The Bizarre Case of Lana Lee

My routinely stroll into my office is interrupted by the striking sound of a metal meal tray hitting the floor. My poor Benjamin has refused his breakfast yet again. I couldn’t ignore it this time. Crippling depression and anger management issues have taken him by storm. He’s been stuck at the MHOB—Mental Health Organization of Boston— for three weeks over his appalling suicide attempt.

“Ben, honey,” I start. “Is that any way to say ‘no thank you?’” He glanced at me, his jaw tightly set, nostrils flared. The server crouches down to collect the now wasted waffles. I waved at her to stop. “Don’t bother.”

“No one in this damn place listens to me!” Ben exclaims.

“I listen to you.” I respond.

“Yeah, because you get paid to. You don’t actually care do you?”

“Would I have spent nine years studying psychology to get this specific job if I didn’t care?” He doesn’t respond. “What’s the matter, Ben? Let me help you.”

“The meds aren’t doing a damn thing, Benson. I don’t have the appetite to eat either. What the hell are you even giving me?”

“Alright, Ben. When that happens, you use your words instead of wasting perfectly good food. Do you think it’s fair for the servers to pick up after your tantrums?”

“They keep bringing me food even after I’ve told them to stop!” He shrugged at me as if that was a good enough reason to start throwing trays.

“Because it’s their job, Ben.” I stepped closer to express my sincerity. “Next session we’ll discuss changing your prescription.” He gave a sigh of relief. “But for now you need to pick up those waffles and kindly hand the tray back.”

“Are you serious?” He rolls his eyes.

“Yes. Apologize while you’re at it.”

He groaned as he bent down and started snatching waffles, spewing crumbs around my polished loafers. He presents the disheveled tray to the server, who cautiously receives it. “Sorry.” He grumbled.

“That a boy.” I grinned and continued my stroll.

Upon entering my office and shutting the door behind me, I get a knock not even a minute later. “Come in!” Dr. Lawrence pokes his balding head inside.

“I saw that you’ll be treating Lana Lee.” He says.

“And?”

“When’s the first session?”

“In two hours.”

His eyes widened and he stepped inside to shut the door. “I wanted to ask if I could take this case for you. You’ve got those other two boys already and I know a third patient might be a handful—”

“It certainly is not a handful. Why are you so concerned?”

“If you let me take this patient…” He starts. I’m already rolling my eyes. “I’ll transfer old Mary to you. She’s the bipolar patient everyone talks about. She’s very interesting and definitely not a load of work, I swear.”

“Dr. Lawrence, I don’t specialize in most genetically inherited disorders, for instance, bipolar disorder. Besides, the patient’s mother specifically requested a female psychiatrist.”

“Well, when you find out, could you, at least, fill me in on what happened to her?”

“You know the rules, Dr. Lawrence.”

“I’m not asking for the nitty gritty, I just want to know if she ran away or worse. You’ve seen the news stories, right?”

“Right.”

“So you’re aware that she went missing for three months, correct? And then randomly appeared in bed three weeks ago. Every other doctor in this place will be knocking on your door soon enough, Dr. Benson.”

“I get it. She’s a popular case.” I lean back in my cozy, swivel chair. “She’s only seven. No preexisting mental health conditions, however, they say she’s been strangely different since she reappeared. Her mother wants me to find out why.”

“Strange how?”

“Her mother claims that she hardly speaks and when she does it’s depressing. She lacks the energy she had before. There’s, also, the night terrors and a lack of appetite. I’m worried she may have experienced trauma.”

“No question about it.” He says. He takes a seat on the armrest of my sofa.

“Considering the way she reappeared, do you agree that it implies that she may have found her own way home and snuck back in on her terms?”

“I can’t think of a better explanation, so I must agree.”

“I can’t stop thinking about how she could have gotten into her bedroom without her mother noticing.”

“Could she have simply climbed in through her bedroom window?”

