Sara Reinke - Backwoods

“She has kids,” she observed.

“Two of them, yeah.” While sifting through the four nearly identically sized and shaped keys on the key ring, Andrew noticed that rather than a plastic or metal tab, a goofy charm or even vehicle remote control, Dani had some kind of small folding tool at the end of her key chain. Gerber Clutch had been printed on the black exterior. Being the owner of a Gerber knife himself—said knife currently in his backpack, wherever that had wound up—Andrew smiled appreciatively. Clearly, Dani knew a good multi-tool.

“Here,” he said to Alice, as he found the right key and unlocked the door. “You’ll be safe in here.”

She didn’t immediately answer and curious, he turned to see her lingering in front of Dani’s desk. She’d taken one of the framed photos in hand, one of Dani in extreme close up, with Max tucked beneath one arm, Eme beneath the other, all three of them grinning goofily into the camera. He could have sworn Alice looked almost melancholy.

“I don’t have any pictures like this,” she said when Andrew went to stand beside her. He folded his legs beneath him, leaning over to look at the photo.

“You mean with your mom?” he asked. With a sick bastard like Moore for her father, he found he wasn’t the least bit surprised to realize she missed her mother, despite the fact the woman hadn’t sounded much better than Moore, to have heard tell of her.

Alice shook her head. “Smiling.”

It took him a moment to understand. “You mean, you don’t have any pictures where you’re smiling?” he asked and she nodded. “Oh. Well, uh…” If he’d had his iPhone, he could have taken one for her right there on the spot, with its built-in digital camera. “I’ll take one for you someday. How about that?”

“No.” She shook her head again. “I mean, I don’t smile.”

“Of course you can smile. It’s not like your face doesn’t work.”

“No, but my brain doesn’t,” she replied. “It mixes things up, so I want to smile but I don’t remember how. Or I want to cry, but the tears won’t come out. I didn’t say I can’t . I said I don’t. You’re doing it again, hearing not listening.”

Once he’d settled her safely into the little store room, Andrew made several clandestine trips between the barracks and the garage, stealing through the shadows, bringing her pillows, blankets, some snacks and drinks. He made a cozy little pallet on the floor for her while she stood aside and watched. The glimpses of uncharacteristic emotion she’d shared with him earlier seemed gone now and her face had turned impassive again, her gaze detached and aloof.

“It won’t be long,” he promised her. “Just for tonight, maybe tomorrow.” He stroked his hand against her hair, then led her toward the nest he’d made for her on the floor. “I know it’s not much, but you’ll be safe here. No one can get in without the key, see?”

Holding up his hand, he let the key dangle in her view, then curled his fingers around it and tucked it into his pocket. “As long as you stay quiet, no one will even know you’re here.”

After she’d curled up on the pallet, he drew the blankets snugly over her shoulders, kneeling down to tuck them beneath her chin. “You hungry?” he asked, but she shook her head. “Thirsty?” Another head shake. “I brought you some crackers, a couple of bottles of 7-Up. They’re right over there, see?”

When he pointed, she followed the line of his finger with her gaze, then nodded.

“I’ll come back tomorrow as much as I can and check on you,” he promised as he stood again.

“I’m sorry Daddy hurt you,” she said, looking up at him, the overhead fluorescent glistening in her eyes.

Andrew smiled. “He didn’t too bad. And it wasn’t your fault.”

“Yes, it was. He’s worried.”

“Alice.” He squatted again. “Listen to me.”

How could he explain to her? Moore was her father, someone she obviously loved and held in high, adulating esteem, if only because in Alice’s young, idealistic and impressionable regard, he’d rescued her from the mental institution in which her mother had placed her.

“Your dad…” he said, then paused, sighed, ran his fingers through his hair. “Look, your dad loves you. But what he’s doing to you is wrong. He’s hurting you.”

“No, he’s not.” She shook her head. “He uses local anesthetic before he starts to drill. All I ever feel is pressure. Like a finger digging in really hard. Here. I’ll show you.”

Stricken, Andrew caught her hand, stopping her. “Alice, your father is sick. There’s something wrong with his mind.”

“No, there’s not. It’s my mind doesn’t work right. I told you. Daddy said it has something to do with neural pathways. The electrical signals don’t go from one place in my brain to another like they do for other people. Sometimes my signals get mixed up, sent to the wrong place. And sometimes they just dead end. It’s like the map in my head doesn’t work right, he said.”

“And cutting holes in your head fixes that?”

“No. But the medicine he puts in the holes does. It goes into my cerebral sinuses. They’re sort of like big blood vessels surrounding your brain. He goes through the fontanels. The bone is newer there, thinner.”

Tilting her head slightly, she pulled back her hair, revealing the stitches he’d noticed earlier near her temple. He must have looked disgusted, horrified, because she reached out, catching his hand.

“I’m better now.”

“But Alice,” he said, helplessly. “Your dad didn’t do that by cutting holes in your head.”

“Yes, he did. The medicine makes new nerves grow. It fills in the missing places in my brain. It makes the electrical signals get to the right places. Daddy said that one day, it will all be fixed. I’ll be just like you are.” She looked at him earnestly, nearly pleading. “I’ll be just like everyone else.”

Back inside the compound, Andrew stopped at the infirmary to see if Dani was there and had any news on O’Malley’s condition. He also decided he needed to make her aware of Moore’s increasingly erratic and violent behavior, and poor Alice’s delusions that his abuse was somehow helping to cure her autism.

Maybe Dani can talk to her, he thought. She’s got kids. She can relate better. Maybe she can make Alice understand.

His footsteps faltered as he approached the infirmary doorway and Major Prendick walked out, flanked on either side by a pair of armed soldiers. All three wore bright yellow hooded jumpsuits over their uniforms, with plastic shields covering their faces and blue latex gloves over heir hands.

“Mister Braddock,” Prendick called out. “I’m going to have to ask you to stop where you are.”

“What?” Bewildered, Andrew raised his hands hesitantly, a reflexive gesture even though no one had demanded it of him. “What’s going on? What’s wrong?”

“I need you to come with these men,” Prendick replied. The two armed soldiers forked out, each keeping wary distances from Andrew as they moved to either side of them.

“Where? What’s going on?” Andrew asked again.

“You’ve been exposed to a highly virulent strain of contagion. By military protocol, I’m to confine you to your quarters until I’m able to determine whether or not you’ve been infected.”

“What protocol? You mean like quarantine?” Andrew asked. “You’re placing me in quarantine? You can’t do that. Suzette said all I had to do was take a shower. Hey!” When one of the soldiers reached for him, he jerked away, brows furrowed. “Where’s Dani? Where’s Specialist Santoro?”