She’s sitting on the bench seat under the window, frowning at a crossword puzzle. There are purple-black bruises under her eyes and deep wrinkles in her T-shirt. She hasn’t left the hospital in days, at least.
She notices I’m awake and jumps up, the pencil clattering to the ground.
“Hope!”
“Mom,” I manage. My throat burns, and I swallow to moisten it.
“How are you feeling? Are you okay? What can I do? Do you need water?” She hovers over the bed, and I shake my head.
“Lyla,” I say.
Mom’s mouth screws up tight, and she sits down hard.
She knows. I don’t know much, but she knows.
“Is she…?” I ask. “Do they have her?”
She jerks her head once, a resigned no. I’m breathing faster. Harder. She’s out there, and she wants me dead.
“There’s security posted outside the room twenty-four seven,” Mom says, guessing my thoughts. “They’ll find her soon. She can’t hide forever.”
I nod mutely, eyes wide, and Mom tucks my hair behind my ear, then pulls my head to her chest. She smells like Chantilly perfume over hospital shampoo.
She’s out there. She’s free.
“Oh, Hope,” she whispers. “What happened? How—how did any of this happen?”
I don’t want to tell her. I’m so humiliated and ashamed and horrified and utterly, utterly devastated that it got to this point, that I did this to her. That a girl—a friend—is dead from our game. But she’s going to have to find out sometime, and I can’t keep hiding the truth from her forever. Lyla is out there, and she’ll come after me again. After Jenny. After her.
So I take a deep breath and…spill.
I’m out of breath when I’m finished, and I can tell Mom doesn’t know whether to scream at me or cry. And I understand. I can hardly believe any of this happened either. That Lyla, the girl I was starting to think of as a real friend, could have betrayed me the way she did, carried such a darkness inside her that she wanted me dead, wanted us all dead. I don’t know if I’ll sleep well at night ever again, if I’ll ever not feel guilty for being the one who survived instead of Hartley, who had a full life ahead of her. If I’ll always taste dirt in my mouth.
Mom’s jaw works, and she swallows hard, but then she pulls me back into a hug.
“I’m never letting you out of my sight again,” she whispers.
I close my eyes against a rush of tears. It’s over, and I should be happy. I’m safe. I’m alive. They’re going to find Lyla. I have a mother who loves me. Everything else shouldn’t matter.
But it does.
I try to hold it in. It’s not the time. But what has logic ever had to do with any of this? A small, pained sound escapes me.
Mom pulls back sharply and looks me over for injury. “What’s wrong? Are you hurt? Do I need to call the doctor?” She starts to stand again, but I grab her arm, fingers digging into tender flesh.
“No,” I say, then release my grip. She rubs her arm, staring at me gimlet-eyed, and then sits down again.
I know I made a lot of mistakes. I was reckless, I pushed myself too far. I did damage to my body, maybe even irreparable damage—the body she worked so hard to keep in shape. But I’m not prepared to go back to my old life. With Mom so desperate to make sure I don’t die that she won’t let me live. To sit in that apartment collecting dust until I can’t breathe anymore. Until I turn to dust.
I can’t live with fear and limits dictating everything I do.
“Mom, I love you,” I say. “But…we need to talk.”
ONE YEAR LATER
I crash through my room, my still-damp hair leaving a trail of wetness down the back of my shirt. My boss will kill me if I’m late for my second day of work.
I kick through a pile of laundry, tear through my drawers. Finally I heft back my comforter. There it is. I don’t know how the hell my uniform top got under there, but I have a feeling it has something to do with a certain little sister and her snoopy tendencies. I slip the nasal prongs off my face, pull off my T-shirt, and throw the white polo over my head, teasing the wires back into my nose. Then I tip back my oxygen tank and turn around.
Jenny is standing in the doorway.
I gasp. “Jesus, Jenny.”
“A letter came for you.” She pulls an envelope from behind her back. I feel all the color slip out of my face.
She realizes her mistake and quickly backtracks. “Not that kind of letter!”
I exhale as I step closer to take the envelope from her. It’s a standard white business envelope, not the creamy cardstock Lyla used for her invitations. The return address is the Pantheon-Sorbonne University in France.