“Definitely not. They live in an apartment building. Seventh floor.”

He wore a look of astonishment now. “The mother must have been away where she couldn’t see or hear the door. It’s the only possible explanation.”

“I agree.” I lean forward in my seat to rest my elbows on my knees. “If anything ground breaking comes up that the mother consents to being shared, I’ll come find you first.”

“I’m flattered.” He chuckled. “Let me know how the mother is handling all of this. This can’t be easy for anybody.”

I nod in accordance. “I’ll have to kick you out now, Doctor. Treating a child takes some prep work.”

“No worries. I’m gone.” He says as he hauls himself back to the door.

“Thanks for the pleasant chat.”

“Of course.” He smiled, shutting the door as he left.

I pick up Lana’s files. On the 18th of July of this year, Lana Lee was feeding birds with her mother, Jennifer Anderson, and two-year-old brother, Georgie Lee, in the the playground on Broadway Avenue in Salem. According to police reports, Ms. Anderson turned her back on Lana, who was chasing pigeons into the woodlands behind the playground, for just a minute to pull little Georgie away from the nearby duck pond. When she turned back around, you guessed it, Lana had disappeared. Ms. Anderson spent the next three months publicizing the case in hopes that someone in Massachusetts would find her daughter. No one got the chance to because Lana reappeared sleeping soundly in bed on the night of the 22nd of October.

This little girl hasn’t been the same since and refuses to confess where she’s been. If she won’t tell her own mother, why would anyone think she would tell me? Either way, I’m Ms. Anderson’s only hope to getting into Lana’s eccentric psyche.

……….

From down the corridor leading up to my office, I can see Ms. Anderson herself checking in at the help desk with little Lana latched onto her hand. They shared the same curly, blond hair and upturned nose. I walked up to her with my hand extended. “Ms. Anderson?” She grinned at me and met my hand eagerly.

“Yup, that’s me.” She replied.

“I’m Dr. Amelia Benson. I assume this is Lana Lee, in the flesh.” I said, looking down at Lana’s protruding eyes. To my utter surprise, they were two different shades. One being a pale blue like her mother’s and the other a golden honey. “Her eyes are beautiful.”

“I’d agree, but they weren’t like that before.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that her eyes were blue before she went missing. When I found her at home, I realized one seemed to turn brown.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

“I know.”

“Surely, you’ve taken her to see an ophthalmologist, correct?”

“Of course.” She reassured. “They said her vision was perfect in both eyes and that there were no serious risks.”

“At least there’s that. Still very concerning.”

“Yeah.” She murmured.

I escort them into my office where they get comfortable on the sofa. Instead of taking a seat in my chair, I crouch down to Lana’s level and ask how she is feeling.

“Good.” She mumbles.

“I’m only here to help and be your friend. You can call me Amelia.” She doesn’t respond. “Do you remember when you fed the pigeons last summer?”

She nods.

“Sounds like fun. Was it fun?”

She nods again and I notice a corner of her mouth turn up.

“Do you remember where you went after that?” I watched her face intently. Unfortunately, she shook her head and stared down at her knees. “That’s alright. No big deal.” I stood up and made my way to my chair. “Do you remember anything about where you’ve been for the past few months?” She shook her head again.

“The investigators already asked her all of these questions. She didn’t answer them either.” Ms. Anderson noted.

“I figured.”

We had a brief moment of silence, allowing me to select my next question carefully. I looked at Ms. Anderson who was rearranging the curls in Lana’s hair. I could tell that she was anxious. Her leg has been bouncing since she sat down and the sweat on the bridge of her nose is discernible. She’s aware that she hasn’t fully gotten her daughter back and she is depending on me to find her. Would it even be possible at this point? What if Lana’s mental damage is already too far gone to nurse back to health? I expect Lana to be fully capable of managing her symptoms of trauma when she is grown, but that’s not enough. She deserves to have a memorable and gratifying childhood right now.

