InSight

didn’t answer. She raised her shoulders and scrunched her head back, forcing his hand off.
    “Don’t,” she said. “Don’t do that.” He withdrew his hand. “Did they let you out?” she asked again.
    “Yes.” He hesitated. “Because I’m well.”
    She heard the lie in his voice like she’d heard it so many times before. Which Stewart had kidnapped her? There had been so many that last year. The delusional man who heard voices, the contrite husband who begged forgiveness, or the paranoid who monitored every breath she took? How could they release him? He murdered my child.
    Lucy knew Stewart was alive. Did she know he had escaped? Would she have kept that from me, too? Abby didn’t know what to think anymore. She’d been kept in even greater darkness than the world she inhabited.
    “Are you hungry?” he asked. “How about a hamburger?”
    “I don’t want anything to eat. I want you to say what you have to say, then take me home.”
    “I told you I’ll take you home after we talk.”
    His hand grazed her cheek and she cringed. She knew better, but she couldn’t control her reflexes any more than she could control a sneeze or an eye tic.
    “I’m better now, Abby. The doctors figured out which medications keep me under control. We can live a normal life. You can learn to forgive me.”
    She had her answer. Maybe he didn’t hear voices any more, but he was still delusional. “You can’t expect me to go back in time, Stewart. I have a different life. Very different. We’re not the same people we were when we met.” She wrapped the blanket around her more tightly. “What do you plan to do? You must have thought this through. You’ve kidnapped me. The police will be searching, and when they find me, they’ll find you too.”
    “They won’t find you until I’m ready.”
    Abby’s heart rate spiked at the ominous words. “Will…they find me alive?”
    “I promise I won’t hurt you.” He pulled up a chair and sat next to her. Daisy grunted. “When I learned what I’d done, I refused to believe it. For years I’ve lived in a private hell, floating like some supernatural apparition outside myself, looking in. How could I have murdered the daughter I adored and put you in a dark world, never to see the sun again? Me, an artist, whose sight meant life. Whatever clarity remained convinced me that someone else had committed those monstrous acts. Someone I didn’t know. I have to believe that, Abby, or I’d end my life right now. I want you to believe it too.”
    His words brought everything flooding back into that part of her consciousness she had buried to keep her sanity. Visuals to her were only flashbacks ― remembrances ― and when Stewart’s face broke through her darkness, she saw him as he appeared the day they met.
    * * * * *
    A bby’s friend pushed her into the gallery. “I don’t know why you dragged me here, Lainie . I don’t know a thing about art.”
    “You don’t have to know anything. Besides, the exhibit hasn’t even opened. I thought it would be fun to see them hang it. Sandra Orr is on the committee and she said the artist is hot. Kind of crazy but really cute. And he’s on the fast track to becoming famous.”
    Abby pulled her hand away to make her point. “I’m dressed like a homeless person, I’ve got a paper due tomorrow, and I don’t have time for this.”
    “Oh, hush,” Lainie said, pulling her deeper inside the gallery. “We won’t stay long. You’ll get an A anyway, so what’s to worry?”
    Abby wondered how she and Lainie Simms had remained friends for so long. Lainie’s English major took a back seat to her real major—partying. If anything was going on at Emory or in Atlanta , Lainie knew about it. She constantly tried to pry Abby from her studies to join her excursions, but Abby refused to be distracted. Today Lainie wouldn’t take no for an answer. So here Abby stood at the installation of Stewart Gentry’s latest exhibit.
    “Look at these paintings,” Lainie said. “They’re fantastic. Have you ever seen anything like them?”
    Abby scanned the large gallery. Polished wood floors, white walls, and halogen lighting were the perfect setting to highlight the large acrylics and watercolors. Some sat stacked against the wall waiting to be hung; others already graced the walls. Stewart Gentry’s paintings mesmerized her. Most were figuratives with a few moody landscapes to show versatility. They were like nothing she’d ever