They led me into the hospital, and it felt as if I was me again, that gut reaction when I caught those antiseptic medical smells. But the smell was faint and the feeling was more terror than hatred, and I knew it wasn’t my reaction, it was hers, Pamela’s. Her shoes felt made of lead and her legs ached, but she forced them to move.

Do it for Mommy. Do it for Mommy.

But I hate it. Hate, hate, hate it!

My grandfather checked in at the front desk. Pamela stood at his side, clutching his hand. She couldn’t see over the counter, but I could imagine it, having seen the ruins. After a few words to the nurse, he led Pamela down equally familiar corridors, so dingy and worn they didn’t seem far removed from the ones I remembered in the abandoned version.

We climbed the stairs and walked into a huge ward. I remembered this, too. Even the beds were as I recalled them, two rows of metal cots. Only a few were in use, the rest exactly as I’d seen them, bare and rusting.

“It’s so terrible,” my grandmother whispered. “I can’t believe they’ve let it go like this.”

“Funding cutbacks,” my grandfather said. “I hear it’ll close soon. They haven’t taken new patients in over a year.”

He led Pamela to the last occupied bed. A young nurse stood beside it, holding a wrinkled hand. When the nurse turned and smiled, her face seemed to ripple. Beneath her eyes, light poured, bright light. Her skin glowed with it. Her doughy features sharpened, pocked skin smoothing, teeth straightening, and inside Pamela, I stared, thinking how beautiful she was, but the thought formed only in that corner of my mind that was still my own, and the overwhelming thought instead was hate.

Get away from Aunt Isolde. Don’t smile at me. Don’t pretend you care. It’s your fault. All your fault. I hate you. Hate you all so much.

Pamela gripped her father’s hand tighter, as if to keep from launching herself at the woman, and the hate roiling through her was unlike anything I’d felt before. Black fire, consuming everything it touched.

“How’s she doing today?” my grandfather asked.

At the side of the high bed, Pamela couldn’t see more than that wizened hand, and I mentally swallowed, remembering a hand just like it, on another hospital bed, when I’d gone to visit Pamela after her attack. My first vision.

“She’s comfortable,” the young nurse said. “That’s all we can hope for at this point.”

“Is it . . . ?” my grandmother asked.

“She’ll be free soon,” the nurse murmured. “Her passing will be comfortable. I’m sure of it.” The nurse squeezed the old woman’s hand. “She’s had such a hard life. It’ll be better soon.”