CHAPTER 1
PENROSE
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The ripple of smoke he exhaled evaporated into the misty air with a hypnotizing swirl, yet the sensation of warmth and tanginess of the tobacco in his tongue couldn't occupy his mind to either be distracted or pacified. The lean fingers that tucked the cigarette in between their rosin-powdered curvature, cold and chafed; the silver ring that adorned his thumb and pinky frozen.
He glanced once again at the building only a small distance away from where he was leaning next to his car in the parking lot. A couple of other owners of the vehicles, who had seen him linger from the time they arrived to when they exited the building around thirty minutes later, gave him an odd look. He hadn't been moving from his spot outside of the state hospital in this godforsaken winter for some time now, just standing there like a creep, did he want to catch a cold or something? Was he a part of the patient treated here somehow?
The truth was he was just early. Too early in fact, he had come an hour and a half before his supposed conference with a psychiatrist inside. He figured that the spare time would help him to be more prepared for the things to come, but it just backfired into making him more anxious, his stomach stirred and surged with nauseating anticipation. If he thought to stay inside the car for any moment, he might just relent to the urge to just drive away, change his mind with a flick of his wrist on the handbrake, and never look back and he would hate that. Wouldn't he hate that? Was this a good decision after all? Or better yet, was it a sane one?
He checked his watch that showed 10:44, only a few minutes more until his meeting and he had to go up there. Now he hesitated whether he felt relief after waiting for so long or he dreaded it even worse.
He inhaled a deep intake of smoke for one last time before dropping it into the snow and crushed it under his boots. Then he crouched to pick the bud up—the nearest trash can gave him a glare of a warning sign. He discarded the litter and took another appraising look at the state hospital building. The expansive, red brick structure stared back at him in provocation, as though making a bet with itself whether he would turn around, giving in to the comfort of living life in ignorance or continue his way inside to look for the answers of questions that had been haunting him.
"Excuse me."
A voice snapped him out of his reverie and he looked over his shoulder to see a stocky man, dressed in a navy blue, security guard uniform, approaching him. The man fixed his cap and regarded him with narrowed eyes. He assessed his plush, dark attire and tall stature for a second. The suspicion in his gaze wavered as he seemingly contemplated the kind of tone he would use on him.
"Saw you from the gate up front. Can't help but wonder why you're lingering around." The guard beckoned his head back to the direction of the heavily-guarded entryway where one must surrender their identification as a warrant.
"Cameron Crane," a different security officer had said back there, enunciating his name as if he was burning it on the back of his mind, a silent implication that his presence here would be recorded and kept under close surveillance.
Cameron tried to relax his expression when he faced the seasoned guard. Revealing the visitor card from out of his pocket, he displayed it up to him. "Yes, sorry. I was just on the phone."
"That's gotta be a long ass phone call. You sure you're not missing your appointment?" the guard eyed the card warily. "They gonna want you to put that on if you wanna come inside."
He nodded as he fastened the pin behind the card on the left side of his chest.
"You sure you're not missing your appointment?" the guard repeated, this time louder in volume.
I've heard that for the first time.
He shook his head as he glanced at the building again, before refocusing himself. His composed face didn't betray him but he worried the vigilant stare of the guard would pinpoint his giddy hands and feet. "No, it's actually at eleven. I came early."
"Right, the entrance is straight ahead." He motioned with his hand. "Just don't loiter around, it'll make the other guards antsy."
"Sorry, I'll be going." Cameron fought the urge to roll his eyes as he turned away from him, feeling his gaze burning a hole on his back.
He only began to stall again when he inhaled a deep breath as he ascended the set of stairs that guided him inside. The door was made of translucent glass and a security officer that was posted behind it opened the entrance for him to enter. Warm breeze immediately wafted to his face, defrosting the layers of coldness that veiled his skin but not enough to thaw the iciness that had penetrated within.
