Page 168 of The Secret We Keep
After minutes of endless silence from all of us, Morgan finally speaks, her voice so low, I can barely hear her. “I don’t believe you.”
Her words have me kissing the top of her head with heartbreaking sympathy. “She’s gone.” Maybe if I keep repeating it she’ll believe me.
“No.” Her hands loosen their grip on my arm.
Her lack of emotion terrifies me. “I’ve got you,” I try to console her, fear rising uncontrollably within me.
She’s limp. Motionless. It’s unnerving.
Eventually, dragging herself from my embrace, she leaves me abandoned. Just when I think things can’t get any worse, she looks me square in the eye, her face blank. “You’re lying.” The bags under her eyes are grey and heavy. What she’s going through right now is sucking the life clean out of her.
I glance at her parents as they stand.
Nothing. We’ve achieved nothing.
“Morgan,” Bill starts, watching his daughter like a hawk.
Morgan goes to her dresser, looking through the small jewellery boxes on top. She finds what she’s looking for and turns to face me, her voice completely normal, and every bit that of the young woman I know. “How did she buy me this necklace?”
Another look is exchanged between the three of us.
“She didn’t, love,” Julie says depleted. “That’s the chain I got for your birthday.”
Morgan looks at us all as if we’re playing some sick trick on her. “No. Holly gave this to me.” She looks down at the gold chain wrapped around her fingers. “It has M for my name on it.”
The look her dad gives me is helpless. Of course it is. He’s seen this before. Her inability to see the truth.
“It was on the table in the kitchen. You had already opened it before I could give it to you.”
Morgan’s gaze drops to the necklace.
There’s no M on it.
I give her mum a sympathetic look, trying my best to give her a reassuring smile. “Curly fries,” I say, moving out of her bathroom, knowing that after some extensive research, I had to gather what I could in order to help her. “Will you sit with me?”
“Why?”
I pull out my phone. “Need to show you something.”
She doesn’t move, and I give Bill a look, wanting to know if I should go on.
Clearly no longer able to determine what he thinks is best for his daughter, he gives me a nod of his head.
Having never encountered a patient with the same schizoaffective disorder as Morgan, I cautiously find the recording I took when she thought she was calling Holly in my car. “Tell me what you hear, curly fries.” I hold the phone out between us.
The recording plays back. There’s a pause before Morgan speaks.
Hi… I’m not sure… Can you meet me at mine? I am. We’re on our way home. I’m fine… He didn’t hurt me… Can you just meet me at mine in an hour?
Morgan’s eyes stare at the phone in my hand. “What did you do?”
My eyes plead with her to understand what my recording proves. “I recorded you talking to Holly.”
She huffs, looking between me and my phone before she points at it. “But not everything she said is on there.”
“What did you hear?” I ask gently.
Morgan’s eyes narrow to pins at me. Her head shakes. “She asked me if I was with you. But… Why can’t I hear her?”
