The Sister(26)

The casual way Penny breached Ryan’s confidentiality bothered Mrs Milowski. The two women eyed each other briefly; Penny was about to speak when the door opened and Ryan brought Bruce out. They shook hands. The firmness of the boy’s grip surprised the psychiatrist, crushing his arthritic finger. He winced.





On the way back to the station, she tentatively started a conversation without expecting much in return. She’d grown accustomed to his silences. ‘So, how did it go?’

‘He’s a really nice bloke, Mum. It wasn’t what I thought it would be, although he did try to hypnotise me, and I wasn’t having any of that.’

Mrs Milowski couldn’t hide her surprise. ‘He tried to hypnotise you? He never said he was going to do that.’

‘It doesn’t matter. He tried, but he didn’t.’

She gauged her voice so that it sounded normal; a little scared of what his reaction might be. ‘What did you talk about?’

He frowned; suddenly he couldn’t remember much about the session at all. ‘Not a lot, just...Mum can we leave it for now?’

‘Not a lot…Bruce, you were in there for over two hours! You must have talked about lots of things.’

‘Mum!’ he said firmly. ‘I’ve just had hours of soul-baring or whatever; I can’t remember. Right now I feel drained.’ The crease in his forehead deepened. ‘Although I do remember something...he wanted to know why I threw my seashell to Chris.’

Chris Brookes, one of the dead boys – this was a new development. When she’d realised his shell was missing – he’d treasured it since he was a small boy as if his life depended on it – she’d asked him where it was. He’d flown into a rage. Choosing her words carefully now, she asked, ‘Why did you throw it at him? Did you tell the doctor?’

He gawped at her blankly. ‘I...can’t remember.’

She decided not to press him further.

Once on the train, she checked the consent paperwork she’d signed, and though she couldn’t remember specifically seeing it, there it was. Some treatments may involve the use of hypnotherapy.

If she’d seen that before, she wouldn’t have signed. Hypnotherapy was a form of treatment she frowned on. She didn’t agree with messing with people’s minds. Sitting back in her seat, she smiled. It was the longest talk she’d had with him since the accident.





Chapter 20



By the time they returned to Doctor Ryan’s the following week, Mrs Milowski had realised that despite the initial improvement, the effects of the last visit were just temporary, diminishing progressively with her son returning completely to his post-traumatic sullen self after only four days.

They sat quietly in the waiting room. The green light was on when they'd first arrived. It had just started to irritate her that they'd gone five minutes past their appointment time, when the door opened and the psychiatrist bounded out cheerfully. ‘Mrs Milowski, Bruce. How are we today?’ He made no apology for his lateness.

‘Doctor, please call me Ellen, it’s a lot easier.’

This informal suggestion triggered a scowl from Penny and, seeing it, Ellen suddenly realised the receptionist thought she was flirting, and went red with embarrassment. The more she thought about it, the redder she went. ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said self-consciously. Men often assumed the reason she blushed so hard because she was attracted to them. Most of the time it wasn’t true, and certainly not in Ryan’s case.

He reassured her with a sympathetic smile. ‘You know Ellen, there are treatments available for that.’

The heat generated by her blushing formed a slight sheen of perspiration that glossed her skin. ‘We’ll get my son sorted out first, then perhaps...’ She fanned air towards her face with magazine in a futile effort to cool it. Bruce glanced at her with irritation. He knew she’d never sort it out, opting out with a comment like, 'I find it too embarrassing', as she always did.

He gestured for the boy to follow him. ‘Shall we begin?’

They disappeared through the door, and it closed behind them. A few seconds later, the red indicator bulb illuminated.

Mrs Milowski felt Penny’s eyes boring into the back of her head as she walked out of the room.





The doctor walked to the window and opened the Venetian blinds; the light coming through the horizontal slats projected across the room onto the opposite wall, recreating the image, distilled into alternate grey and white bars. When he returned to his seat, Bruce had switched places, sitting in the chair his mother had occupied last week. From there, he could see the books on the shelves better. He narrowed his eyes to focus, but could make out only the larger titles printed down the spines: Strategies of Representation in Young Children, Children’s Drawings, Foetus Into Man. Below, piles of old Nature magazines stacked on top of a range of sliding glass-fronted cabinets that were filled with similar reading.

‘Have you really read all those?’ he said, indicating the bookshelves.

Ryan revolved around on his chair to look at them and then spun back to face his patient. ‘No,’ he chuckled. ‘But they look pretty impressive don’t they?’ His glasses had slipped to the end of his nose, and he pushed them back up. Almost immediately, they slid down again.