Lucky Number 23 Read online

  Carter crossed the room to the white door and pushed it open.

  "There are towels next to the tub and soap in the pump thing sitting on the edge of the tub. Hanging next to the tub is the nightgown you need to wear. Put that on and let me know when you're done and I'll get Mama," Carter instructed before ushering me inside.

  He closed the door behind me, and I heard the click of the lock. I whirled around and turned the knob. He had locked me inside. Probably just for my privacy, I told myself.

  I left my clothes in a puddle on the floor and climbed into the fancy clawfoot tub. I had never lived with a rich family before. I didn't think rich families took in foster kids, but this place, McCourt Manor they called it, was a dream come true. I soaked in the tub and thought about the other girls here. The wicked girls Carter had called them. I hoped Mama Ester and Dr. John didn't think I was wicked already. I wanted them to give me a chance. I liked Carter and Mama Ester so far, and I thought I could be happy here, especially if Dr. John could fix me as Carter said.

  "You've got five more minutes," Carter's voice came from the other side of the locked door.

  "Ok," I responded and ducked my head under the water to wash my hair.

  The tub was so deep I could sink my entire body under the water like at the swimming pool. I couldn't remember the last time I was at a swimming pool, but I could remember what it felt like to be immersed in the water. I smiled and scrubbed my hair, picturing mermaids and tropical fish in my mind. Carter's frantic pounding on the door was muffled under the water and let it float away with the bubbles.

  When I came up for breath, Carter was standing at the foot of the tub holding out a big, fluffy white towel. I stood up from the water and snatched the towel from him. He extended his hand, and I took it to help me out of the tub. I wrapped the towel around myself as Carter pushed me out of the bathroom.

  "Come on; I told you to hurry up. Mama Ester is waiting in your room already. She's mad."

  I scurried down the long corridor, helped along by Carter's nudges to my back. When we got back down to my room, the last one on the left, it was already wide open. Mama Ester was standing by the tiny, barred window, peering outside. The window was far above my head, and I wondered what she saw out there.

  "Sorry, Mama," Carter's head was down when he spoke to his mother.

  I glanced from him to her and caught the smug smirk she didn't bother hiding.

  "You can go now," she directed him. "Be ready at the door for your father."

  Carter turned and left. I jumped at the sound of the door as Carter pulled it closed behind him.

  "We have rules in this house," Ester began. "Rules that must be followed. A strict routine and discipline are the foundation of treatment here."

  Mama Ester walked over to the closet and pulled out a long white nightgown with ruffles on the hem and sleeves. We had forgotten the one set out in the bathroom in a rush back to the bedroom. Shoot.

  "Since this is your first night here, I will let this infraction slide. Dr. John will explain the rules over dinner tonight and after that, well my dear, after that, there is nothing I can do for you if you choose to break the rules. Do you understand?"

  I nodded. This wasn't the first home I was placed in a foster home that believed in corporal punishment. Mama Ester didn't realize yet that spankings didn't work on me. No one had been able to drive out the darkness they claimed was inside of me through time outs or taking away my toys either. I was who I was, but for now, I would be agreeable.

  Mama Ester loosened the towel wrapped around my body and let it fall to the ground.

  "Arms up," she instructed.

  I did as she said and she slipped the soft, cotton nightgown down over my shoulders. The fabric reached my feet and tickled my toes, the way Mama Ester's dress reached her feet. I smiled at the similarities and wondered if she would dress us alike every day. She patted the bed, and I sat next to her. She held a silver comb and began to work through the tangles in my stringy, blonde hair. She was gentle, and when all the knots were gone, she nestled what she could on top of my head in a bun and used bobby pins from her pocket to secure the loose hairs.

  "What color ribbon would you like?"

  "Dark red," I told her immediately.

  "I thought so," she responded, holding a beautiful burgundy silk ribbon out in front of me.

  I smiled, and she tied the ribbon around my hair and made a bow at the front.