"Place all objects in your pocket here, please," the guard instructed as he pointed to the basket on the table next to where he was standing. Cameron only had his phone, wallet, and keys to set aside before he silently followed the guard's motion for him to hold his hands up. The metal detector wand that the man clutched at a hand traced his outline and remained mute throughout the whole austere process.
He was released immediately after he was cleared of the inspection and his belongings returned, sauntering to the receptionist desk across the door. The lobby opened up to a vast vestibule where two artery hallways branched away from each other, but he went straight ahead as he glanced at the preoccupied nurse that was posted up front.
"Do you have an appointment?" she asked with a voice that fell flat and emotionless. She kept her gaze down, fixed to something under the long table.
"Yes, I'm looking to meet Dr. Singh at eleven," he responded. "Under the name Cameron Crane."
The nurse, who appeared to be by the age forty, looked up at him, her tightly knotted bun creating an impression of intensity and hypercritical quality to her already rigid features.
"Like the composer?" she asked as she raised one of her eyebrows, only now there was a hint of interest in her tone.
He tried to not let out the sigh that was almost a reflex. "Yes, but not while I'm not at work."
Her steely eyes gave him a once over, understanding the implication behind his words that he didn't wish to be recognized as his famous persona right now. She glanced down again for a second as he heard the familiar clack of keyboard being pressed by adept fingers, before she stepped away from her spot. "Follow me, please."
The nurse led him to the hallway on his right and the farther he walked into it, the more unfeeling everything seemed to be. The interior was white and the doors that lined up the walls were gray, it was not overly clinical unlike an ordinary kind of hospital, only more drab and lifeless, but then it also felt draining to be here, as though by staying for too long could slowly make one fade into the dull background, blending their identity, soul, and spirit with the haziness of the monotone.
He was forced into a halt when the nurse stopped before the hallway separated into two again. On the door to their left, a shiny plaque was drilled on an eye-level on the surface, a writing with a name on it: Dr. Raina Singh.
The nurse knocked and waited with him in silence, facing him sideways, and he could see through his peripheral vision that she was observing him. It was safe to say she must have been his devoted listener.
She was about to open her mouth when the door opened to reveal a woman donned in a sterile lab coat, at least the purple colored blouse that she wore underneath added some speck of color into the washed out place.
"Mr. Crane, I've been expecting you," the psychiatrist greeted with a warm, calming smile. She held out a hand for him to shake and he received it as she opened the door wider to let him in. "Thank you, Nurse Ingram."
He couldn't help but respond back with a small curve of his lips as he entered the homely office. The walls and backdrop were still monochrome, but there were pictures hanging on the surface to mask the humdrum and a bouquet of rainbow tulips placed in a plastic vase at the table for two in the corner of the room. This was probably the part of the hospital that seemed more lived than the rest.
"Please, take a seat," Dr. Singh said as she occupied the chair behind her desk. Some papers and folders were stacked above each other in front of her, and he eyed them for a moment as a fleeting thought crossed him if there was a document tucked somewhere about a certain person whose affair brought him here in the first place.
"Thank you," he muttered as he took one of the two seats available for guests.
Dr. Singh opened the file that had already been singled out before her and looked up to meet his eyes. "How's the drive all the way here? I believe there was a pileup accident two days ago on Spring Rite Bridge."
He didn't know why but he was glad that she had initiated a small talk, easing her way into the crux of the conversation that he so dreaded, yet earnest to hear at the same time. Perhaps, her doctor's eye could tell that he needed it. "Oh, yeah, I was in one of them actually. Third car on the wreck. The first one had a tire slip. The storm made it hard to see that they were stopped in the middle of the road and that was how the rest of us got involved."
Her eyes widened in surprise, a sympathetic look ensued. "Oh, really? I'm so sorry to hear that."
He dismissed her concern with a small wave of his hand. "Yes, but don't worry, no one was badly hurt, just shocked, and I didn't sustain any injuries either, just need to fix my car, that's all."
