Becky just shook her tear-streaked face back and forth violently. Her whole body trembled and strained against the ties.
Her vacant expression triggered one of Emma’s last memories of her mom. At her preschool graduation, which Becky had missed, Emma won a good citizenship award for keeping her desk cleaner than anyone else’s. She’d tagged along with the families of her classmates to get ice cream afterward and had tried to pretend she didn’t hear the other parents’ whispers of “irresponsible” and “not all there.” She’d gotten mint chocolate chip, which was Becky’s favorite flavor, to help pretend that her mother was with her. Later, when she let herself into their motel room with the key she kept on a Hello Kitty lanyard in her backpack, Becky was in bed staring at the ceiling. Emma carefully put away her backpack and shoes in the closet. She crawled into bed next to her mother and nestled at her side. Becky stared at her as if she’d never seen her before.
“Which one are you again?” she asked.
Emma smiled. This was a game she knew—sometimes her mother teased her, pretending she didn’t know who she was.
“I’m Emma!” she said, touching her own forehead. “Which one are you?”
At that, Becky started to cry. “I’m your mother,” she whispered, hugging Emma close to her chest.
Three days later, she left Emma at the sleepover.
“Emma, Emma, Emma,” whimpered Becky. Tears ran down her face, leaving tracks in the grime on her cheeks. Emma—little-girl Emma—wanted to step forward with a Kleenex to gently wipe her mother’s face. But in the real world she couldn’t seem to move. She didn’t want to go near the deranged woman flailing on the hospital bed.
“There now, Ms. Mercer,” said a gentle voice with a soft Anglo-Indian accent. A middle-aged man in a white coat stepped past the nurse, a syringe in his hand. When she saw the needle, Becky groaned. She shook her head wildly, her hair whipping across her face. “This will only hurt for a second,” said the doctor, quickly sliding the needle into her arm.
Seconds later, Becky’s body relaxed. Her eyes unfocused and her head lolled to face the wall.
“Thank you, Dr. Banerjee,” Mr. Mercer said wearily.
Emma looked up at the doctor in surprise—it was Nisha’s father, a short man with a round face, thick glasses, and a sad expression. His wife had passed away not long ago. Every time Emma had seen him, he’d looked so lost.
Dr. Banerjee ushered Mr. Mercer and Emma out of the room. “Let’s go into the hall so she can rest.”
“You’re just going to leave the restraints on her?” Emma blurted out.
Dr. Banerjee looked at her steadily. His red-rimmed eyes were magnified behind his lenses. “They’re for her own protection, Sutton. I promise, we will do our best to make her comfortable. But right now she is a danger to herself and to others.”
They followed him into the hallway. A low bench ran against the wall under the Monet print, and he gestured for them both to sit. Mr. Mercer sank onto the bench gratefully, but Emma shook her head. Dr. Banerjee turned to face them.
“This is the worst I’ve seen her in a long time,” he said, exhaling heavily. He opened a large file that had been clamped beneath his arm and rifled through it. Becky’s records, Emma realized. She glanced at Mr. Mercer questioningly.
“Dr. Banerjee has treated Becky several times over the years, when she’s been in town,” he explained.
She nodded slowly. “How did she end up in here today?” she asked Dr. Banerjee.
“She was arrested,” Nisha’s father explained.
Mr. Mercer rubbed his face, as if trying to scrub the information away. Finally, he looked up at Dr. Banerjee again. “Did she hurt anyone?”
The other man sat down across from him and took what Emma recognized as a police report from the file. “No, thankfully. She pulled a knife on a man at the mall downtown. She was confused, agitated. Several shopkeepers reported that she’d been in their stores earlier in the day asking bizarre questions. But mall security managed to get the knife from her without anyone being hurt.”
I remembered the eerie look on my mother’s face in the canyon the night we met. If she could wave a knife at someone, maybe she could do worse. Maybe she had done worse.
“When was the last time you saw her?” asked Dr. Banerjee.
Mr. Mercer shook his head. “About two months ago. She checked out of her hotel, so I assumed she’d left town, like she usually does. But then she called me from a motel just last week, so I’m not sure where she’s been.”