Off the Deep End (51)
“We’ll take this with us and look it over,” he said, snatching the paper from my hands.
I looked at him in alarm. What was he doing?
Detective Hawkins pursed his lips and squinted his eyes at me. “It shouldn’t take you more than a second to read through. It’s very standard language for whenever we collect evidence. You know how we have to be so careful with liability these days.” Even I recognized the used-car salesman in his voice.
“We’ll look it over.” Mark’s jaw was set. You weren’t going to move him anywhere when he had that look in his eyes. Detective Hawkins might as well give up. “Is there anything else we can do for you?”
“I think that’s it for now. Just get that signed and back to me so we can move things forward. I wouldn’t want there to be any holdup in the case. Like I said. All I’m trying to do is get your baby boy back home to you alive.”
“I—”
Mark jumped in again, not letting me talk. “Thanks so much. We appreciate that. Let’s go, Amber.”
CASE #72946
PATIENT: JULIET (JULES) HART
I got here before Dr. Stephens. Ready and in my seat. He walks in empty handed. No coffee again. He never should’ve set up that expectation at our first morning meeting. If he was my student, I’d flag him for it in supervision.
He holds his jacket over his arm, an iPad tucked underneath the other one, which is holding his briefcase. He steps back, clearly taken off guard. “How . . . where?” He looks behind him to see if there are any staff members sitting outside the door like they’re supposed to be since nobody’s allowed in these rooms alone, but the lobby is empty. “I don’t understand. How did you get in the room?”
“Hank brought me down early and let me in. He has a key to all the rooms,” I say with a beaming smile. Hank’s the overnight staff, or babysitter, as I like to think of him. He shows up at eleven and stays until eight. He has a thing for redheads, so I made sure to make friends with him immediately. It didn’t take long to learn that the key to surviving institutions was making friends with the staff. But not just any staff member. Just the ones who could help you with things if you needed it, and Hank would do just about anything for a carton of cigarettes.
Dr. Stephens sweeps his eyes into the hallway and across the way into the other offices, but they’re empty, too, except for Corinne sitting at the main desk in the reception area. He knows I’m not supposed to be in the room by myself, and he can’t decide if he wants to call me out on it or not. He might be the cutest when he’s conflicted.
I give him another smile. He’s flustered. I’ve never seen him flustered. Not even yesterday when I turned up the heat. This is good. I need him off balance.
“Sit,” I say, pointing to the chair across from me at the table. The one he always sits in every time we meet. The table is the one piece of furniture that they threw into this room as a last-minute effort to try to get it not to look so institutional, but that’s a lost cause. There’s no mistaking the harsh fluorescent lighting and the peeling paint on the concrete walls.
He sets his things down next to the chair and takes his time sinking into it. He loosens his tie. He must’ve come from court or an important appointment. Sometimes I forget he has other clients. A life away from here. I wonder if he’s married. He doesn’t wear a ring, but lots of shrinks don’t, so that doesn’t mean anything. He probably is. Does he talk to his partner over dinner about me? Ask them for advice on how to deal with the complexities of my case? Or does he leave his working life at the office like a good little boy? Tucked away behind these dirty walls and aluminum doors.
Every therapist always promises their clients that they won’t talk about them outside therapy, and we sign confidentiality agreements outlining just that, but nobody abides by those rules. Not any therapist I know anyway. There’s no way to listen to other people’s lives and not process those experiences somewhere else. Sure, we have supervision all the way through school, and there’s always somebody there to talk to on the job, but you watch what you say when the person you’re seeing for therapy has the power to kick you out of the program or fire you. You have to find places where you can talk about your thoughts and feelings without consequences or being judged.
Where does Dr. Stephens go, and what does he say about me? What does he think when nobody’s listening and his thoughts travel unchecked? I spent all last night obsessing about him. He even crept into my dreams, just like Isaac used to do all those months ago before everything got so screwed up. But it’s different with Dr. Stephens. Everything’s going to be different with him. I’ll make sure of it.
“Look, I’m sorry for how snappy I got with you at the end of our time yesterday.” I fill my words and my eyes with deep apology and regret, hoping he can feel how sorry I am. “It must’ve been confusing for me to be so nice to you one minute, then suddenly flip the script and get so short.”
He waves me off with his hand. “Don’t worry about it. It was nothing.”
“Nothing? It certainly wasn’t nothing. There was a whole lot of something between us.” He felt it too. I know he did. I’m glad he’s so quick to forgive my moodiness, though. I reach across the table and brush my fingers across his hands. Electricity surges through me. Instant heat. He pulls away, but only because he feels it, too, quickly folding his hands on his lap underneath the table. He probably doesn’t trust himself either.