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I woke in darkness. The capsule's sticky pleather had become familiar scratchy, faded sheets and thin mattress. I looked up, bleary-eyed, and in the faint light recognized the black track of tubing that ran just inside the ceiling, tubing meant to hold hangers clad with furs and winter clothes—unnecessary items here in Southern California. I had been returned to my bedroom, which was really a converted walk-in closet tucked into an obscure northern corner of the house.
My brain and muscles felt like they had been stretched out, knotted up, untied again, then hooked to the bumper of Ranice's econo-car. My mouth and eyes were scrapingly dry. And I could hear two voices, male and female, whispering in the hall:
“What could be causing her to act up like this? I mean, uh, before the Zacdil. Has the family indicated that she might have used some other drugs? At school?”
The only grown-up person I knew who said “uh” like that—a little too deliberately—was Dr. Graying, the state psychologist who reviewed me yearly and during times of crisis.
“All Mrs. VanDeer said was that she put Jane in the capsule to protect her own children. She didn't mention other drugs.” That was Ranice.
“You, uh, think it's an abuse case?” Heavy pause. “What jury is going to prosecute a rich woman for defending her biological offspring against a foster child?”
“Jane probably has a concussion.”
“I'm just a psychologist. You think we need an M.D.?”
“Maybe she just hyperventilated? I don't want to mess with Mrs. VanDeer any more than we have to, with her connections.”
“Right,” Dr. Graying said on a sigh. “Besides, I've already sent three other kids to the ER this week. I'd rather not make it a fourth.”
“Who?” Ranice asked.
“The Lopez case. Carla Rawlings.”
“I thought you said three times.”
“Carla twice. Head trauma second time. State won't pay for the c-cortex rebuild. No experimental treatments on government insurance. They put her in a home.”
“Figures. Cheap bastards.”
“You'd think they'd realize the rebuild would cost less in the long run than extended capsulization.” Dr. Graying sighed. “Should we, uh, think about a transfer?”
Ranice laughed with something I now understand was bitterness. “Wasn't Carla Rawlings a transfer? Didn't work for her, did it?”
I must have gasped or made some small noise, because just then Dr. Graying and Ranice peered in at me.
“She's awake,” Ranice said.
I turned over as quickly as I could, pulling the sheets over my head. Another wave of fatigue washed over me.
The door opened fully. “Jane?” Ranice asked. “There's someone here to see you.”
I peeked over the covers with one eye.
“Hi, Jane,” Dr. Graying said. “Mind if the light comes on?”
I pulled the blanket down to my chin and shook my head.
Dr. Graying hit the manual switch on the wall. I blinked and squinted as my pupils adjusted. When I was able to see clearly, I saw Dr. Graying take a pinch of bubble gum from his pocket and pop it into his mouth, chewing loudly. Past experience told me that Dr. Graying wouldn't be offering me any of this gum, nor should I ask for some.
He perched on the far corner of my bed and asked around the mushy pink glob in his mouth, “How are you feeling?”
“Fine, thank you,” I replied.
He exchanged an amused look with Ranice, and then popped his gum into his cheek. “Ranice told me what happened. Do you, uh, want to talk about it?”
I looked away to the wall, studying the cracks in the naked plaster.
“Jane,” Dr. Graying said, “sometimes it helps to talk. I want to help you, if you'll let me.”
I wanted to figure out if Dr. Graying was friend or foe under the circumstances. Still facing the wall, I asked, “What did Ranice tell you?”
Ranice supplied this answer. “I told him that you broke an HR, beat up Clint, and broke a whole bunch of Mrs. VanDeer's collectibles.”
I heard Dr. Graying chew on his gum thoughtfully. “Is that true?” he asked.
I struggled to sit up, turning my head so Dr. Graying could see my nicked temple for himself. “Did you tell him how I got this?” I asked, pointing.
“Mrs. VanDeer told me,” Dr. Graying answered, “that her daughters said that when you first tried to hit Clint, you tripped and fell on the corner of the coffee table.”
I remembered the blood on my palm, and I remembered pressing my palm against the carpet—several yards away from the coffee table. “Did you find any blood on the floor where they said I got this cut, or was it somewhere else?”
Dr. Graying and Ranice exchanged another glance.
An empowering triumph replaced my anger. “The HR broke after Clint threw it at me. I'm tired of letting him hurt me while everybody else does nothing.”
Then, I realized that I actually had done something wrong—break Mrs. VanDeer's precious collectibles. Tears began to trickle down my cheeks. I tried grinding them away with my fists, but new ones quickly took their places. “I didn't mean to break the antiques, though.”
“Does this kind of thing happen a lot, Jane?” Dr. Graying asked.