“What are some fun things you like to do in your spare time, Lana?” She shrugs. “Come on, there’s gotta be something you like to do.”

“You like coloring, don’t you?” Ms. Anderson adds.

“Are you an artist?” I asked Lana while giving her a playful gasp. The corners of her mouth creep upwards as she nods in my direction.

I move out of my seat to retrieve the markers and paper I set out. When I lay them on the coffee table, Lana emerges from the sofa to kneel before the paper. I tell her to feel free to draw whatever she pleases. She obliges by reaching for the purple marker. When she does so, I notice a small image of a perfect, equilateral triangle on her inner wrist. It looks as if it has been etched into her skin with white ink. “What’s that?” I ask, pointing my nail at the etching. “It looks like a tattoo, if I’m being honest.”

“What? The triangle?” Ms. Anderson confirms. I nod. “That was there when I found her. Her physician said it’s clearly a scar but they can’t tell from what.”

“It’s a nearly perfect scar. It must have been done with an extremely sharp and precise tool or something. How strange…” Lana ignores us and proceeds to make little purple circles on the paper. I look up at Ms. Anderson who is watching Lana’s fist gliding around over the paper with a look of interest. “So Lana,” I start. “Would you like to talk about those bad dreams you’ve been having lately?”

“No.” She answered flatly. I looked at Ms. Anderson again who raised her hands as if to say, see what I mean? I do see what she means. Could we be dealing with selective muteness here?

“Are they too scary to talk about?” I asked her.

“No.” She repeats. “I wanna keep it a secret.”

“Alright, fine.” I sighed in a state of defeat. It’s normal of people to not remember their night terrors, however, she has implied that she does remember them. She refuses to share about what she has been through and there’s only one reason I can think of as to why. I assume she must feel so intimidated by the intense amount of attention and expectations being placed on her that she must withhold the information that everyone wants to know—it’s the only thing she possesses control over right now.

Ms. Anderson leans forward to get a better view of the assortment of purple flowers Lana has now drawn. She furrows her brows and opens her mouth hesitantly. She places her hand on Lana’s back endearingly. “Lana, baby.” She says to her. “I’ve seen you draw way better than that before. Why don’t you draw what you did yesterday again?”

“No.” Lana shakes her head and places the marker down. “I don’t feel like it.”

“But it came out so good, Lana. Wouldn’t you be proud to show Dr. Benson how good you can draw?”

She shook her head again and abandoned the coffee table to curl up on the sofa, bringing her knees to her chest. Ms. Anderson sighed and turned to me now. “I have seen her draw some incredible stuff, alright.” She insisted. “I didn’t think you would believe me, so I wanted her to do it in front of you, but I guess not, so…” She plunges her hand into her canvas tote bag and pulls out some folded sheets of lined paper. “Look at this.”

I take the pages in my hand and gawk at the near flawless sketches of human faces, perfect circles and straight lines coming together to depict various other-worldly structures. Other pages showed illustrations of strange, other-worldly creatures to match. Lanky bodies, spider-like fingers, and gargantuan eyes filled with black ink. I glanced at Lana and then at Ms. Anderson with my mouth still agape.

“You’re positive these are hers?” I asked Ms. Anderson. She nodded and stared into my eyes expectedly. I handed the drawings back to her. “We can touch base on this at our next session.”

……….

The following three sessions with Lana are the same. Lana refuses to speak on her experience and I’m worried the trauma may have been so severe that she may very well have honestly forgotten. Maybe it’s better this way. It could be doing more good than harm if those three months stay forgotten. Maybe I should focus more on treating her obvious mood disorder and urge Ms. Anderson to leave the past in the past. It would do Ms. Anderson herself more good, as well. She is constantly worried about Lana’s mood and strange behavioral qualities, leading her to cry at least once during each session. I’ll have no choice but to start couponing on tissue boxes for the office.