  "Are you ready to meet Dr. John?" She asked me when she was finished.

  I nodded, not knowing if I had any other choice.

  “Dr. John is especially excited to meet you tonight. Do you know that you’re incredibly special to us? Number 23. John’s favorite number and we get you on the 23rd and it just so happens to be your birthday! Not to mention your file is exactly what he’s been looking for. We are so grateful to have you here,” Mama Ester said with joy.

  She took my hand and led me back down the corridor and to the foyer where the bathroom was. This time though we went down the staircase. There were only fifteen or so steps, and when we got to the bottom, Mama Ester stepped in front of me and used a key that hung from a necklace she wore to unlock the door at the bottom of the staircase.

  She pushed it open and walked through. She ushered me ahead of her as we entered the biggest kitchen I had ever seen. There were four big ovens built into one wall and a big flat cooktop that took up an entire counter. Three large silver refrigerators sat opposite the cooktop, and the middle of the room had three islands, one with a built-in sink. All the surfaces were made of what looked like sparkling rocks.

  "Wow," I gushed.

  "Rule number one is: Don't speak unless you are spoken to. You should remember that when you meet Dr. John." She nodded with wide eyes in an attempt to get me to take the meeting as seriously as possible.

  I nodded back to her, and we proceeded to walk through the kitchen and down another hallway. The doors on this level of the house were made of a light color wood, and the walls were all white. Much different than the upstairs of the home where my room was.

  She knocked on one of the doors in the middle and stepped back.

  “Enter” was the only response.

  Mama Ester gently pushed the door open and stepped inside, keeping me behind her.

  “Good evening, doctor. Number 23 has arrived. Would you like to meet her now or at dinner?”

  I peeled around the corner of Mama Ester’s long white dress and saw Dr. John. He sat at a large wooden desk and stared down at a pile of papers. He had brown hair that was neatly combed back away from his face. He looked bored, and when he finally looked up at Mama Ester, he took his thin, wire-rimmed glasses off, and set them on the table, then neatly folded his hands on top of the desk, and let out a deep sigh.

  “Carter has already given me the rundown on that girl. She’s slow. She doesn’t listen, and she’s younger than the rest.”

  His voice was even, and he spoke each word as though it were a fact—simple common knowledge. His eyes flickered down to mine and narrowed. Mama Ester saw the movement and quickly pushed my face behind her back where Dr. John couldn’t see me.

  “Carter came to you already?” She asked him, the joy she had earlier completely gone from her voice.

  “As soon as he deposited the girl with you, as he is instructed to. Now, I suppose you’ll handle her punishment?” He looked back down to his stack of papers to let her know the conversation was over.

  “She hasn’t started treatment yet,” Mama Ester reminded him.

  He scoffed in reply, and I peeked back around Mama Ester’s back. Dr. John stood up abruptly and the chair he sat in fell over behind him.

  “You are the one that wanted to bring in a younger girl. I told you that younger girls wouldn’t respond to the treatment. You took it upon yourself to accept an eight-year-old for fuck’s sake. Deal with her or I will deal with YOU!” Dr. John slammed his fist down onto the table and startled me.

  I cowered beh
ind Mama Ester. I knew what was coming next. They all thought they could punish the bad out of me. The last one spanked me and locked me in the closet of the basement after I cut open the barn cats. I wondered what my punishment from Mama Ester and Dr. John would be.

  Chapter Four

  Dr. Neumann’s office smelled like lemon and bleach when I walked in for our second-to-last session. The heat was turned down, and when I sat on the couch, I noticed the leather was slick and smoother to the touch than usual. I was exhausted, anxious, and confused. My dreams about the McCourts were getting more frequent and more vivid over the last few nights, and I was out of sleeping pills. I needed them to stop. They frightened me, and I hoped Dr. Neumann would refill my three-month prescription one more time before I was finally free next week.

  “The couches are clean,” I remarked as if he didn’t already know that.

