The Treatment (The Program 2)

“So he left you?” she asks.

She might as well have punched me. Water floods my eyes, and I grip my fork so tightly the metal bites into my skin.

“Please don’t,” I murmur, setting down the utensil. Realm continues eating.

“Don’t what?” Dallas asks innocently. “I’m just making dinner conversation.”

“He’ll come back,” Cas says, drawing my attention. “Don’t pay attention to Dallas—she’s just being a bitch. We all know James will be back.”

“Shut up, Cas,” Dallas sneers. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Besides, we’re not staying here. Sloane’s got The Treatment. She’s had it this entire time.” Cas’s eyes round and his breathing catches like he’s been struck. But I immediately look at Realm as a realization hits me: I don’t have The Treatment. James does. Oh my God, James put it in his pocket. Will he take it now that he’s not with me?

“We can’t leave,” I say to Realm, my pulse racing. “We have to wait until James gets back.”

Realm exhales, pushing his bowl aside. “Your love life is the least of our concerns, Sloane. I’m sorry, but we’re leaving as soon as night falls.”

“I’m not going without James!”

“Well, then I’ll drag you out of here!” Realm says, raising his voice. “Unlike your boyfriend, I’m not scared to do what’s right for you. We’re not risking you or The Treatment because he’s throwing a temper tantrum.”

I slap my hand down the table, making the forks rattle in the bowls. “Stop it,” I hiss. “Stop always trying to break us up. It’s not going to work no matter what excuse you put behind it!” Realm reacts immediately, jumping up from his chair and knocking it to the floor. His cheeks are glowing pink and he looks completely crazed.

“He left you!” he shouts.

“So did you!” But the damage has been done. Realm’s words cut me, piercing my vulnerability. I grab my bowl and fling it at the wall, sending bits of ceramic and wet noodles everywhere.

I’m so sick of this! If Realm wants a fight, he’s got one.

Cas curses under his breath and pushes back from the table.

“I’m done,” he says dismissively. “You two can go ahead and kill each other.” He looks over his shoulder at Dallas, and motions for her to follow him.

Dallas smirks, and then she takes one more slurp of cold noodles before tossing her folk on the table with a clank. “Do kiss and make up, kids,” she adds. “It’s going to be a long car ride otherwise.”

When they’re gone, I find Realm watching me. “You’re being horrible,” I tell him. “You know I’m hurt and you’re still being cruel. What’s wrong with you?” I’m angry, a deep resent-ment toward him I don’t fully comprehend. Or maybe I just don’t remember.

“If you’re waiting for me to tell you how to fix things between you and James,” he says, “that’s never going to happen.”

“I don’t expect you to. I . . . I thought you were my friend, but we keep ending up like this.” I motion to the chaos around us. It’s clear to me that if anyone is toxic, it’s Realm.

“Friend?” Realm laughs, patronizing me. “Sure, sweetness, we’re friends. But if I’m being honest, there’s a bigger part of me that just doesn’t want James to win. You could have come out of The Program and restarted your life. You could have been happy. But instead you went back to him and now look. You have nothing. You have no one.” His eyes weaken a little. “How long before you get sick again? Has it started?” I feel my expression fall because I know it has. The dark thoughts, the isolation, it’s all there under the surface. Waiting.

Realm swallows hard, reading my reaction.

“I won’t lose you, Sloane,” he whispers. “I’ll kill him if I have to.”

“I’d rather die.”

Realm turns away. “That’s what I’m afraid of.” He’s quiet for a moment; his posture slumps. With complete exhaustion, I sit down in my chair, too tired to fight with Realm anymore. Too tired to make excuses for our behavior.

“What do I do now?”

“We have to leave,” Realm says. “Right now, before the doctor, The Program, whoever comes back. We’ll leave this place behind us.”

I pause, his intentions becoming clear. “Us?” He looks up. “Just us.”

He isn’t listening, not about James, not about what I really want. “Realm, I don’t have The Treatment anymore,” I say quietly.

His lips part, and he looks absolutely stunned. He runs his hand through his hair. “Well, f**k,” he mutters. “Did you take it?”

“No. James has it. When we were in my room, he put it in his pocket. He still had it when he left. I . . . I don’t know what he’s going to do.”

Realm looks around the room like he’s trying to gather his thoughts. After a quiet moment he nods his head definitively.

“James won’t take the pill,” he says. “Of course he won’t take it.”

“I just want him to come back,” I say, holding up my hands helplessly. “I don’t care about The Treatment.”

“You should care about it,” he says, righting his chair and collapsing into it. “The Program does. Arthur Pritchard does.

It changed my life.” He glances away, and I can’t tell if he’s feeling nostalgic or tormented. “Sloane,” he says. “When we met, it wasn’t my first time in The Program. Evelyn Valentine had been my doctor, and she chose me to go through the testing—

she gave me The Treatment. You see, the depression had started creeping back in, and she’d thought she found the answer. But there is a drawback to the pill. Only the truly strong can survive the crash of memories. Evelyn got me through it with therapy, but she couldn’t save all of us. I don’t think she could handle the loss.

“She disappeared soon after. I showed up at her office and it’d been ransacked. Evelyn was gone—along with her research, our identities. She kept us a secret from The Program, saving me one last time. As a precaution, they put every patient she’d come in contact with back through The Program, but the pill protected my memories, cemented them. There are only four people who know I’ve taken The Treatment—no one else, not even my sister. It nearly drove me insane. I wish I could tell you getting it all back was worth it, but you have no idea how awful it is to remember, Sloane. You have no idea how cancerous it can be.” I’ve seen the scar on Realm’s neck from when he’d tried to kill himself. But I never had to picture it before. It always seemed like it happened to someone else. Now I imagine what it must be like to have all of your dark thoughts descend on you at once. Even if Realm thinks I am, I’m not sure I would have been strong enough to handle that.