She nodded as she weaved her fingers together. "I sure hope you'd come in great shape for our meeting today, Mr. Crane."
"I tried to prepare myself. I figured it would be taxing," he replied as he placed his elbows on the armrest.
The doctor picked up the metal pen on the table and tapped one end to the paper that he knew was the printed sheets of a court petition he had delivered through emails two weeks ago. "Why now, Mr. Crane? After eighteen years..."
He gazed up to her dark brown eyes that although kind, was also heedful and seemingly on the lookout. "It's not a decision made on the spur of the moment. I've thought about it since I was eighteen."
"Then why not sooner?"
He licked his lips, it had gone just a little uncomfortably dry. "My financial circumstances only allow me to do so now."
She studied him for a moment, the way his eyes probed him as though she was only trying to understand, but he realized that it was perhaps only a posturing she put on the surface. She was suspicious of him, just like the guard in the parking lot, and curious, just like the nurse that escorted him here.
"You announced your early retirement after your last performance at the Royal Albert Hall. Is it safe to say that one of the main driving factors is your wish to take guardianship of her?"
"It is," he answered briefly, an irksome feeling began to surface within him upon the direction of the conversation. He cleared his throat and subconsciously fumbled for the ring on his thumb as he twisted it back and forth with his free hand, and he knew the doctor saw that. How would she interpret it? A telltale sign of neuroticism?
"But you're on top of your career, do you not find it fulfilling anymore?"
He dropped his hands as he shook his head. "This is really not about me."
Dr. Singh inhaled a deep breath as she leaned back on her chair. "It's really not, of course, it's about your sister, Clementine Spencer, but you have to understand our disposition here, Mr. Crane, it's not everyday that a patient who has been estranged from their family for almost two decades suddenly has someone trying to bring her home somewhere. You have to forgive my prying of you. I didn't even know that she was related to you until two months ago after our first phone call."
He shifted in his chair uncomfortably, somehow the notion of being perceived as a stranger to his own blood didn't sit well in the pit of his stomach, but neither could he deny it, it was only a fact, and for that reason, it was a must that his intentions be delved and dissected, because he really was a stranger to her and strangers usually meant no good.
"Sorry for not coming in sooner, I was in Europe, but, yes... it's just performing to an audience is no longer something that excites me, I lose focus on my art. All I could think about is this moment."
He didn't want to think about it that way but this conference surely felt as though a job interview, him as an applicant attempting to convince the employer that he would be the most fitting, most perfectly suitable person for this job of bringing home his unwell sister and caring for her. She, whom he hadn't seen since he was just a boy. She, who must not recognize his twenty-eight years old features now that he grew up to be so drastically distinct from his scrawny figure at the age of ten, the year when she was taken away.
Dr. Singh contemplated his choice of words for a second, her eyebrows furrowed slightly. "You took up your wife's name... or husband's, Mr. Crane?"
He shook his head. "No, Crane is our grandfather's surname. Our mother changed it from Spencer when she left home."
"And where is she now?"
"She passed away five years ago," he answered, a simple question with a heavy weight.
"I'm sorry to hear that." There was a hesitating empathy in her tone, but it was no big deal for him.
"It's fine."
"You said here in your document you have two more siblings. Who are they and where are they now?"
His stomach churned in nausea, licking his lips again before responding, "Nicholas, thirty, two years older than me. He lives in California and is a businessman and Victor—he's the youngest at twenty-four, lives in Texas, he's a med student and it's his last year."
She straightened on her chair, her eyes narrowed slightly. "Do they know of your wish to take her home?"
This was it, this was the determining momentum. He believed the inquiries about him no longer held as much as crucial value as this one question. For once, he couldn't refrain from sighing in frustration anymore. He maintained eye contact when he revealed truthfully, trying not to make it worse for the whole situation. "No, they don't."