  “Yes, I asked the cleaning company to tell their workers to make sure the couches are wiped down each night,” he explained.

  “Seems they weren’t doing it before then,” I frowned as I thought about all the times my bare skin had touched the nasty, sweaty, germ covered couches. This time I made it a point to wear jeans.

  “Have you given any thought to your plan for next week?” Dr. Neumann asked to change topics.

  I squirmed in my seat and bit my lip. I knew I couldn’t mention the McCourts again. I wasn’t stupid. I remembered talking about them would get me another four months in this place, Dr. Neumann said as much last week.

  “I’m looking for apartments this week. I have a showing for one today, after our appointment in fact,” I lied.

  “So, you’ve decided to stay in town then? You’re not going to Minnesota?”

  Dr. Neumann stood up and moved around to the front of his desk and sat on the edge of it. I didn’t like how he could look down on me from that position, so I stood up as well and moved over to the window, behind his large desk. The blinds were open, and I peered through them to see nothing but the dead grass and the parking lot outside.

  “Why would I ever want to leave here?” I asked him.

  He heard the obvious sarcasm in my voice and rose from the desk to join me at the window. He stood right next to me so that my shoulder was lightly brushing his arm. I hugged my arms across my chest and took a step to the side so that we wouldn’t touch.

  “Why would you want to go anywhere else?” He asked me as he looked out the window with me.

  I snorted and turned around. I let my back rest against the window and didn’t miss Dr. Neumann’s eyes travel from my head, down my chest and to my hips all in one glance before returning to my eyes. The old man had a history of flirting with his patients, the other women in the house talked, but there was no way I’d let him make any advances. Men who tried funny business with me didn’t tend to get far.

  “I’d love to go far away from here, but the truth is that I don’t know anyone anywhere else. I’m twenty-two, and I became an adult in jail and spent my twenty-first birthday in solitary confinement. I have no job experience, no place to live, no possessions. I know the reality of my situation doctor,” I assured him.

  “If you are serious about staying in the county and getting up on your feet, we have programs that can help you. You’ll need to stay in therapy, but some grants can help you get an apartment and living expenses until you have a few paychecks in the bank,” he offered.

  “That’s probably a good idea, thanks,” I agreed with him before walking back across the room and sitting back down on the couch.

  I had no intention of staying in Harrisburg. I wanted to get as far away from the town and the halfway house as I possibly could, and I needed to get to Carter and Mama Ester. Thinking about them made the dreams I had been having about my family come rushing to the front of my mind.

  “Anything bothering you, Ivy?” Dr. Neumann asked as he took a seat back at his desk. “You’re spacing out a bit.”

  “Actually, I was hoping you could write me another prescription for the sleeping pills,” I admitted.

  “Having trouble sleeping?”

  “Obviously.”

  “You should have enough of your last prescription to last another two weeks. Since you’re staying in Harrisburg, you can stop by to get a refill then,” he stated.

  “I think the pharmacist shorted me on the last refill you gave me because I’m out now, so if I could just get another today, while I’m here that would be great,” I pushed.

  Dr. Neumann sighed.

  “Have you tried any of the methods we had talked about before to help you sleep—meditation, tea, oils, changing your diet, adding exercise to your daily routine?”

  “None of that helps,” I insisted.

  “Well, how do you know if you don’t try?” He badgered me.

  “Because I know,” I insisted. “I need the sleeping pills. The only time I can sleep peacefully is after taking one of those little pills.”

  “Ivy, the problem is that you should have somewhere around fifteen pills left and you’re telling me the pharmacist shorted you? If you took an extra one just once or twice, I might overlook it this once, but you dosed yourself double what I prescribed and told you was safe,” the doctor lectured.

  I rolled my eyes and slouched back against the leather sofa.

