In a Dark Season by Vicki Lane Page B

had asked for a box or garbage bag to put the stack of quilts into, and when Tracy went to the kitchen in search of something suitable, Elizabeth had hastily slipped the laptop and notes between the folds of one of the quilts.
They were going to toss it anyway,
she argued, overcoming the small still voice that nagged in vain.
And I was honest about the quilts.

Chapter 6
    In Hell
    Wednesday, December 6
    N oise. There was always noise. Rattle, clang, clank, loud meaningless voices, shrill mirthless laughter, hoarse whispers. And always the hopeless sound of someone crying. There was no night—night with its blessed concealing darkness and the silence that she had once wrapped herself in like a familiar garment. There was always light. There was always noise. The overheated air smothered her and the dark odor of despair clung to everything.
    I am in hell,
thought Nola Barrett.
I am in hell for my sins.
    Hands plucked at her, pulling at her nightgown. Metal rings slid across a rod. “Nola honey, company’s coming today. You want to be a clean and pretty young lady, now don’t you? We got to wash you up good.”
    The thin cotton nightgown was twitched away and there was a spatter of liquid and a sloshing sound. The moonlike face of the attendant grimaced at her and wheezed a smoky laugh. “Like I always say, first we wash down as far as possible…”
    A rough cloth, cold and wet, scrubbed at her face, her breasts, her belly. She tried to protest but her tongue, thick with the bewitchment of hell, turned the words into a garble of meaningless sound.
    “And then we wash
up
as far as possible.”
    Nola flapped futile hands at the invasive washcloth that swabbed her feet, then worked its way up her trembling and jerking legs.
    “And
then…
we wash
possible!”
The braying voice was loud in her ears and the foul breath of her tormentor made her gag as the relentless hands thrust the wet rag into her most private parts.
             
    They had tied her into the wheelchair, for her own good, they said, and set her in front of a television where mindless people did mindless things. The colors whirled and blurred as her eyes filled with tears.
    I should have died…I wanted to die…I deserved to die…
    Abandoning the hopeless litany of guilt, Nola Barrett concentrated on turning her head to look at the door. The bewitchment of her tongue seemed to extend to the rest of her body: she could
think
an action, but movement, it seemed, was restricted to creaking, shaking slow-motion. As her eyes passed from the flickering screen, over the built-in cupboards and sink, past the open door of the bathroom and so to the second bed with its huddled and silent occupant, there was time to study it all.
    Even without her glasses—“You won’t be needing these, now will you, sweetheart?”—even though shapes blurred and quivered, the limits of her world were clear.
    O there’s none; no no no there’s none
    Be beginning to despair, to despair,
    Despair, despair, despair, despair.
    Nola Barrett’s head slumped forward as the leaden echo of the poem learned in her youth filled her consciousness, drowning out the chatter of the television and the endless, eternal noise of the nursing home.

    “No one’s there—that Tracy and what’s-his-name left a little while ago, hauling off a load of Nola’s things. I heard them saying they’d have to make one more trip at least.”
    Elizabeth turned from Nola Barrett’s front door to see a pleasant-looking woman pulling a wheeled bin toward the garbage collection site just a few steps across the road. Sharp blue eyes under a red knit hat studied Elizabeth. “You must be the new friend Nola told me about. I’ve seen your car here quite a few times. It was here Monday, so I guess you know what happened. Were you looking for that niece of hers?”
    “Yes, I was.” Elizabeth left the porch and started back toward her car. “I was going to visit Nola at the Layton Facility, and I thought