Peppermint And Gunpowder

Chapter Twenty-Six: I Don't Love Him

A week has passed since Olivia and I's interaction, since the pills and hiding. And in that week, Gracie has gotten better. She's still weak and tired, but nothing more than slight sniffles or a cough. I can't contain my joy, for the night of fear was enough to last.

And so Gracie sits now, cross legged on the floor, playing with a blue ball Olivia had given her to pass the time. She bounces the rubber ball up and down, hoping six inches above the tile before falling, then starting over again.

The passcode lock is typed from the other side of the door, the beep opens it, and Olivia walks in. She holds a folder, many papers peeking out the corners and sides.

The way she walks is different today, she looks as if she was floating on air. She smiles too--is this the first time I've seen her wear a real smile? Maybe.

"Good morning," She says, crouching beside Gracie on the floor. Gracie stops playing with the blue ball and looks up at Olivia with a grin. "Are you feeling better?"
"Yes," Gracie says, nodding. She looks down, almost sheepishly, and whispers: "Thank you for helping me."

"Of course," Olivia hugs Gracie--not a full body hug, but a one-armed half hug, but a hug nonetheless. "I never want to see someone as little as yourself so sick."

Gracie doesn't understand what Olivia says, instead merely smiles and goes back to bouncing the blue ball. Olivia watches her for a few moments before drawing her attention to me.

"Have you been giving her the medication like I told you?" She asks.

"Yes." I reach under my pillow to grab the mostly empty pill bottle, rattle it slightly to show her we only have about five days dosage left.

"Good." She nods and stands, leaving Gracie on the floor. Gracie doesn't seem to notice.

Olivia fiddles with the folder and papers within with a confused look on her face, shuffling through paper and data, statistics and theories.

"How have you been responding to the medicine, Mercury?" She sits on the chair in the corner, crossing her legs at the ankles and folding her hands neatly.

"Good." I lie.

"No sickness? Nausea? Pain? Dizziness?" She moves her hands and pulls a pencil from an unknown location on her persons, checking and unchecking boxes.

"None." Though I hold Olivia in a higher regard than before and part of the reason I refused to take the medication was purely out of spite, that has changed. It is no longer against her, but BLI. She is just a pawn.

She helped Gracie, she'll help me.

Olivia says nothing, merely checking more boxes and scratches notes in the small margins of the paper. From here I see her handwriting is neat cursive with defined loops and slopes and pressure in all the right places.

"No fatigue? Or excessive energy?"

"No, just... normal?" I say it more as a question. I am not lying, only hiding the truth. My energy and fatigue is normal, but only because I didn't take the pills at all besides the first dose, nor has Gracie.

"The only thing confusing is why Gracie responded so harshly and you didn't respond at all." She pushes a strand of hair out of her face. "Surely our studies weren't so off, were they? Something had to have been wrong... the dosage? Ingredients? What was it?"

Olivia looks at me with pleading eyes, as if I knew the answer.

"I'm sorry." I whisper, unsure if she heard me or not. Her eyes flick to me and she sighs, running a hand across her face and through her hair.

"We have to start over." She looks at me, tired eyes and frizzled hair. "Mercury? Would you come with me? I have to run tests." I look down at Gracie, who is now suddenly paying attention and looking fearful.

"Don't worry, my friend will sit in here with you again. You don't remember him, do you? You were sleeping?" Olivia walks to the door and opens it slightly. "You'll like him, though he doesn't talk much. Will you be alright alone? It will only be a few minutes."

Gracie looks at me, silently asking what to do. I nod.

"Good," Olivia steps into the hall with me in tow and whispers hastily to a passing orderlie.

"Were any of the results salvageable? Or do we have to start over completely?" Instead of walking paces behind Olivia, I stand and walk side by side.

"Your initial vitals... that's about it." She frowns. "With you and Gracie's cooperation, we should have a new trial within the coming days."

I pinch my lips together and nod. How much longer can I fool her? She isn't oblivious, or as oblivious as I thought.

"The man," I change the topic. "You said he was your friend? He sat with Gracie last time?"

"Yes."

"What is his name?" I watch her reaction closely. Her hands clench, her cheeks flush. Her eyes light up, she smiles.

"Leon." She says fondly. She seems to be in a world of her own.

"You love him, don't you?" I say softly. Olivia is taken aback.

"What? No... no, surely not." She stammers over her words. "No, I don't love him. I don't love Leon."

"Olivia, I know you're lying." I look at her through a side-glance. "I've seen that look, I've had that look."

"With Ray." She says. I blink, thinking. Ray.

"Yes," I formulate the lie of the imaginary lover, of the boy who never existed--the man who is supposedly Gracie's father and is Jet's namesake. "I had that look... with Ray."

Of all the lies I've told, not only here but ever, this was the hardest. My voice caught in my throat, my words skipped and stuttered like a scratched CD. A lump of cotton forms in my chest, a pressure moving up my throat and neck and my head.

I have had the look, the look of love, but not for Ray. I don't love him, he isn't even real.

The man I do love? Miles away, who knows where. At Dr. D's broadcasting shack? At the factory? With the Trans-am? Dead? I do not know.

The man I love is Poison, and now is the first time I've said it, even within my mind. I would give anything to see him, to tell him to his face.

And the look I'm sure is on my face now, is the look Olivia wears with shame, while I wear it with pride.