Rose studies her reflection in the mirror over the bathroom sink. There is no full-length mirror. Perhaps this is a kindness in an old folks’ home. All the glass shows is her head and shoulders. Short, white, wavy hair in need of a cut; Rose runs water over her hands, then pokes and fluffs until it resembles a sane woman’s hair. She’s always had good hair. Her face is gaunt and pale, but her hazel eyes are clear.

“Tally ho,” she says to her reflection. The woman in the mirror does not smile.

Pilfered keycard in hand, she leaves the room. The cola-loving nurse has not moved. Passing the desk, Rose notices Karen’s purse in a half-opened bottom drawer.

Rifling through another woman’s purse is distasteful, but once one has drugged and stolen from her, perhaps it is inevitable. The wallet contains a credit card, a debit card, a driver’s license, and seven dollars in cash. Rose dares not take the cards and would not stoop to stealing such a paltry sum of money. The wallet is returned to the bag.

Car keys with a tiny LED flashlight on the ring are in a side pocket. Rose takes the flashlight. Tissues, pens, notebook, comb, reading glasses, aspirin, lipstick: Rose takes the lipstick and uncaps it. The shade is pinker than she likes, but what the hell.

Using the wall mirror behind the desk, Rose puts a bit of the color on her cheeks, then carefully paints her lips. The woman in the mirror smiles. Amazing how a touch of lipstick can cheer a person up. She drops the recapped lipstick back into the purse and closes the drawer with a slippered foot.

On the far side of the desk, she straightens her makeshift dress, tugs her jacket straight, takes a deep breath, and flattens the keycard against the black plastic reader.

Her prison door hisses open.

CHAPTER 6

Rose steps over the threshold into a blank-walled hall that doglegs into another short hallway. This opens into the entrance foyer. The reception desk is unmanned, the double doors locked. Rose presses the cola nurse’s keycard against a reader to the right of the doors. They silently slide apart.

Night air, warm and soft, sinks into her, a balm for a sore body and a troubled mind. Filling her lungs, she feels as if she drinks life, as if the conditioned air of the lockdown unit is merely oxygen to sustain the body. Fresh real air is sustenance for the spirit, filled with life-affirming qualities scientists will never discover in windowless laboratories.

For the first time in her mutilated memory, Rose feels completely alive, totally present. To her right a hedge of autumn leaves, psychedelic pink under the unearthly glow of a streetlamp, points the way. Dropping the nurse’s keycard into the cacophony of color, she turns right. Walking quickly—but not suspiciously quickly—she heads toward the dark arch of trees where the sidewalk ends.