Page 77 of The Vanishing Place
Lewis hesitated. “You don’t think it was Four?”
“No.” Effie let her head sink into him again. “I don’t.”
Lewis’s arms tightened around her, protecting her, just like he’d always done.
“If your dad’s out there,” he said, “we’ll find him.”
“He can’t get away with it again, Lewis.”
“He won’t.” He kissed her head. “You won’t let him.”
—
Effie sat at the kitchen table and stared at her phone. Blair, whose face filled the screen, was in her blue work scrubs.
“I just,” Effie bent forward, resting her elbows on the table, “I don’t know how to be around her, Bee. It’s like she’s two people in one body and I never know who I’m going to get—the kid who hates me so much that she wants to throw herself off a bridge, or the kid who’s sitting in the living room right now doing watercolor paintings with June.”
“It’s quite calming.” Blair yawned. “Shona, the art therapist, gets the patients doing it at work. Could be worth you giving—”
“Blair.” Effie snapped. “I’m not about to do a bloody watercolor.”
“Right.” Blair rubbed her face. “Sorry. I’m running on caffeine and cocaine at the moment.” She stopped to take a gulp from a mug with “Born in the NHS” printed across it. “What time is it with you?”
“About three in the afternoon.” Effie sighed. “I’m just back from my interview with Morrow.”
“Fun had by all, then?”
“Like a day at Disneyland.”
“That bad?”
“No,” she said. “Not really. Morrow asked all of the right questions. It’s just that I don’t have anything to tell her. I keep going over it in my head, but I don’t know what happened out there.”
“Did they grill you about your childhood?”
“Not really.” Effie hesitated. “A few questions about Dad and Tia. And Four, of course. But it was a lifetime ago. Tia and Four have been strangers to me for years. When I left, they were just children, Bee.”
“So were you.” There was a pause before Blair spoke again. “And the kid?” she asked.
“They’re coming here to interview her soon,” said Effie. “So I guess she’ll either sit in silence or try to scratch their eyes out.” She sighed. “I don’t know. Do you have any advice? Anything from a medical perspective?”
Blair clutched the mug between her hands, staring into it as if the answer might be at the bottom. “Did you ever readRoom?” she asked. “About the woman who’s held captive with her son.”
“Blair.”
“Just bear with me.”
“Yes.” Effie rolled her eyes. “I’ve read it.”
“Well, there’s this scene where they measure everything in the room, as a sort of fun activity. The walls, and the table, and the chair. Until the mum can’t take it anymore. Because she knows it’s not just some game. She sees the room for what it is, a prison. But to the boy, who was born there, the room isn’t something to be feared or questioned. The room is all that he’s ever known. For him, what’s scary is outside. The boy understands the rules of theroom, and even though he’s a prisoner, it’s where he feels safe. It’s where his life makes sense.”
Blair set the mug down and leaned into the screen, just centimeters away, rather than a whole world.
“When the boy escapes,” she continued, “everything about the outside world overwhelms him, and he wants to go back. So when his mum tells him that he can’t, the boy is distraught.” She paused. “It’s the same for Anya. Even if she’s escaped something terrible, something thatweknow to be wrong, it’s going to take time for her to trust this new reality. We also don’t know exactly what she’s been told about the world. It might be that she’s been groomed to distrust outsiders. To fear us.”
Blair went quiet, and for a moment, neither of them said anything.
“So,” said Effie, “just to be clear…after all that, your big takeaway piece of advice for me is time.”
