Dreamers Often Lie Read Free

the entire right side of my face felt tender and hot, like it had when we were little and Sadie accidentally bashed me in the eye with a Little League bat. I raised a hand to touch it, but taped tubes and needles jerked my arm back. “Wait.” The sparkling whiteness and fog and bloody roses were piling up again. “I hit a tree?”
    “You were unconscious for a while.” Sadie rearranged one of the tubes I’d pulled out of place. “There’s a fracture in your skull. But the doctors don’t think it’s too serious. There’s no bleeding in your brain or anything.”
    The words—
skull, fracture, bleeding in the brain
—seemed to belong to someone else. Someplace else. They slithered out of my reach. I closed my eyes, hoping Sadie wouldn’t see how lost I was.
    Her voice had been so bland. So factual. So well-rehearsed.
    “Sadie . . .” My throat burned. “Have you told me all of this before?”
    “Have
I
told you?” There was a pause. Too long. “Yes. More than once.”
    I kept my eyes closed. “I don’t remember.”
    “But this is the first time you’ve
asked
me if I’ve told you before,” said Sadie. “That’s probably a good sign.”
    “I don’t remember any of it.”
    “The nurses say that’s totally normal. They say people with head injuries do all kinds of things they don’t remember afterward. Especially when they’re on painkillers. Some of them hit people, some of them shout things, some pull the needles out of their arms and run out of their rooms in their little flapping hospital dresses.” Sadie’s voice changed, and I could tell that she was smiling. “I guess you sat up in bed the other day and recited Juliet’s whole ‘Wherefore art thou Romeo’ speech at the top of your lungs.”
    “I did?” I opened my eyes. “I didn’t even know I knew that speech.”
    Sadie’s grin widened. “Apparently the entire wing could hear you.”
    I laughed. It was just a short laugh, but it made my chest throb like I’d been punched. It took a few seconds before I could speak again. “So . . . how did they say I was?”
    “Oh my god.” Sadie threw her head back. “You are
such
a drama queen.”
    Her words worked their way through the fog.
The other day, you sat up in bed . . .
    “Sadie,” I began, “how long have I been in here?”
    Sadie’s smile vanished. She craned back slightly, likeshe wanted to get out of my reach. “For the record, you’ve never asked me
that
before either.” She straightened the tubes taped to my arm again, even though they didn’t need straightening. She didn’t look at me when she answered. “It’s been six days.”
    “. . . Six
days?
” Panic flash-froze my insides. “How—what have I been doing here for six days?”
    “Resting,” said Sadie flatly.
    “But I can’t—” My lungs had crystalized. The words came out with a wheeze. “
Six days?
I can’t even remember them.”
    “That’s because you’ve been
resting.
”
    Oh my god. Six days.
Six days.
My thoughts ripped apart, flying in all directions. Some flew to my mother.
Where is she? Is she all right?
Some flew to the play.
What have I already missed? Has Mr. Hall given my role away? Has Pierce even noticed that I’m gone?
And some flew backward, to that hole in the snow, the whiteness filling up with blood-red roses.
Six days.
How could I not remember
any
of it? Would I forget all of this in another few minutes, and only remember to ask again on day twelve? Day twenty? Day four hundred?
    “Oh my god, Sadie.” I reached for the bed’s plastic railing. “I have to get out of here.”
    “Nobody wants you here. Believe me.”
    “No.” I tried to sit up. The bones of my spine seemed to have fused, and the best I could manage was to roll ontomy left elbow. The tubes in my other arm pulled. Somewhere nearby, a high-pitched alarm began to beep. “I need to get out of here. Mom must be—”
    “Jaye, hang on.” Sadie darted around the bed and gripped my shoulders.