The drawings, however. What does one make of those depictions? I wonder if those odd monsters Lana supposedly drew are what’s causing her nightmares. When I asked, she shook her head as usual. Those atrocious creatures have made their way into my own nightmares lately. They were sketched out so realistically that I can’t help but picture them as real life creatures, which only creeps me out even more.

I wrap up my paperwork for the evening and rise from my bed to store the files in my briefcase. Just as I touch my fingers to the lamp switch my phone goes off. I pick it up to see what I recognize as Ms. Anderson’s number. Ms. Anderson calling at 10:24pm? I answer with a confused “Hello?”

“Dr. Benson? I’m sorry it’s so late. I didn’t know who else to call to help me.” She cried. I can hear the trembling in Ms. Anderson’s voice.

“Yes, Ms. Anderson. It’s me. What’s wrong?”

“I can’t find Lana,” She’s beginning to hyperventilate. “She’s missing again, oh my God!”

“How? When?”

“I put her to bed over an hour ago. I just went to check on her and she’s not in her room. I was here the whole time, I was here! There’s no way she could have left the apartment. I can’t do this again, God please!”

“Have you searched every corner of the apartment, Ms. Anderson?”

“Of course! I don’t know what to do!”

“Ms. Anderson, listen.” I’m forcing slacks over my night slip now. “May I come over?” She permits. “Have you called the police?”

“No, I—I’m sorry, Dr. Benson. I’m not ready to do this all over again, I just can’t. The media is definitely going to want to cover this and I just cant go through it again.” She sobbed.

“Ms. Anderson, you must.” I hastily slipped on my loafers and pulled my coat and bag over my shoulder on my way out the door. “You have to call the police. Do it right now, I’ll be there very soon.” I hang up.

I park my car in front of the apartment building fifteen minutes later. To my surprise, there are no police vehicles at the door. I pray that she took my advice. I’m barely finished knocking on the apartment door before it flings open. I’m greeted by a frazzled Ms. Anderson. She urges me inside and tells me that she can’t bring herself to call the police yet.

“Ms. Anderson, I can’t do anything to help without the police here.”

“They’ll just waste time standing around asking questions. I need help finding her right now while she should still be close. And call me Jennifer, I’m tired of ‘Ms. Anderson.’” She mocked me. I didn’t take it personal.

“Where is Lana’s room?” I ask. She leads me to a small bedroom that gave off a pinkish glow for the rose-colored walls and pink, sheer curtains. The bed was empty, sheets tossed aside. I glanced out of the window where it dropped off at least fifty feet to the parking lot. “The only possible way she could have left is out the apartment door, Ms. Anderson. Something fishy must be going on if you’re that positive that she didn’t leave her room.”

“She couldn’t have. I didn’t even use the bathroom or anything, I swear. I was right there in the living room the whole time.” She started to cry again. She fell onto her daughter’s bed and began to sob into her pillow. I sat beside her and placed a hand on her trembling back.

“You can do this, Jennifer.” She pulled herself up into a sitting position, taking her daughter’s pillow with her. She clutched the pillow to her chest. I immediately notice a pile of papers laying where the pillow was. “What are those?” I point. She jerks her head and slowly gathers them in her hands.

“I don’t know.” She says. She drops the pillow and sorts through the papers on her lap. They were flawless, realistic sketches of buildings, houses, all various places with a date written at the top of each drawing. Jennifer stops on an image of the exact playground she first lost Lana at. It was dated July 18th, the day Lana went missing. She continued flipping pages, passing all sorts of homes, stores, hotels, and more. She stopped again on an image of the apartment building, dated October 22nd, the exact day Lana was found back in her apartment safe and sound. Jennifer looked at me and then with a trembling hand she lifted the page to reveal the final drawing.

