Adam chuckled. The sound hit me between the ribs. My mouth opened to make a flirty remark, but I shut it quickly, reminding myself of who I was, or who I was pretending to be.
I wasn’t sure I knew the difference anymore.
Chapter Eleven
Adam
Because Dr. Thompson had gone out of town, I was working with Dr. Maslow. Working with Dr. Thompson had its perks. I was able to sit in actual neurosurgeries and shadow him when patients came in. The last few weeks, I’d been jotting notes as Dr. Thompson examined patients who were recovering from strokes. It was the job I’d signed up for, the one I’d been after for as long as I could remember, but working in The Institute awakened a curiosity I didn’t have before.
And so, when Dr. Thompson left on his trip and told me to report to Dr. Maslow’s office in the morning, my excitement bubbled. I’d finally see the rest of The Institute, the areas that had been off-limits to me until that point, and to top it off, I’d get a tour from the boss himself. We were walking through the corridors of what everyone referred to as The Hotel, and I could see why. It looked like a swanky five-star, with white-glove service and everything.
“It’s like you dropped The Ritz in the middle of Ellis.”
Dr. Maslow chuckled. “We definitely took inspiration from The Ritz.”
“With a place like this, I wouldn’t mind taking a mental vacation.”
Normally, the connotations that came with mental institutions were negative—people strapped to beds, fighting their meds, getting electric shock treatments that would set their brainwaves into submission. They were all things I only knew of secondhand, due to a bipolar grandmother who spent more time in a mental institution than her own home while I was a teenager. My grandmother was one of the reasons I’d become so interested in the human mind. I figured, if I could help come up with a map for the brain and provide a solution that wasn’t as invasive as the ones I’d seen her endure growing up, I could make a real difference in the world. My family said I took after my mother, while my brother took after our father, but I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t straitlaced or perfect, but I did appreciate structure, which was something Nolan hated.
“This is where you’ll be working this week.” Dr. Maslow stopped walking in front of an office and led me in. It was a small office, all white, the only pop of color coming from the plush navy blue lounge couch in the corner. “There’s a questionnaire on the iPad that you’ll use whenever a patient comes in, you’ll ask the questions, press the answer, and that’s it. Simple. It’s connected to my server, so I’ll get the answers automatically and be prepared when I see the patients.”
“Sounds simple enough.” I nodded once, looking from the iPad on the desk to the large window behind it. “I’m surprised you have glass windows.”
“Hurricane impact,” Dr. Maslow said. “No way anyone can jump through them.”
“Oh.”
I’d never heard of anyone who had hurricane impact windows. We were so inland that the only thing we ever got was severe snowstorms during winter. The chance of Ellis ever being hit by a hurricane was precisely zero, but the forethought of someone here trying to break through it and jump to their death was pretty smart. Of course, when I paused to think about it, I wondered if anyone would try that. Even in movies jumpers sought the roof, but people couldn’t be underestimated.
“Come. I’ll show you the rest of it.”
I followed Dr. Maslow out of the office and down the hall again. The spaces opened into large, open areas, where people sat and watched television. Some were knitting, others were reading books, and some were talking amongst themselves. They all wore sweatpants and T-shirts or sweatpants and sweatshirts and even though their sneakers had no laces, they were still clean Nikes. Everyone was definitely under thirty and they all looked like they were here willingly, which, I knew couldn’t be the case for all. As we walked, Dr. Maslow pointed out things along the way—cafeteria, which looked like the five-star restaurant it was, two game rooms, where I saw even more people who looked like they could be enrolled in Ellis University, playing air hockey and table tennis. By the end of the tour, I was convinced The Institute was indeed the best hospital, mental or otherwise, that existed in the entire U.S.
When Dr. Maslow left, I walked back to the office, and waited for my first patient. The questions were simple, but they took their time answering them, as if they were scared there was another part to all of this. It gave me pause, but not enough to question them. Besides, that wasn’t the job I was here to do. I was cleaning the iPad and clicking back to the beginning of a new questionnaire when there was a knock on the already open door. I signaled for them to come inside without looking up; the damn iPad was frozen on the last person’s signature. Still not glancing up, I sighed.
“Give me a second please.” I jabbed on the screen, trying to get a response and set it down while picking up a pen to jot things down with my other hand. While the technology sorted itself out, I’d have to write everything down freehand, the way Freud would have. The way Maslow would have.
“Name?” I asked.
“Stella,” the voice said. My entire body went cold, then hot, as I glanced up and looked at the girl sitting across from me. “Stella Thompson.”
“Hey.” I was still frowning and felt it deepen when I took in her appearance.
“Um. Hey.” She frowned back slightly.
I had always been intuitive. It was something my brother and closest friends relied on me for. Nolan had been burned too many times by friends that I hadn’t approved of from the get-go, so he’d made it a thing to bring over new friends and get my okay on them first. I’d always been intuitive, but I’d be the first to tell you I didn’t believe in gut feelings or otherworldly things. I may be in a secret society that was headed by men devoted to the Catholic Church, but they were also devoted to science, and that was what I appreciated. I didn’t react based on emotions, but facts. When others reacted, I waited. It was why my intuition was rarely wrong. It was why I was good at poker. Looking at Stella, sitting across from me, I felt . . . confused, my intuition absent. I’d seen her, what, an hour ago? Maybe two? And she hadn’t been wearing a gray hoodie and her hair had been straight, not short and in tight curls, like this.
“What are you doing here?”
“What do you mean?” She rolled her neck left to right, then right to left. “What are you doing here? What are any of us doing here?”
My pulse roared as I set my pen down. “Why did you say that?”
“Say what?”
“What you just said.”
“I . . . I don’t know. It’s just something I say.” She frowned again.
“Yeah, right.” I shook my head. She was trying to play head games with me. I didn’t know why or when or how she’d changed her appearance so suddenly, but she wasn’t going to get under my skin. “So, Stella Thompson, how are you feeling today?”
“Fine. Same as yesterday. They changed my pillows though, so my neck hurts a little less.”
“Your neck was hurting because of your pillow?”