"Mr. Crane—"
"We keep a healthy relationship, but I'm not dependent on them in any way. I have my own house. I have enough income and security to provide for two, and even if I've retired I won't be deprived of my earnings. She doesn't ever need to go to work or something if she's not capable of it." He tried to defend, something about the way he elaborated his solicitation made it sound desperate and he hated it, but he couldn't stop himself. "I will also prepare for any living arrangements she may need..."
"I understand. I don't doubt your capability to facilitate, Mr. Crane, but I just wanted you to know that this decision you make will not only affect yours and Clementine's life, but also your brothers, because the fact that she was brought here in the first place is tied back to all of you," she explained as she observed his tensing features. "What will your brothers think when you make a monumental decision like this without telling them?"
He knew what she wanted; she was trying to incite some raw reaction from him. "The others can feel whatever they want to feel, and I know mine as well. This is not just something that I just thought over the weekend. I understand what I'm putting myself into."
"Do you really?" there was a challenge in her tone, almost patronizing. It didn't sit well with his pride but a part of him knew that he had brought it upon himself. She didn't try to castigate him though. From the start, he could tell that she was too professional for something like that. "Let me ask you this one question. What is it that you're really trying to achieve by doing this?"
It was the only inquiry among all where he could give her the most sincere and resolute answer, no matter if it would set a bad light on his foundation of reason. "I want to understand why she did it."
"And if what you find out doesn't satisfy you?"
He inhaled a deep breath. "Whatever it is, I'm ready. I'll take care of her."
"And what if she won't talk to you about it at all? Because, trust me, Mr. Crane. We've all tried." Dr. Singh shook her head in thoughtfulness. "She wouldn't say a thing."
He snapped his eyes up and uncovered another set of worries that came with the whole baggage. This one wasn't brand new though; it came first and foremost even before he had to consider the fact that all this would destroy his relationship with his brothers. It was the possibility that she would never tell him anything.
"I will wait for as long as it takes," he declared, receiving a corresponding hum from her.
"You haven't seen her for years. What do you think she looks like now? Physically speaking."
"I think she'll look a lot like Nicholas. Which means, she also looks a lot like me, because I have the same features as him, you know, at least that's what Vic said about us." He cringed at himself when he realized he was rambling.
"Can you describe it?"
He nodded as he tried to conjure up a vision of a woman from his memory, but the picture of her was torn apart in his mind, scratched with scissors by his mother who taught them all that there was left to do was to hate her, and if he wanted to see her from another perspective, he only had the images of her in the newspaper that headlined about the cold-blooded murders.
"You are now the second oldest, Cameron. If someone asks you how many siblings you have, you must say there are only three of you, all brothers. You have no sister anymore, okay? There never was a sister and there will never be a sister."
"She had brown hair and hazel eyes. She was around five foot four inches when she was eighteen, so I guess she's grown one or two inches since then."
"I should say that's not too far off." Dr. Singh opened the document in front of her and picked up a file, pushing it forward for him to see. It was the hospital administration form for a patient named Clementine Magnolia Spencer, his older sister. There on the front, next to all the details of identification, was a picture of a woman staring at the camera with hollow eyes. Her skin was paler than how he remembered and her features had matured significantly; the characteristics that portended youth had gradually faded away, like the fat on her cheeks that had diminished and replaced with jutting bones, accompanying the deepening of the crow's feet on the edge of her hazel eyes.
"That's her?" he pondered.
"Yes."
He swallowed the lump on his throat. "She doesn't appear... sick, I mean... she doesn't look like someone that could do what she did..."
"Appearance can be deceiving."
He gazed down into the lonesome picture of her for a while, trying to see where he had missed it in her face, in her eyes, the darkness that he should have seen. The darkness that killed.
"Why would her reaction be when I meet her again?" he wondered quietly.
Dr. Singh tilted her head slightly. "What do you think?"
"I think she'll know it's me."
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"Will it wash out in the water or is it always in the blood?"
- John Mayer