FLAT, BRIGHT SUNSHINE ILLUMINATED THE landscape outside Julie’s hotel room window. Palm trees dotted the horizon, and cars glinted on the freeway overpass as the afternoon rush hour swung into full gear. Julie leaned back in the stiff upholstered chair and gazed into the cloudless blue sky. Her whole body—arms and legs, fingers and toes—was relaxed. Her mind was still for the first time in as long as she could remember. The absence of stress, of fear, was beautiful and invigorating.
The last twenty-four hours were a blur. Julie had no idea exactly how far she’d traveled, but it didn’t matter. All she needed to know was that she was as far from the secrets and cruelties of Beacon Heights as possible, where no one would find her. She had left them all behind, shaken them all from her trail—even the doctors and nurses at the facility, even the cops. They were smart, there was no denying that, but she had still executed her plan to perfection. There was no way she was going to stay in a mental institution, for god’s sake—there were limits, after all, to how far she’d go for Parker.
Julie felt no remorse for lying to the hospital staff. She did the right thing, telling the doctors and cops and attorneys that she was sick, letting them work themselves into a tizzy over her very rare, very severe case of dissociative identity disorder. After all, escaping a mental hospital was a hell of a lot easier than escaping from prison. How else would she have been able to get away? Lying to them, telling them that Parker was a figment of her imagination, was her only choice. And she had done it for both of them, for herself and for Parker. But Julie knew the truth: Parker was as real as she was. And Parker was the one who had committed those crimes. Not her.
It had been Parker, though, even before she’d turned herself into the cops, who’d laid the groundwork for the plan. Julie had found her in the woods when she’d fled from that party, and Parker had taken her shoulders and said, “It’s going to be okay. For both of us. I have an idea. We should use Fielder.”
“Fielder?” Julie had frowned. “I thought you hated him.”
And then it was Parker who’d come clean: She’d been seeing Fielder, both as a patient and, sort of, as a friend (she’d lowered her eyes when she said this, though). She told Julie that she’d really bonded with him, and it seemed that he had a soft spot for her, considering what had happened to his mom. “He’ll come and see you in the hospital, I promise,” Parker had said. “And then . . .” She whispered the rest.
Julie had been hesitant, but she’d taken Parker’s word. So she’d turned herself in to the cops. Let them cart her off to the hospital, tie her down, sedate her—but they promised, from the start, that they’d try to track down Fielder. Finally, he’d arrived, all flushed and freaked out, his hair flying every which way around his head, and his shirttails hanging out over his pants. He heard her out. She gave him the same spiel about Parker not being real. Fielder had nodded, tears in his eyes. “I want to get better,” Julie had urged. Fielder had placed his hand over hers. “I want that for you, too.”
It was when he’d grabbed his coat that she’d snatched the visitor’s pass off his jacket. He didn’t catch it at all, smiling at her sadly when he left, promising to return the next week. Twenty minutes later, when she was sure he was gone and the nurse shift had changed—she was still so new that most of the nurses didn’t recognize her—Julie changed clothes, pinned the badge on her shirt (luckily, it only said E. Fielder, so she could be an Elizabeth, or an Elsa) and walked out of there. Easy as that.
Did she feel bad she’d used Fielder? Not really. He’d stalked Parker, and that still made him a weirdo in Julie’s book. And anyway, it had been Parker’s idea: We have to take extreme measures to get free, she’d whispered to Julie that night in the woods. Fielder would be fine: Guards might suspect him of assisting in her escape at first, but once they talked it out, this wouldn’t hurt his career. He’d just look like a dupe.
Julie’s stomach growled as she watched the cars slow to a standstill on the off-ramp. She’d need to get some food soon. Traffic inched forward. So many people, Julie thought, stuck in their cars, stuck in their lives, just waiting for someone else to get out of their way. But not me.
It was better this way, Julie knew. There was nothing for them in Beacon Heights anyway—not anymore. She felt a shot of longing for Carson, who had been so good to her, but then she reminded herself that he most certainly thought she was nuts, just like everyone else in town. Just like her own mother, according to the horribly awkward interviews she’d given on CNN, MSNBC, 60 Minutes. It was better to have a clean break. She should have thought of doing this years ago.
There was a knock on the door, and Julie hopped out of her seat. She skipped across the room, past the two queen beds, past the tiled bathroom, and opened the door slowly. When she saw who stood there on the thick carpet in the hall, she let out a little cry of joy.
“Oh, thank god!” Julie exclaimed, shooting forward and wrapping her arms tightly around Parker’s thin, hunched, hoodie-clad frame.
Parker stood outside the door, grinning broadly. Julie looked so grateful, as if she’d feared she might never see her again. “Can I come in?”
“You don’t need an invitation.” Julie laughed, opening the door wider.
Parker stepped over the threshold, a plastic bag bursting with Chinese takeout boxes dangling from one hand, spilled sauce beginning to pool in a corner of the sack. “Hungry?”
“Starving.” Julie smiled, a smile big and broad and full of sunshine. “Thank god you’re okay,” she gushed, holding out her arms and pulling her friend into a hug.
“Oh, please,” Parker scoffed, brushing her off. “I’m a fighter. I’ll always be okay, Julie. You know that.”
“I know, but you risked so much.”
Parker shrugged. All she’d done, really, was hide while everything went down with Julie. While Julie turned herself in, while Julie spent those days at the hospital, while Julie narrowly escaped, carefully adhering to Parker’s plan. She’d known where to find Julie afterward, traveling far to get here, always in disguise. After all, Julie was the one who’d taken the heat—for everything Parker had done.
And Parker would always be in her debt.
Then she pulled away and looked her friend squarely in the eye. “I’m always going to be fine, you know. As long as I have you.”
Julie beamed. “Same here.”
Then they sat down and divvied up the food. Parker ate and ate and ate, suddenly hungrier than she’d been in years. She felt . . . alive again. Revived. Everything about this moment was right. They were alone, but they had each other. In a teeny, tiny way, Parker regretted using Fielder—they really had made a connection, she thought. But she couldn’t dwell on that. The important thing now was Julie. Finally, they were together, with no one to threaten their bond again. The closest of friends forever.
And Parker and Julie swore to themselves in a singular thought, communicated through that uncanny telepathy they sometimes had, that they would never, ever be apart again.