“I’m not,” I say. “And I don’t consent to any of this. I’m not dead. Or even pre-dead. I should have a choice.”
Whistler rises from his chair. “We don’t need your consent. Your legal guardian has given his.” He nods at the paper cup with the pill. “Take your meds.”
I crumple the little cup and hurl it toward him. It bounces off his shirt and to the floor.
“I repeat: take your meds,” he says. He lets himself out, and I hear the click of the bolt as he locks me in.
15
CAPTIVE
I HATE BEING IN MY CELL. For hours, I pace. I rage at the walls. I scream at the window in the door, demanding to be let out. I can’t believe nobody comes back. I try breaking the window glass with the chair, but it won’t shatter. I throw my tray. Still, no one comes. It feels like the height of callousness that they don’t have a camera on me. How do they even know what I’m doing? I could hurt myself and they wouldn’t know. In time, I’m hungry again. I scan the floor for crumbs that spilled when I threw my tray and dot them up with my finger to nibble.
“Are you going to starve me? Is that the idea?” I yell. “I’m not taking my pill!”
Finally, I wear myself down to exhaustion and crawl back onto my cot. I hide under my blanket, hating them. I refuse to cry. What are they doing to Dubbs? Where are my parents? Has Lavinia told anyone where I am? I don’t know anything. I have failed, utterly, and now I’m getting weak from lack of food.
When I wake next, I try staying calm. I use the bathroom, wash up, and brush my teeth. I come back to my cot and neatly make up my blanket and pillow. I sit in the middle of the bed, my hands folded. My stomach growls. It’s then that I notice the crumpled pill cup still under the table where it fell.
Bitter rage nearly blinds me. I slide off the bed and lean over to pick up the little cup. Sure enough, the pill is still inside. I tip it slowly onto the palm of my hand, and my heart sinks. If I start obeying, if I start taking my pill, when will it end? I lean my head back and close my eyes, trying to keep back the tears.
Where’s that starry, tingly feeling I felt before? Where did that go? I could use another vision now to take me out of this place.
A slow, dark heaviness stirs in the back of my mind like a stone settling at the bottom of a pond, and then it goes still again.
What, are you worn down, too? I ask mockingly. Am I not enough fun for you?
Nothing replies.
Despair consumes me. I have no way out. They have me.
I toss my pill back and swallow it down dry. Minutes later, I’m asleep.
*
I wake to the sound of the door opening, and Whistler is back with another tray. I’m too weak to argue with him or complain. Instead, I start with a slice of green apple, and the tartness is sublime. I ignore the white cup with a pill in it. Whistler closes the door behind him and takes his former chair.
“How are you feeling?” he asks.
I don’t answer.
“I’m sorry about that,” he says. “You’ll get regular meals as long as you take your pills.”
I take a sip of cool water, and then I start on my sandwich. This one is turkey and Swiss with avocado and Russian dressing. My taste buds go wild.
“Where’s Dubbs?” I ask.
“She’s fine. She’s resting.”
“Does she know I’m here?”
“She hasn’t woken up,” he says.
You mean, you haven’t let her, I think.
He takes off his helmet and sets it on the table. “You know, starving rats live longer than well-fed ones.”
“What’s that have to do with anything?” I ask.
“We’ve been talking about what makes you so tough.”
“I’m not tough. I just gave in.”
“That was the smart thing to do,” he says. “But it took you long enough.” He leans back in his chair and crosses his legs at the knee. “Jules thinks growing up in the boxcars made you a better dreamer.”
“I’m not interested in his theories.”
“Anna thinks it was losing your father at a sensitive age. Me, I think any age is a bad time to lose a father.”
I’m even less interested in that.
The lights flicker, and I jolt. When Whistler takes his helmet and starts to rise, I suddenly can’t stand the thought of being left alone here again.
“Doesn’t it bug you, being down here all the time?” I ask quickly. “Doesn’t the darkness get to you?”
“I can see sunlight whenever I want,” Whistler says. “I can see anything. Be anything. Go anywhere.”
“I don’t believe you,” I say.
He frowns a moment. Then he sits back down and points a finger at me. “You’re forgetting the dreams. We have a virtually endless supply. We can take them whenever we want, for as long as we want.”
“Like a drug?” I ask. Even as I say it, I recall something I overheard long ago, a conversation between Berg and Dr. Fallon when she talked about using a sample on herself. Intoxicating was the word she’d used, or something like that. Berg was annoyed with her, as if she’d wasted something precious.
“If they’re mainlined in the right dose, dreams are the perfect escape,” Whistler says. “No unpleasant side effects or aftereffects. We can pick where we want to go and be transported completely.”
“Those are illusions,” I say. “They aren’t real. You’re no more alive down here than your dreamers.”
He smiles. Then he rubs his knuckles in his hair and a few strands fluff up. “Let me ask you something,” he says. “In theory, if you needed a new heart, would you accept a heart transplant?”
“Yes,” I say.
He nods, like he expected no less. “And how about new eyes, or a skin graft? What if you needed an artificial limb, like a foot, or a new liver?”
“Sure,” I say.
“What if you needed all of them?” he asks. “What if you had replacements for everything, even a new face? People get facelifts all the time. And tucks and whatever.”
“What’s your point?” I ask.
“When’s the moment when you stop being you?” he asks.
I consider a moment, thinking of Thea, who had her entire body changed. She started out as me inside, but her body gradually changed her. She couldn’t ignore a pregnancy. That’s an extreme example, but I don’t have to wonder if I would change if I had a different body. I know I would, but then the new me would be me, too.
“I guess as long as I still have my brain, as long as I still think like myself, then I’m myself,” I say.
“So you wouldn’t be yourself if you got old and senile?” he asks.
That makes me pause again. I shift on my bed and pull my blanket around my shoulders against the chill. “No, that would still be me, too,” I say. “Getting old’s natural. Whatever happens to me, I guess I’ll face it.” If I ever get out of here, I think.
He nods again, and then gestures to indicate alternatives. “So you can be old in your own body and your mind can be failing and you’re still you, or you can be young with all your body parts replaced but your mind still working, and you’re still you. Do I have that right?”