“Are you okay?” Kevin asks, startling me. I glance sideways at him and see that his light eyebrows are pulled together in concern. I’m not sure who to confide in, what’s even real, but he’s the only one here.
“Anxious,” I say. “Like I’m . . . unglued. Is that normal?”
Kevin’s expression doesn’t change. “It is normal for you, yes. But that feeling will fade in a couple of weeks. Right now, your mind is repairing itself. You’ll have echoes—a space between memories that will make you feel hollow. But they will fill in. Medication can help with the transition.”
His words don’t comfort me, and instead I feel a tiny twinge of sadness. But just as soon as it’s there, it’s like warm water is splashed inside my chest. “Whoa,” I say, putting my hand over my heart.
“That’s the inhibitor,” Kevin says. “It relieves the panic. You should probably take another before going to class.” He gets a pillbox from the center console and pinches out a white pill before extending it to me. I take it from him, staring down at it while he hands me a bottle of water.
“So this feeling will go away?” I ask, just to make sure. There are competing emotions, and it’s hard to tell which are mine and which belong to the medication.
“Yes,” Kevin says. “You will regulate. Eventually.”
I look again at the other students out the window. I feel empty, but they look normal. Happy, even. And someday, I’ll be like them. Once this damn fog clears. So without another thought, I swallow the pill and let Kevin take me inside.
• • •
“Here’s your schedule,” Kevin says. “It might be tough to pick up in your subjects where you left off, but your teachers have all modified their lesson plans to catch you up. I’ll walk you to and from classes and attend them with you.” Kevin’s gray eyes look me over.
“I’m a little confused,” I say. I take a deep breath, and the white pill works its way through my system. My muscles loosen, and an overall feeling of well-being comes over me.
“You’re doing great,” Kevin says, patting my shoulder.
I smile. Kevin seems genuinely invested in my recovery, and it’s encouraging. I might really need the support.
I walk into my first class, and the room is mostly empty. There’s a girl with blond hair near the front, and she says hi to me as I walk by. I smile in response, the small interaction confirming that I at least look normal, even if I can’t remember parts of my life.
“I’ll be in the back if you need me,” Kevin says after I’m settled in my chair.
He goes to stand by the bookcase, and I glance around the room, noticing the colorful posters on the walls. I can still remember my old school, how washed in white everything was. This place smells like vanilla—like aromatherapy. Are they trying to keep us calm?
On my desk is a paper—just like on every other desk in the room. As students walk in, they drop their bags on the floor and fill out the forms, delivering them to a tray on the teacher’s desk. I take a sharpened pencil from my bag and stare down at the questions on the daily assessment. They seem vaguely familiar.
In the past day have you felt lonely or overwhelmed?
NO.
I fill in the rest of the ovals, pausing when I get to the last question. Has anyone close to you ever committed suicide?
NO.
I pick up my paper but wait a beat, feeling like I did something wrong. I look over the questions again but can’t find a mistake. At that moment, my teacher walks in, nodding politely at us as she does. When she sees me, she smiles.
“Sloane,” she says. “I’m so happy to finally meet you.”
The entire class turns to stare at me, curious expressions on their faces. The day has taken on a dreamlike quality as I float to the front to put my paper on the pile. But unlike the other student’s assessments, my teacher stops to look over my answers. When she’s done, she smiles.
“Good girl,” she says. And then she turns to write on the board.
• • •
Kevin leads me to lunch and decides to pick out my food for me. He says that I need to keep my weight stable, even though a side effect of the medication is loss of appetite. As he tells me this, I realize that he’s right. I can’t remember the last time I was hungry.
I sit at a table, alone, and peek out at the cafeteria. Kevin is leaning against the wall, silently taking in the room. There are three other handlers in here, watching their charges. Dr. Warren told me that a handler would shadow me for a few weeks after I’m released, and then monitor me for six after that. I’m on day two.
“Can I sit?”
I jump and see a girl standing there. She’s pretty and blond, and I recognize her as the girl from my first-period class who said hi to me. “Sure,” I say, although she’s already sat down across from me.
“I’m Lacey,” she says, her voice deep and raspy like an old-time movie star. In front of her, she unrolls a brown paper bag and pulls out a package of orange cupcakes. I look down again at my lunch tray and the slab of meat on it.
“You’re Sloane, right?” she asks.
I must look surprised that she remembers, because she shrugs. “New-kid thing,” she says. “We notice all of the returners as they enter. Sort of like . . . will they or won’t they?”
“‘Will they or won’t they’ what?” I ask.
“Remember. I’m convinced that eventually one of us will remember something, and then the entire system will break down. What can I say? I’m an anarchist.” She smiles broadly, and I like her already. She’s alive. I can feel her vitality oozing off her.
Lacey shoots a glance at my handler. “They’ll stop following you soon,” she offers, tilting her head toward Kevin. “As long as you don’t mess up.”
“Mess up?” It hadn’t really occurred to me that I would mess up, or even what messing up would entail. I’m cured. But I lean forward to listen because Lacey’s been in The Program, has been successful at returning. Maybe she knows something I don’t.
“I’ve been back for fifteen weeks.” She lowers her voice and brushes a strand of her blond hair behind her ear. “I’m still missing the pieces that The Program took away. At first I didn’t care, right? I was just glad to have survived. But now . . . Now I’m wondering about things. Did you know that they said I wanted to kill myself ?” she whispers, as if she’s been dying to talk to someone about it. “That doesn’t even seem possible. I’m like . . . the most well-balanced person I know. Did they say you tried to kill yourself, too?”