Bringing All the Bad, стр. 7
Baby didn’t have that. What Baby had was something denser, something with layers. It was as if she’d sat down and let a tree grow around her, each ring a fibrous thing that encased her, fitting through and around her until there was no longer any difference between the wood and Baby.
No tap with a spoon was going to crack that. And Mel couldn’t take a chainsaw to that tree either. No, Baby was threaded into those fibers and it would have to be peeled back, ring by ring. It would take patience and an unwavering attention to detail to get through to the real girl locked inside.
Mel could do that.
As per protocol and simple good sense, Mel needed to prepare Baby for a foray beyond this room. It would probably seem strange to anyone not in their business, but any movement not already taken was often a cause for intense fear, even trauma. That’s just how these things were.
“Baby, we’re going to go to the elevator, then down, then out to the parking lot. My car is just outside. I will be right beside you the entire time. Is that okay with you?”
She nodded, saying nothing.
“All the people here are good. They work to heal people. You’ll see some as we leave, but I’ll be right there.”
At that statement, Baby’s eyebrow quirked up ever so slightly. It was subtle, but the subtext was clear. She didn’t believe all the people here were good. She probably didn’t think such a thing was possible. Given the likelihood that many of her clients had been so-called good men with great reputations, camera-ready families, and careers that made them admired, Mel should probably revise her statement.
“No one bad can get to you without going through me,” she added.
Baby glanced once at the gold badge clipped to Mel’s belt, then nodded again. She waited while Mel opened the door, then stepped quite close to her as they exited. In a way, that was good. It indicated that Baby trusted Mel to protect her. It was a start.
The difference between the hallway and the room was vast. Beyond the door, men and women bustled between the central desk and the row of rooms arrayed along the hall. Lights blinked above doors in a variety of colors, each shade indicating some need within that room. A janitor parked his cart at an open door with a harsh squeak. A young patient shuffled down the hall, her mother encouraging her as she pushed along a pole hung with too many I.V. bags.
Mel led the way, Baby keeping close to her side. The paperwork had already been done and Baby was cleared to leave, but one couldn’t just walk out with a girl. The nurse she’d spoken to at the central desk stood when she saw them exit and waved them over. Smiling at Baby, she handed her a disposable plastic container containing cookies frosted in bright, summer colors.
After signing one last set of papers, Mel turned to Baby and asked, “Ready?” Baby’s gaze was intent on the hallway and the people walking down it. Mel put it down to nerves. She bent a little and asked again, “Baby, are you ready to get out of this place?”
The girl seemed untroubled when she lifted her eyes to Mel’s. “Of course.”
Rather than hurry, Mel kept her pace calm and sedate. It was important that Baby understand there was no need to hurry away from people. It was part of the process. Even so, there was a line she needed to keep on the right side of. Exposure to strange men needed to be kept to a minimum until such time as Baby was ready. A few of the other girls had been so fearful of the male police officers that women from other departments had to be shifted to provide escorts out of the hospital.
As they walked down the hall, Mel felt Baby’s warm hand slide into hers. She must have been less confident than she seemed. Without making any obvious moves, Mel glanced down at Baby to see if she was alright. The girl’s eyes were aimed straight ahead of her. She could see no fear there, but rather, a peculiar intensity at odds with her young face.
Approaching from the other end of the long hall was a doctor. There was nothing notable about him that Mel could distinguish. He was just a man wearing a white coat and carrying a metal clipboard, a serious expression on his face as he flipped pages. He glanced up just in time to step around the janitorial cart. Doctor or not, he was male, so Mel casually made to cross to the other side of the hallway.
“Let’s cross so we don’t bother the man with his cleaning,” she said. While the cart was only protruding from the room enough to keep others from entering, it was a decent excuse.
Baby’s grip on her hand tightened ever so slightly. “No, I’m fine.”
Perhaps she understood what Mel was doing. Perhaps she was trying to be brave. Brave or not, the girl kept her eyes riveted on the doctor. It was a rather avid gaze, a little unnerving to Mel, though the man didn’t seem to notice. Just as Mel began to wonder if this man might be someone Baby recognized as a client, which was a horrifying thought, they passed him.
Several things happened at once. The exact sequence of those events was never entirely clear in Mel’s memory later. It seemed to her that she first saw a flash of green. Everything around her almost shone with the color, as if someone very large wrapped the world in a sheet of shiny green cellophane like an oversized batch of Christmas cookies being prepared for delivery. It was that kind of green.
Second, she felt dizzy. She was certain that came after the flash, though she