“That wasn’t a question,” I confirmed.
He kissed my forehead. “No, Mrs. Adams, it wasn’t. But I could infer—”
“You could,” I said with a hint of laughter, trying to steer him away from his initial question. His use of my surname sounded so familiar, the falseness of it barely registered.
“If I did, after I took matters into my own hands”—he playfully cupped my behind—“I might say that you seemed different somehow when I first got home. When did the incident at the lab occur?”
I took a deep breath as I lowered my chin against my chest. “Monday.”
“Hmm.”
Though I wondered what that meant, I knew not to ask.
“I see,” he said.
I shook my head as I closed my eyes. Maybe if I stayed awake I’d know what he meant. Yet if I stayed awake, I risked saying more than I wanted. Even though I hadn’t been completely honest, in his arms my lids grew heavy and Jacob’s breathing evened. In no time at all we both drifted to sleep.
As a week passed, each day was more difficult than the one before. Each day memories came mixed with emotion. I’d be working at the lab or doing a mundane task such as sorting our laundry, and something from the dark would infiltrate my thoughts. Some memories were benign: my apartment or Dylan’s house. That was always the way they began, the prelude to more, my fish (his name was Fred), or Dylan’s backyard and the way he grilled steaks or salmon in the warm Detroit air. Some were so intense; they were more than images, also sounds and smells. The authenticity of them made each one difficult to dismiss.
Even in the summer, the outside air at the Northern Light held a chill. I found myself longing for the oppressive Michigan humidity I used to detest.
Somehow I learned to shut off the old me when I was with Jacob. I’m not sure how I did it, but I did. I concentrated on him, on us. Whenever the old me tried to break through, I became hyperalert, fearing a change in Jacob’s expression, afraid he could see my internal battle raging. Maybe it was simply paranoia, or perhaps it was real. Either way, I worried constantly that I’d give myself away.
My other battles came around female followers. As time passed I deduced that those women who recalled the dark, like Elizabeth, had come to The Light of their own volition, while others, like Dinah and Mary—Mindy—had come as I had, forced to accept a life they couldn’t question.
As we all pressed our fingers into the prayer sponge and I contemplated our lack of fingerprints, the women in the morgue fueled my desire to leave The Light. The world needed to know what was happening.
I was an investigative journalist. Fate had somehow given that job to me. I had the responsibility not only to expose this travesty but also to rescue my sisters and the children of The Light.
While I used to look forward to my visits to the day care, now entering the doors and seeing the small trusting faces broke my heart. The babies and children hadn’t chosen this life. They were prisoners behind the campus’s walls as much as we all were. I couldn’t decide about the men. I wanted to ask whether they’d all come freely, or whether any of them were here as the result of an “accident.” Of course I couldn’t.
As days passed, the old me found ways to glean information.
I spoke less and listened more. As Jacob spoke to other men, I bowed my head and took in as much as I could. While I sat quietly at the coffee shop, retrieved our groceries, or did laundry, I listened. Since we’d all been trained to leave the dark in the past, I learned little about that, but I did pick up other things.
At one point Raquel mentioned medications. When I first woke, I had been given many of them. I didn’t want to ask in front of Elizabeth, but the simple comment that I might not have noticed before now had me wondering. Did The Light possess medication that made us more adaptable—more accepting? Obviously they had something that had taken away my memories while allowing new memories form. Since the only medication I had taken regularly after leaving the hospital had been birth control, I concluded that in those pills was where I’d been receiving the memory suppressant. It wasn’t until I stopped taking the birth control and after the medication had time to leave my system that my memories came back. If The Light could do that, then I assumed that anything was possible.
Since the return of my memories, I was constantly on edge. Though I’d been pretty diligent, speaking about my birth control was one of the glaring mistakes I’d made. Thankfully it had occurred with Raquel. I told myself that I could chalk it up to the building stress or perhaps a sense of friendship, but whatever the cause, once the words were out of my mouth, I feared the worst and prayed for the best.
I hadn’t meant to say anything.
With each such instance, my fear and paranoia grew.
I had a plan.