  “I didn’t take any extra Dr. Neumann. If the pharmacist didn’t short me, one of the other girls in the house must have stolen them. You know, Candace is on Ambien too, and I think even Diana might be taking them, that girl cries herself to sleep almost every night. I wouldn’t put it past either of them to take some of my stash,” I rationalized to Dr. Neumann even though I knew he didn’t believe me.

  My story was plausible though. I lived in a halfway house with drug addicts and alcoholics and other women who had just gotten out of prison. Stealing pills wouldn’t be unusual or a surprising offense for any of us. I could see the wheels in the doctor’s head turning as he scratched his throat around his jaw where his 5-o'clock shadow was two days past needing trimmed, and bits of grey were slowly spreading across his beard.

  “Why don’t you tell me why you are so desperate for the pills?” Dr. Neumann asked quietly.

  I looked past him and shook my head. I bit my lip remembering the past few nights of nightmares. Terrifying images of being strapped to a table with headphones over my ears. Dreams that included closets with spikes sticking out of the walls so that if you moved even a few inches, you’d be poked, cut, or worse. The worst ones included bathtubs of ice water and being whipped with a leather belt while being made to watch disturbing images on the projector. I didn’t understand any of it. None of it happened, of course. These weren’t memories, but I was having dreams of memories as well; except, they were different. In my dreams, I felt scared and nervous. I was worried about being punished in my dreams, but the McCourt’s were always so kind to me.

  “Ivy?”

  “I’m having nightmares, it’s no big deal,” I stated.

  I crossed my arms across my chest and looked him in the eyes. I wasn’t lying.

  “What kind of nightmares. What happens in them?” He asked with his pen poised to start writing down everything I was saying.

  “Just the regular kind. No big deal,” I reiterated, making sure to say the last words slowly.

  “About jail?” the doctor asked.

  “Yes,” I told him.

  “You're not truthful, Ivy.”

  “About terrible things, okay?” I finally admitted to Dr. Neumann in exasperation.

  “Give me an example,” he prodded.

  “Well, last night I dreamt of the McCourts. I know you don’t want to hear that, but if you want me to be honest, well, here I am, being honest,” I threw my hands up in the air.

  “The McCourts? Well, what happened in your dream?”

  “Nightmare,” I corrected Dr. Neumann.

  “Okay, nightmare then. What happened, Ivy?”

  I gulped and tried to think back to the nightmares t
hat left me with only three hours of sleep the night before.

  “Well, lately, they’ve been about when I first got there, when I was eight. The nightmares are kind of like my memories, but different, darker, I guess. I don’t know, it’s confusing, and I know the things that happened in the nightmares never actually happened. I know it.”

  Dr. Neumann set down his pencil and looked at me with excitement.

  “Ivy, you’re beginning to get your memories back,” he told me.

  “No. I told you, these aren’t memories. They—they’re twisted up. Not right,” I insisted.

  “Dr. John McCourt was a murderer and—”

  “He was not a murderer!” I snapped loudly at Dr. Neumann and pointed my finger at him.

  “Lower your voice, Ivy,” he warned me, calmly.

  “No, doctor. I’m sick of this. I’ve been living in Lochnar House having you and Barb, and Dr. Santiago all try to tell me that my childhood wasn’t real! That I made up all the good times to cover my trauma? I don’t accept that. I know what happened to me. I lived there for four years. That’s a whole lot of memories to make up!”

  I stood and paced in front of Dr. Neumann’s desk, wringing my hands in front of my stomach and fuming. The unwillingness to accept the reality of my situation, as the good doctor described my situation, was part of what got my time in Lochnar House extended, but I knew, in my heart, that nothing bad had happened to me at that house. I was loved there, and I loved them back, all of them.

  “Ivy, this type of, memory blocking or memory replacement is common with abused children—”

  “I was not abused!” I shouted at the doctor.

  A knock at the door stopped me in my tracks.

  “Everything okay in there, Dr. Neumann?” The secretary from the front desk asked.

  “Is everything okay, Ivy?” he asked me.

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.