Broken Wings 2 - Midnight Flight by Andrews, C. (free ereaders .TXT) 📗

from a well of fear. You act out because you are defensive, slightly paranoid, I'm afraid. In your present way of thinking, the world around you threatens you. You believe everyone is against you and you're just naturally antagonistic to everything.”

I guess she saw the lack of understanding in my face. She smiled, again so softly, I felt I could relax and listen to her for hours.

“Don't worry about any of that yet, my dear. You'llsee. You'll all see. That's what's so wonderful about my work,“ she said excitedly, ”at least to me, especially the way it opens the eyes of my girls. For me,“ she said, her voice rising an octave, ”there is nothing as satisfying as seeing one of my girls suddenly come to the realization she can be as good as anyone else out there, she can be productive and worthwhile. She can make friends and be liked and like others. Her heart can hold sunshine, even on rainy days.”

She did make it sound wonderful. For a moment she paused with her face so radiant and full of happiness, I felt some hope seep into my hardened and crusty surface. She looked at me as if she could sense it and gave me a special nod, a little more of her smile.

"People are always asking me, 'Dr. Foreman, you were a successful and renowned college professor. Why did you throw away your classroom work, your publications, your lectures, put all your fortune into this school, and go off and surround yourself with the hardest sort of challenge: girls whom everyone has given up on, girls who would easily end up in penal institutions?'

“Well, the answer is you, my dears,” she declared with her arms out as though she were about to embrace all three of us at once, “you and your awakening. Nothing is more satisfying to me than to bring someone back from the dead,” she continued, her right hand over her heart, “for that is where you are now, in some cemetery of your own making, burying yourselves in your disgust, your fears, your dysfunction.”

She grew stern looking again and took another step toward the three of us.

"Within the next twenty-​four hours, fourteen hundred teenagers like yourselves will attempt suicide,

twenty-​eight hundred will get pregnant, fifteen thousand will try alcohol for the first time, and thirty-​five hundred will run away from home."

She let those facts linger in the air between us for a moment. I glanced at Robin and then Teal. Neither seemed impressed nor seemed to care.

“But not you. No, not my girls. To me,” Dr. Foreman said, looking up at the ceiling as if she could look right through to the heavens, “you will all be like Lazarus, rising from the grave.”

“Does that mean you're God?” Teal asked, her mouth dripping with sarcasm.

I thought I was brave and tough, but this soft, pretty white girl who sounded like she had been born with a silver spoon in her mouth was sure nasty and unafraid, even after all that had been done to her, to us.

Dr. Foreman's eyelids fluttered. She had what seemed unflappable poise. That smile never faltered as she lowered her gaze at Teal like someone lowering the barrel of a cannon at a new target.

“For you and for the others, dear Teal, as long as you are here, that is exactly who I will be.”

She waited a moment for her words to settle. Teal shook her head and looked away.

“Now,” Dr. Foreman said, turning back to speak to all of us, “let me begin by explaining that you're not going to a school any way like the ones you have attended. First, my school is at my ranch. It's a working ranch and you will all participate in the daily chores.”

“Oh, so we're really a form of cheap labor, is that it?” Robin complained.

“Hardly cheap, Robin. For your work, you will be given full room and board.”

“Isn't my father paying you?” Teal fired at her. “Ishouldn't have to do any daily chores,” she declared staunchly, her eyes burning with arrogance.

“Yes, in your case, the family is paying, but there is much more that will be given to you than you would get anywhere else for that amount of money,” Dr. Foreman said calmly. The arrows and darts Teal shot at her with those fiery eyes seemed to bounce off an invisible wall of protection that surrounded her.

“Like what?” Teal demanded, refusing to step back. I saw how the girls behind Dr. Foreman glared at Teal. They all looked eager to get their hands around her neck and shake her head off her body.

“Like my expert treatment, my therapy sessions, my proven techniques,” Dr. Foreman said to all of us and not just Teal. “It's off the charts when you start computing the costs, and even Teal here, who points out that her parents are paying the tuition, couldn't really afford the tuition if it were equated with the value you will all receive.”

“Why are you so nice and generous to us?” Teal muttered, the corners of her mouth folding in.

“Why? I do this because I want to give back to the science that has been so good to me, as well as my deep desire to help young women in desperate need, to help them find what is spiritually good in them.”

“Oh, brother,” Teal muttered. “We're in a nunnery.”

Dr. Foreman's rottweilers moved restlessly. She glanced at them and turned back to us.

“To continue”-—Dr. Foreman glared at Teal—“at my school you will not find a staff of teachers to coddle and prod you into doing your homework, studying properly, and achieving. I will assign you all your work and you will have to master it all yourselves.”

“Huh?” Robin said. “Did you say ourselves?”

“What are we going to study, basket weaving?” Teal asked with a crooked smile.

“You will be studying regular academic subjects, of course. We want you to qualify for high school graduation, to be able to pass exams, even be good enough