Henry Franks(7)

“Do you talk to her when she talks to you?” Dr. Saville asked.

“She has her own friends.” He shook his head. “I have … ”

“You have?” she asked, when he didn’t continue.

“Was going to say my father, but he’s usually MIA, so it’s just me.”

“Do you think you have any friends?”

“I have pictures of friends in the scrapbook he put together. And nightmares. But I don’t recognize anyone from the photographs.”

“Has anyone from the album appeared in a dream?” she asked.

He stared back out the window past the palms to the sliver of the Atlantic visible between the other buildings. The distant horizon shimmered in the haze.

“Mom.”

“She’s the only person you recognize?”

“No.” He shook his head, once more hiding behind his hair.

“Who?”

“The little girl. Calling me Daddy, over and over again.”

“She’s in your scrapbook?” Dr. Saville asked.

“No, but I always think I know her.”

“Do you?”

He shrugged. “Her name’s Elizabeth.”

“Elizabeth?”

“She told me.”

“You asked?”

He smiled. “Why not, it’s my dream.” Then the smile died. “I think.”

“You think?”

“I asked her what my name was.”

“And?”

“She called me Daddy again.”

“That’s progress.”

“I asked her what Mommy called me.”

Dr. Saville’s pen stopped its steady march across the paper and she looked up at him. Her brown hair, lighter in the summer months, was plastered to her scalp and didn’t move with the motion. “‘Mommy’?”

“She started to cry.”

“Did you wake up?” Dr. Saville asked.

“‘Victor,’ Elizabeth said. ‘Mommy called you Victor before she died.’”

Henry pushed himself up so hard that the heavy couch actually moved across the wooden floor. He walked to the window, watching the heat radiating in waves off the white stone pathway beyond the palm tree. The path wandered into the bushes and stopped. It was, he thought, symbolic of something; this meaningless walkway behind a psychologist’s office, boldly going nowhere. Like his life.

“Ready for school?” Dr. Saville asked after too long a silence.

He didn’t look at her. “It’s school.”

“New year, new opportunities.”

“Joy,” he said, hiding his smile from her.

“Your father asked me to speak to you about the future, Henry. You’re a junior now, only two years until college.”

“I know.”

“And?”

“And?” he asked.

“The future?”

“I have enough problems with the past.” Then he laughed, the sound thin and weak.

“Henry,” she said.

“Maybe in the future, I have a daughter.” He looked at her. “I think I’ll call her Elizabeth.”

“That’s not quite what your father meant, but we can talk about that if you’d like.”

“Is this my last session?”

“Do you want it to be?” she asked. “My understanding is you’ll continue to come after school, the way you did last year.”

Henry looked back out the window. “Will it help?”

“I’d like to think so.”

Henry walked back to the couch and sat down, pressing his palms into his thighs. Closed his eyes and counted to ten.

“Did Elizabeth say anything else?” Dr. Saville asked.

He opened his eyes, looking at her through the fall of his hair. “I had to protect her,” he said, his voice harsh. “She’s my daughter.”

“You’re not Victor,” Dr. Saville said, her pen still and silent above the paper.

“I had to.” He rested his head back, exposing his neck. He swallowed and the scar writhed. “I couldn’t let her die like that.”

“Tell me what happened, Henry.”

“I killed her.”

“Who?” she said, the single word barely spoken out loud.

“I killed them all.”

“Henry?”

“Then I woke up.” He smiled. “I killed my mother.”

“What happened to Elizabeth?”

“I held her while she died.”

Discovery of Bodies

Closes Popular Beach Jekyll Island, GA—August 6, 2009: The bodies of two missing boaters washed ashore on Jekyll Island early Wednesday morning. Missing since late Monday night, they were discovered caught in the driftwood by Darius Martin, a local fisherman.

Nancy Woods, of the Jekyll Island Parks Services, said that preliminary information was still being gathered but that their boat, which has yet to be located, might answer further questions.

The two boaters, Crayton Mission, 52, and his nephew Paul Wislon, 24, were reported missing late Saturday night by Wanda Mission, wife of Crayton.

As of this time, foul play is not suspected.