I was too miserable to answer. I just watched my tears make dark spots on my blanket.
Ranice spoke up. “Mrs. VanDeer says she's afraid you're going to hurt her children.”
Pounding my fists in my lap, I cried, “Why is no one afraid that I'll be hurt?”
Dr. Graying and Ranice seemed startled by this outburst.
“It's not fair,” I continued, pounding again for emphasis. “Everyone else has someone looking out for them but me!”
As inept as Ranice could be, she generally did mean well, and so I did not pull away when she knelt by my bedside and took my small, ash-tawny hand in her nail-bitten brown one. “S'okay, honey,” she said. “I'm looking out for you, aren't I?”
“But you're paid to look out for me,” I accused. “Mrs. VanDeer looks out for her kids because they're hers. I'm nobody's.”
Ranice looked to Dr. Graying who was leaning back, trying to chew more insight out of his gum. Aloud he mused, “Technology has advanced since you were tested last. Maybe we could find at least one of your biological parents.”
Ranice's eyebrows turned down at the corners, and I think the same cautious skepticism manifested itself on my face.
After turning this possibility over in my mind for a split second, I asked, “Why didn't they claim me when I was born?”
Dr. Graying sighed and answered, “Any number of reasons. That was towards the end of the fifties. Probably they just didn't have the money.”
“That happened a lot back then,” Ranice added.
I pondered this information. “If they wanted me now, they would have come looking for me already.”
Nodding, Dr. Graying asked, “How about a new foster home?”
I thought of some poor girl I'd never met named Carla Rawlings. The VanDeers were awful, but at least they'd never put me in the hospital. I shook my head firmly.
Dr. Graying nodded and blew a bubble. After sucking it back in, he asked, “What about an emancipation school?”
Emancipation. I knew what that word meant from the dictionary. It meant freedom.
“She's only ten years old,” Ranice interrupted, incredulous. “What judge would make her an emancipated minor at ten?”
“It's not a problem, usually, if there's a house willing to accept her. Thanks to the Democrats, there's plenty of those around now. Jane, instead of living with another family, would you like to live and work and go to school in a house with other girls like you?”
When I heard “other girls like you,” I did not ask for details. Instead, my mind began carving its own path. I imagined a heaven full of girls my age, all of us knowing how it feels to be unwanted, all of us giving each other the friendship, support and understanding we'd always lacked. We would share the unquestioned devotion to each other that we never received from loving, loyal parents. “Other girls like you” signified a throng of long-lost kindred spirits.
“Okay,” I said.
Dr. Graying sat up, startled at the speed of my decision. “You're sure?”
I nodded.
“Mrs. VanDeer is still her legal guardian,” Ranice said. “We have to discuss this with her before a decision can be made. Then the case has to go to court—”
“Fine, fine, fine,” Dr. Graying said dismissively, reaching in to his jacket to produce his own state-issued HandRight. He opened it up and made a note with a toothmarked stylus. “I'll talk with the courts. You,” he pointed to Ranice, “talk to the family and see what they say, and you,” he pointed at me, “get some rest. Ranice, get her some water. She'll need to be rehydrated after that, uh, Zacdil.”
Frowning, Ranice released my hand and rose from her spot by my side. “I'll be right back.”
Dr. Graying stood with her. He opened the door for Ranice and waved her out into the brightly lit, copiously wallpapered hallway, blowing a small bubble as he did so. Reaching for the manual light switch again, Dr. Graying winked in my direction.
He dimmed the lights to black and pulled the door until it was only cracked open again. The sliver of light from the hall poured a triangle into my room, made jagged by the imposition of my bed upon the floor's cold, peeling no-wax covering. I turned my back to the wall and tried to curl into sleep, but my thoughts were too full of images of playmates and soulmates and freedom from snide cruelty.
It wasn't too long before I heard voices again. The VanDeers' actie room was below my closet. Mrs. VanDeer was talking to someone online. She could have just texted her interlocutor. Either Mrs. VanDeer didn't remember or care that I was only one floor above and couldn't help but hear her.
“...and a life that is allowed to continue only because of corrupted information can only end up corrupted itself. If it hadn't been for the health inspector's bad timing, that fetus would have been terminated properly and forgotten instead of growing into that lying, scheming monster of an ingrate. She's a blameful, sneaking, leeching, emotional...”
Heavy footsteps approached, drowning out Mrs. Van Deer. My door opened, and Ranice stood silhouetted in the hall's light, carrying a plate and cup.
Again I feigned sleep. I heard Ranice place her quarry on my little resin bedside table. She brushed my hair from my forehead, her fingers cold on my throbbing temple, then left.
