Untouched The Girl in the Box

Chapter 19



I awoke again to the beeping of the machines, this time with Dr. Perugini standing over me. “Oh, good, you’re awake,” she said without enthusiasm.

“I had to pee before I fell asleep,” I said. “Did I...”

“You got a catheter after Zollers injected you.” She delivered the news with a little snippiness. The restraints were gone, though my hand was elevated. The flesh on it looked to be an angry red, with blisters standing out like little white bubbles against a torch red background. Also, now it itched.

I rubbed my eyes with my good hand. “I’m hungry.” My stomach growled as if to emphasize the truth of my statement.

“I’ll send for the cafeteria to bring you something in a few minutes.”

“Poison?” I asked with a smile.

She ignored my wisecrack and used her stethoscope to take my pulse, avoiding touching my skin even with her gloves. “You are nearly back to normal, which is good because I want you out of here as soon as possible.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that, Doc.” I said trying to be coy, but I think it came off sneering. “After all, I can’t do any more damage when I’m here. Once I’m out in the world, it’ll be no time at all before you’ve got the medical unit full again.”

She let out a hiss that startled me, it was so violent. “You,” she said, spitting it at me with the same vehemence as the Italian curses she so frequently used.

“Me what?” I shot back. “I didn’t ask for any of this—not my powers, not my mom to disappear, not Wolfe to come after me, nor this Armored Assclown. I wasn’t looking for Scott Byerly to grab at me when Wolfe was so close to the surface of my mind, and I damned sure wasn’t spoiling for a fight with Clary! I didn’t ask Gavrikov to vaporize my hand, I never wanted a single person to die—but they all happened, and I can’t do anything about them now.”

“Porca miseria!” She withdrew her hands and took a step back, and for a moment I thought she was going to spit on me. “Oh, yes, you have had such a miserable time. So many bad things have happened to you, poor you, nobody else has it as bad as Sienna.” Her voice came slow, mocking me.

It smarted. Enough to bring that curious burning to my eyes, the one I wished I could disavow. I hate crying, and I wasn’t going to do it in front of an enemy. Not that I had many friends at this point. Or ever. “Yes, I have had a miserable time. And you don’t hear me griping about it.”

“No, not griping,” she said, almost as if she were agreeing. “Moping. Sulking. Stewing, I think they call it also? You are a girl, about to be a woman, yet you act like a child.”

“Act like a child?” I almost choked on it. “I’ve had all these things—”

“Happen to you, yes, such miseries, I already acknowledged.” She folded her arms. “So sad, no one in the history of the world has ever been through any worse.”

“Been through?” I almost choked on my own words. “How about ‘still going through’. They’re still after me, the people who sent Wolfe—I still have him hanging around in my brain—”

“You are not the first to go through that, either.” She shrugged, as though it was a matter of little consequence. “You’re hardly the first succubus. They made it through somehow, so will you muddle through—if you ever decide to stop moping.”

“You know, I think after all I’ve been through, I’m entitled to a little— ”

“No, you’re not.” She cut me off. “You’re not entitled to a damned thing. This is where Ariadne and Old Man Winter make their mistake with you. Yes, you have had a hard life up to when you left your house, being locked in, boxed up, crated, whatever you want to call it. You leave your house, all hell breaks loose and worse. All this is true. You have had very bad things happen to you, no denying. But you take responsibility for the things you shouldn’t and take no responsibility for the things you should.” She threw her arms up in the air. “You will be a bitter, pathetic shell of a person if you continue down this path.”

“Well, awesome.” My words were acid. “Because I’ve always aspired to be like you.”

A self-satisfied smile made its way across her face. “I hurt your little fragile ego, so you lash out. Very mature.”

“Yeah.” I tasted bile in the back of my mouth. “Well, I’d call you old school but you’re really just old. Die already.”

Her hand came down and slammed the bed and I jerked back, reacting to the idea that she might actually hit me. “At some point you have to accept some responsibility for your actions. Not Wolfe’s. He killed all those people, not you. If you blame yourself for those, you are stupid. But now you want to blame Wolfe for some things you control. It’s not always him that lands you in trouble. Bad things happen to all of us. You cannot control bad things that happen to you any more than you can control the weather. It’s less about the things that happen and more about how you react to them.”

She turned away and stalked back to her office. “Or you can sit here in your little pity party and let whatever life you could have pass you by—be a vegetable of sorriness, feeling bad for yourself, curl up in a little ball and waste away, waiting for momma to come find you and hoping those people you didn’t even see die will somehow vanish from your conscience.”

“Why do you care?” I snapped it at her, trying to find some way past her infuriating facade. “I’m just another patient, another pound of flesh for you to minister to. Why does it matter?”

She stopped at the door to her office, put her hand on the frame and rested on it for a split second before turning back to me. There was emotion peeking through from behind a wall, some reservoir of feeling that I couldn’t see the depth of. “Me? I don’t care what you do, whether it’s waste away in a little ball of sadness or become a useful, productive, happy member of society. Neither one matters to me.” She pointed at me. “But if you’re going to do the former, at least leave so I don’t have to watch you throw your life away?” She smiled all too sweetly. “Okay? You can go now.” She turned and I heard her office door shut softly and her blinds closed a minute later.