, moving, swaying. No beds filled the room. No tables or chairs. Just women.
Sage looked everywhere for her sister, searching every face in the wards and hall. With this many people in one building, she thought it would have been easy for Rosemary to return, unseen and overlooked, to get lost in the endless hordes of women and girls crammed into one floor—especially when so many looked so similar, with hollow faces and vacant eyes, thin limbs and snarled hair. Finding her sister among the other residents was improbable, but she could hope.
Shouting orders for everyone to keep moving, the ward attendants herded the residents forward, funneling them into the main hallway like animals into a processing chute, squeezing them between the beds and carts on both sides. Everyone stood too close. They crowded Sage’s space and pressed nearer and nearer and nearer. She was jostled and shoved, her feet were stepped on, and her elbows were knocked into her ribs. It sounded like thousands of people were shouting and weeping, mumbling and screaming. Between feeling crushed, the chaotic din echoing off the walls, and the horrible stench that hung like a thick haze in the air, she could hardly breathe.