But as she listened, she thought the footsteps paused outside her door.

She stiffened in the bed, craning her head in the direction of the faint, distinctive sound.

She told herself she was mistaken, and then thought she heard the handle of her door slowly turn.

Lucy instantly turned to the bed stand, and fumbling noisily, managed to click on the bedside lamp. Light flooded the room, and she blinked a couple of times, as her eyes adjusted. In almost the same motion, she threw herself out of the bunk, and stepped across the room, banging into a metal wastebasket, which skittered noisily across the floor. The door had a deadbolt lock, and she saw that it had not moved from the closed position. Crossing the room rapidly, Lucy pushed herself up to the solid wooden door and placed her ear against it.

She could hear nothing.

She listened for a sound. Anything that might tell her something; that someone was outside, that someone was fleeing, that she was alone, that she was not.

Silence gripped her as awfully as the noise that had plunged her into alertness.

She waited.

She let seconds slide past her, craning forward.

One minute. Perhaps two.

Through the window open behind her, she suddenly heard some voices passing by beneath. There was a laugh, then it was joined by another.

She turned back to the door. She reached up, threw the deadbolt lock, and with a sudden, swift motion, thrust the door open.

The corridor was empty.

She stepped out and peered to the right and to the left.

She was alone.

Lucy took another deep breath, letting the wind inside her lungs calm her racing heart. She shook her head. You were always alone she told herself. You are letting things get to you. The hospital was a place of unfamiliar extremes, and being surrounded by so much odd behavior and mental illness had made her jumpy. If she had something to fear, it was far less than whoever it might have been had to fear from her. This sense of bravado reassured her.

Then she retreated again into the room Short Blond had once occupied. She locked the door, and before getting back into bed, arranged the wooden chair so that it was balanced up against the door. Not as much as an additional barrier, because she doubted that would work. But propped in such a way that were the door to open, it would crash to the floor. She took the metal waste-basket and placed that on top, then added to the makeshift tower her small suitcase. She believed that the noise of it all tumbling to the floor would be enough of an early warning to rouse her, no matter how deep her sleep might be.

Chapter 23

Was that you?

"It was never me. It was always me." "You took risks," I said stiffly, argumentatively. "You could have played it safe, but you didn't, which was a mistake. I couldn't see that at first, but eventually I saw it for what it was."

"There was much you didn't see C-Bird."

"You're not here," I said slowly, the tone of my words betraying the lack of confidence I felt. "You're only a memory."

"Not only am I here," the Angel hissed, "but this time I'm here for you."

I spun about, as if I could confront the voice that harried me. But he was like a shadow, flitting from one dark corner of the room to the next, always elusive, just out of my reach. I reached down and seized an ashtray jammed with butts and twisted cigarette filters, and threw it as hard as I could at the shape. His laughter blended with an explosion of glass, as the ashtray shattered against the wall. I twisted, right, then left, trying to line him up, but the Angel moved too quickly. I shouted at him to stand still, that I wasn't scared of him, to fight fair, all of which sounded a little like a crying child in a playground trying to confront a bully. Each moment felt worse, every second that passed I felt smaller, less capable. Furious, I picked up the wooden stool and threw it hard across the room. It smashed against the frame of the door, gouging out a chunk of painted wood, then dropping to the floor with a thud.

With every second passing, I felt more and more despair. I opened my eyes, searching the room for Peter who might help, but he wasn't there. I tried to picture Lucy, Big Black, Little Black, or any of the others from the hospital, hoping to enlist someone in my memory who might stand by my side and help me fight.

I was alone, and my solitude was like a blow against my heart.

For a moment, I thought I was lost, then, through the fog of all the noise of madness past and madness to come, I heard a sound that seemed out of place. An insistent banging that seemed, well, un-right. Not exactly wrong, but something different. It took me a few moments to collect myself and understand it for what it was. Someone at my front door.

The Angel blew another chilly breath on the back of my neck.

The knocking persisted. It grew louder, like the volume being turned up.

I cautiously approached the sound.

"Who is it?" I asked. I was no longer completely certain that the noise from the outside world was any more real that the snakelike voice of the Angel, or even Peter's reassuring presence on one of his haphazard visits. Everything was blending together, a soup of confusion.

"Francis Petrel?"

"Who is it?" I repeated.

"It's Mister Klein from the Wellness Center."

The name seemed vaguely familiar. It had a distant quality, as if it belonged somewhere in the recollections of childhood, not something current. I bent my head to the door, trying to fix a face to the name, and slowly features came into shape in my imagination. A slender, balding man, with thick glasses and a slight lisp, who rubbed his chin nervously near the end of the afternoon, when he grew tired, or else when one of his client patients wasn't making progress. I wasn't sure that he was actually there. I wasn't sure that I could actually hear him. But I knew that somewhere a Mister Klein actually did exist, that he and I had spoken many times in his too-bright, sparse office, and that there was a slim possibility that this was indeed him.

"What do you want?" I demanded, still standing by the door.

"You've missed your last couple of regularly scheduled therapy appointments. We're concerned about you."

"Missed my appointments?"

"Yes. And you have medications that need to be monitored. Prescriptions that probably need filling. Would you please open the door?"

"Why are you here for me?"

"I told you," Mister Klein continued. "You have been regularly scheduled at the clinic. You have missed appointments. You've never missed appointments before. Not since your release from Western State. People are concerned."

I shook my head. I knew enough not to open the door.

"I'm fine," I lied. "Please leave me alone."

"You don't sound fine, Francis. You sound stressed. I could hear shouting from inside your apartment when I came up the stairs. It sounded like a fight was going on. Is there someone in there with you?"

"No," I said. This wasn't exactly true, nor was it exactly false.

"Why won't you open the door and we can talk a little more easily."

"No."

"Francis, there's nothing to be afraid of."

There was everything to be afraid of. "Leave me alone. I don't want your help."

"If I leave you alone, will you promise to come to the clinic on your own?"

"When?"

"Today. Tomorrow at the latest."

"Maybe."

"That's not much of a promise, Francis!"

"I'll try"

"I need your word that you will come to the clinic either today or tomorrow and get a full examination"

"Or what?"

"Francis," he said patiently, "do you really need to ask that question?"

Again I placed my head against the door, banging it with my forehead, once, then twice, as if I could chase thoughts and fears out of my thinking. "You'll send me back to the hospital," I said cautiously. Very quietly.