Secrets by Melinda Metz - Fingerprints - 4 Page B

immediately worried that Ms. Abramson had seen the eye roll and thought that Rae was giving her attitude.
    “I, yeah, you’re right,” Rae answered. “I don’t know why. Ants-in-the-pants syndrome.”
    Ants-in-the-pants syndrome? Had that actually come out of her mouth? Good thing extreme dork-ishness wasn’t a sign of mental illness, or Ms. Abramson would be bundling Rae off to the hospital.
    “Those metal chairs aren’t exactly comfortable,” Ms. Abramson answered.
    Is that it? Rae thought.
    “But sometimes an issue will get raised in group that strikes a chord,” Ms. Abramson continued.
    Of course that ’s not it. What was I thinking? Rae asked herself.
    “Sometimes you don’t even realize what’s happening. It can express itself as simply feeling uncomfortable or anxious,” Ms. Abramson said. “Try to remember when you first started getting that ants-in-the-pants sensation.”
    “I had it before I even got here,” Rae answered. Which was true. It had started up right after she got the stop-asking-questions warning. No big psychological mystery there.
    Ms. Abramson studied her for a moment. “Did anything unusual happen at school today?”
    “Not really. Just… typical school stuff,” Rae told her, being careful to make direct eye contact. That was important to Ms. Abramson. She looked back at Rae, as if she thought if she stared long enough, she’d pull out everything in Rae’s brain.
    Rae liked Ms. Abramson, liked her more than any of the other therapists that she’d had to deal with. But God, sometimes it felt like Ms. Abramson wanted to peel her like an onion, stripping away layer after layer. And what would be left, that’s what Rae always wondered. ’Cause with an onion? There was basically nothing there once all the layers of skin were pulled off.
    “Typical school stuff,” Ms. Abramson repeated after she’d finished the soul-searching look. “Okay, well, I just wanted to check. Oh, and I also wanted to schedule another of our individual meetings. How about after group next Monday?”
    A question that wasn’t really a question. Rae stifled a sigh. “Sounds good.” The only answer she could give.
    “All right, then. Enjoy the rest of your day,” Ms. Abramson said.
    Rae stood up and normal-walked until she was out of the building. Then she sprinted over to Yana’s Bug and climbed in, breathless.
    “To the Wilton Center,” Yana said as she started the car.
    Rae gave a halfhearted whoo-hoo. She’d been counting down the seconds until she could actually get out of the Oakvale Institute, where the group was held. But now that she and Yana were heading toward the center, it was like Rae could feel acid splashing on her own face again and again.
    I could do it, she thought. I could stop asking questions. I could-
    I could die. That was the alternative.
    Rae scrubbed her face with both hands. “You okay?” Yana asked.
    “Me? Could not be better,” Rae answered, her voice coming out a lot more sarcastic than she intended it to.
    “All righty, then,” Yana said. She flipped on the radio, and they both listened to the music until they arrived at the Wilton Center, the place where the group had been held, the group that had Mandy’s mother, Rae’s father, and that basketball-playing prisoner so freaked out.
    “It looks… extremely normal. From the outside, at least,” Yana observed.
    “Yeah.” Rae climbed out of the car, taking in the clearly kid-made masks in one row of windows and the clearly adult-made whirligigs on the center’s front lawn. Her eyes came to rest on the sign to the left of the whirligig display, and she felt like someone had slid an ice cube down the back of her shirt. The sign looked exactly the way it had in the picture of her mother and the other people in the group. “My mom was standing right over there,” she murmured.
    Yana grabbed her arm. “Let’s go inside.”
    “Your hands are freezing,” Rae complained as Yana towed her toward the main