It was a spine-chilling sketch of what looked like a small bridge with a house-like structure built over it. It had a deep, black tunnel running through it to the other side. The vast, darkness of the tunnel made me shiver. The date at the top of the page was November 26th—today’s date. Jennifer and I looked at each other once more, fully aware of what this meant.

“You’re thinking what I’m thinking, right?” She nodded and shakily took the image of the bridge and stood to her feet.

“This is where her kidnapper is taking her and I know where this place is.”

“Where?” I stared at her with eager intent.

“Its the covered bridge in Sheffield. I took her there when she was around four. It’s a three hour drive from here.”

“Three hours is a lot but it’s the only lead we have.”

“We have to leave now if we’re going to catch that kid-snatcher.” She was furiously determined now and scurried out of the room, leaving me to stare at the Lana’s floral-patterned rug. Hardly two minutes later, Jennifer was ready to leave with a trench coat and a sleeping Georgie on her arm.

……….

It’s 1:50 AM when I can finally see the chilling tunnel of the covered bridge at the end of the road. On the trip, I finally convinced Jennifer to call the police, who should be on their way here now. I bring the car to a stop on the grass a couple feet away from the entrance of the bridge. I step out of the car alone since Jennifer had me drop her off at the convenience store at the corner of the street to ask around for witnesses.

The night is dark and the tunnel is darker. I pull out my phone and turn on the flashlight. As I do, I notice the time. 2:16 AM. Wasn’t it just… I shake my head. I must be going crazy from the long drive and exhaustion.

“Lana!” I call out as I take a step into the wooden structure. There is no answer except the return of my own echo coming off the tunnel walls. I notice what looks like a pile of fabric on the wood floor a few steps away. Upon further analysis, it turns out to be a small, blue nightgown fit for a child. I snap a photo and text it to Jennifer. She responds immediately and confirms it was what Lana was wearing when she was tucked into bed earlier. Come over here now, please, I text back.

Suddenly I’m startled by a flash of orange light coming in from both opening ends of the tunnel. My first thought is that the police are here with a helicopter in search of Lana. I begin walking towards the light until a small body falls onto the ground at the opening of the tunnel. I can’t help myself from yelping at the sudden drop. However, I never could have predicted what happened next.

The body convulsed and flew up into the air. I realized it was little Lana Lee in her underwear levitating before my very eyes. Her golden curls were swimming in the light and her eyes were shut as if asleep. I found myself in shock, paralyzed with fear.

I thought back to my college freshman psychology class where my professor was discussing various responses to fear. “The two main responses to extreme fear are fight or flight, right?” He said. The class proceeded to nod in accordance. “Wrong. There are three. The third response being freeze.”

That was me this very moment. I was frozen. I couldn’t even scream, couldn’t cry. Nothing. Then a figure manifests in the darkness, moving this way in the distance. I assumed it was Jennifer coming back from the store but I realized I was severely mistaken when the figure came into the warm glow of the light.

Just like that I regained my ability to shriek at the giant, obsidian eyes of a creature I have only ever seen in Lana’s impeccable drawings. I brought my hands to my face as I continued to scream in pure terror at the thing. It stopped just beside Lana’s floating body and raised a spindly finger at me. All went black.

I awoke in my bed with a cold sweat. I inhaled a deep breath, assuming what I had witnessed was merely a nightmare. When I sat up, I noticed how unmistakably nauseous I felt. I’ll have to cancel Lana’s session today.

I picked up my phone to call the hospital, but stopped when I noticed the contrasting triangle my wrist. An equilateral triangle just like Lana’s. I rubbed on the raised skin with my thumb, realizing it was real.

I proceeded to ignore it for now and called the hospital. When the desk lady answered, I said, “Good morning, Debra. Could you please cancel all sessions for me today?”

“Dr. Benson? Is that really you?” She exclaimed.

“Yes, of course. Why?”

“Dr. Benson…”

“Yes?” I urged her to speak.

There was a short moment of silence before she finally said, “You were reported missing about six weeks ago.”

THE END